G. Roger Denson brings singular insight to Thomas McEvilley's writings. As an art writer he has explored similar territory, but from the point of view of a nomadic ideologist. His approach matches that of his subject. He addresses the issues of pragmatism, historicism, and cultural relativism. In so doing, he effectively dismantles the need to establish a master narrative. The contrast and agreement between these two writers constitutes a mapping of the terrain of contemporary culture. What sets Thomas McEvilley apart from other critics in art and culture is his direct knowledge of the newest art and theory, and his comprehensive understanding of classic art and ancient civilizations. It is rare to find a writer equally fluent in the production of modernist aesthetics, the anti-aesthetics of post-modernism, T'ang Dynasty Taoist painting, the doctrines of the Tantra, Platonic mysticism, and Aristotelian logic. This vast knowledge has enabled him to produce some of the best-conceived and eccentric

Part One History As Context: Expanding Modernist Form; Chapter 1 Heads It's Form, Tails It's Not Content; Chapter 2 Seeking the Primal Through Paint: The Monochrome Icon; Part Two The World and Its Difference; Chapter 3 Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief: Primitivism in Twentieth-Century Art at the Museum of Modern Art; Chapter 4 History, Quality, Globalism; Chapter 5 Arrivederci Venice: The Third World Biennials; Part Three The Self and Subjectivity; Chapter 6 I Am, Is a Vain Thought; Chapter 7 Penelope's Night Work: Negative Thinking In Greek Philosophy; Chapter 8 Empyrrhical Thinking, and why kant can't; Part Four Reincarnations and Visitations: Modernism and Postmodernism All Over Again; Chapter 9 From On The Manner of Addressing Clouds;