“a compendium of texts and artworks on the themes of time, ruptures in history, and Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Metaphysical aesthetics’”

Edited by Simon Moretti and Craig Burnett, the publication of Revolt of the Sage acts as an extension of the exhibition, featuring a compendium of texts and artworks that serve to expand the show’s themes of time, ruptures in history, and Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Metaphysical aesthetics’.

Reproductions of pictures by historical artists Alfred Böcklin and Nicolas Poussin complement the artists, with images of work both from the show and exclusively in the book, extending the exhibition into the space of the publication. Poems and texts by Guillaume Apollinaire, John Ashbery, William Blake, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Giorgio de Chirico, Lydia Davis, Emily Dickinson, John Donne, A.W. Moore, Carol Rumens, Wallace Stevens and Alfred, Lord Tennyson contribute to the conversation about, in de Chirico’s words, ‘the great curve of eternity’.

The book also features a newly commissioned text on de Chirico’s painting The Revolt of the Sage (1916) by art historian Ara H. Merjian, as well as a lively, wide-ranging dialogue between Merjian and philosopher Jesse Prinz on de Chirico’s relevance to contemporary artists.