Iconoclasm, Identity Politics and the Erasure of History

Iconoclasm, Identity Politics and the Erasure of History surveys the origins, uses and manifestations of iconoclasm in history, art and public culture. It examines the various causes and uses of image/property defacement as a tool of political, national, religious and artistic process. This is one of the first books to examine the outbreak of iconoclasm in Europe and North America in the summer of 2020 in the context of previous outbreaks, and it examines the implications of iconoclasm as a form of control, censorship and expression.

Alexander Adams is a British artist and writer. He studied fine art and history of art at Goldsmiths College, London. His art has been exhibited worldwide and is in the collections of the Victoria & Albert Museum (London), National Museum (Cardiff), Walker Art Gallery (Liverpool) and other museums. His art criticism has been published in The Burlington Magazine, The Art Newspaper, Sculpture Journal, The Jackdaw, The British Art Journal, Apollo, Printmaking Today, Print Quarterly and other outlets. His poetry has been published in anthologies, broadsides and single-author volumes in the UK and USA. He was artist-in-residence at the Albers Foundation, Connecticut, in 2011. Alexander Adams is the recipient of the 2018 Artist Scholarship from the Francis Bacon MB Art Foundation, Monaco. He lives in England.

Dr. Frank Furedi is an emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent in Canterbury and Senior Research Fellow at the Twenty-First Century Institute in Budapest, Visiting Professor, UCL Institute For Risk And Disaster Reduction. His latest book is Why Borders Matter: Why Humanity Must Relearn The Art of Drawing Lines.