Dr. Trevor Stark
Positions
Associate Professor
Undergraduate Program Director
Contact information
Background
Educational Background
PhD History of Art and Architecture, Harvard University, 2016
A.M. History of Art and Architecture , Harvard University, 2012
M.A. Art History & Communication Studies, McGill University, 2009
B.A. Hons Art History and Arts & Science Program, McMaster University, 2006
Biography
Trevor Stark is Associate Professor of Art History and Undergraduate Program Director in the Department of Art and Art History. He completed his PhD in the Department of History of Art and Architecture at Harvard University (2016). His teaching and research focuses on the emergence and development of the “avant-garde” in twentieth-century art, as a social formation and an aesthetic ideology.
His book titled Total Expansion of the Letter: Avant-Garde Art and Language after Mallarmé was published in 2020 by the MIT Press, as part of the October Books series (https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/total-expansion-letter). It is a study of how language became both a visual medium and a metaphorical structure for certain artists of the European avant-gardes, from cubism to Dada. Stark traces the genealogy of this first “linguistic turn” to the poetics of Stéphane Mallarmé, who developed a critique of instrumental communication that was devoted to the contingency of the word and the world.
Download a PDF of the Introduction to Total Expansion of the Letter: Avant-Garde Art and Language.
Stark’s research has been supported by fellowships from Columbia University, the Leonard A. Lauder Research Center for Modern Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harvard University, and the Calgary Institute for the Humanities. His writing has appeared in journals including Critical Inquiry, Art History, October, Texte zur Kunst, and The Burlington Magazine. Stark was co-chair with Rachel Silveri of two panels on “Avant-Gardes and Varieties of Fascism” at the 2016 College Art Association Conference. Stark is also the co-editor with Rachel Silveri of the second issue of Selva: A Journal of the History of Art devoted to "Reactionary Art Histories," for which they co-authored two essays.
Stark is currently at work on two books: the first, tentatively titled "Weak Politics: Marcel Broodthaers between Poetry and Reification," is a study of the relationship between the history of modern poetry and the critique of capitalism in the art of Marcel Broodthaers. The second, supported by a SSHRC Insight Development Grant and titled "The Treason of the Clerks: Dada Rationalization," is a study of Dada’s relation to the norms and forms of social rationalization, including the rise of finance capital and of administrative bureaucracy.
The shifting relationship between poetry, music, and the visual arts in avant-garde traditions is an abiding research focus. Articles are underway on topics including the legacies of serialism and Fascism in the cinema of Danièle Huillet and Jean-Marie Straub; visual and sound poetry in Canada during the 1970s; James Ensor; the pursuit of musical deskilling in the scores of Cornelius Cardew and the Scratch Orchestra; and the status of the readymade in contemporary music.
Courses
| Course number | Course title | Semester |
|---|---|---|
| ARHI 51122 LEC 01 01 | Capstone in the History of Art | 2020 |
| ART 609 LEC 01 01 | Art Theory and Criticism | 2020 |
| ARHI 331 LEC 01 01 | Modern Art and Architecture | 2021 |
Publications
- The Reification of the World: Poetry and Conquest in Marcel Broodthaers’s Maps. Critical Inquiry, v. 50, n. 3. 517–542. (2024)
- “Broodthaers’ Debt". October, N. 185. 84-98. (2023)
- “Artforum and the Art World’s ‘Palestine Exception'". Jadaliyya. (2023)
- Marcel Duchamp, the Gambler. The MIT Press Reader. (2023)
- Lawrence Weiner's Materialism. October, N. 180. 105–120. (2022)
- Reactionary Art Histories. Trevor Stark and Rachel Silveri. Selva: A Journal of the History of Art. (2020)
- “The Chaos of Total Decay”: Sedlmayr’s Diagnosis. Trevor Stark and Rachel Silveri. Selva: A Journal of the History of Art. (2020)
- Anonymity and Doubt: Reading Picasso's Papiers Collés with Mallarmé. Art History, v. 41, n. 1. 104-131. (2018)
- The Moment of Marcel Broodthaers?: A Conversation. Manuel Borja-Villel, Benjamin H. D. Buchloh, Christophe Cherix, Rachel Haidu, Rosalind Krauss, Trevor Stark. October, N. 155 (2016) . 111–150. (2016)
- Spectacle, Communication, and the End of Art. Esse: arts + opinions, n. 82 (2014). (2014)
- Complexio Oppositorum: Hugo Ball and Carl Schmitt. October, N. 146. 31–64. (2013)
- ‘Cinema in the Hands of the People’: Chris Marker, the Medvedkin Group, and the Potential of Militant Film. October, N. 139. 117–150. (2012)
- Total Expansion of the Letter: Avant-Garde Art and Language After Mallarmé . Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2020.. (2020)
- “Passionate Expanse of the Law: Intermedia and the Problem of Discipline". Call it Something Else: Something Else Press, Inc. 1963-1974 (Madrid: Museo Reina Sofia). 48-61. (2023)
- “The Treason of the Clerks: Accounting for Paris Dada Paperwork". Historic Avant-Garde Work on Paper (London, Routledge). 209-223. (2024)
- “Picasso’s Hinge: Structure and Mobility in Cubist Drawing”. "Pablo Picasso: New Collection," Museo Picasso Málaga. 23-Feb. (2017)
- 12 short essays . "Pablo Picasso: New Collection," Museo Picasso Málaga. 50-51, 66-67, 76-77, 84-85, 94-95, 100-101, 106-107, 110-111, 122-123, 128-129, 132-133, 138-139. (2017)
- This Will Have Been: Art, Love, & Politics in the 1980s Ed. Helen Molesworth. London & New Haven: Yale University Press. 19 essays. (2012)
- Reactionary Art Histories (co-edited special issue of journal). Trevor Stark and Rachel Silveri. Selva: A Journal of the History of Art. (2020)
- Review of Sebastian Egenhofer, "Towards an Aesthetics of Production". CAA.reviews. (2019)
- Review of "Francis Picabia Catalogue Raisonné," Edited by Beverley Calté, William A. Camfield, Candace Clements and Arnauld Pierre. The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 161, No. 1398 (Sept. 2019). (2019)
- Review of "Francis Picabia: Our Heads are Round so Our Thoughts Can Change Direction,". The Burlington Magazine, N. 1370. (2017)
- Review "MARCEL BROODTHAERS, ART HISTORIAN’S ARTIST / Trevor Stark on Marcel Broodthaers at the Museum of Modern Art, New York" . Texte Zur Kunst, N. 103. 227-231. (2016)
- Review: “Picasso: The Making of Cubism, 1912-14. New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2014”. CAA.reviews. (2016)
- Review: “All the World’s Futures at the 2015 Venice Biennale” . African Arts V. 49, N. 3. 86–87. (2016)
In the News
- Video panel on "Revolution, Liberation and Change through Public Art" BUMP Festival, August 8, 2024. (2024)
- MIT Press Reader: "Marcel Duchamp, the Gambler". The MIT Press Reader. (2023)
- “Reification and Worldview in Marcel Broodthaers’ Maps”. New Views of Modernism Conference.
- "Marcel Broothaers, Between Poetry and Reification". The Naomi Lacey Memorial Lecture at the Calgary Institute for the Humanities.
- Deborah Lewer, Review of "Total Expansion of the Letter: Avant-Garde Art and Language After Mallarmé". CAA.reviews.
- "Artsci Grad Trevor Stark Explores the Avant-Garde in “Total Expansion of the Letter”". McMaster University.
- Video Interview on Hugo Ball (with Debbie Lewer). Tabakalera website. (2019)
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