Jeffrey Shaw: A User's Manual / Eine Gebrauchsanweisung

Moving from the »Expanded Cinema« of the 1960s to the »Cyber Art« of the present decade, this monographic panorama of Jeffrey Shaw's work shows an electronic artistry in which technology is deployed without fetishism, and art never turns into propaganda. Shaw's œuvre reveals itself as a test of the creative possibilities of technology and, in equal measure, the viewer's adaptability and powers of discernment Ultimately, the book too is a test, since- insofar as the printed ward and fixed images claim the final say- it »classicalizes« media art. But this point is sure to be a source of particular amusement to Shaw, who plays masterly with the old but ever-fresh visual and spatial motifs of Mannerist and Baroque styles, and his enjoyment will be shared by the reader. 

Horst Bredekamp