Professor Stephen Barber

About

I have been a Research Professor in Art History in the School of Art faculty at Kingston University, and Co-Director of the Visual and Material Culture Research Centre, since 2012. I previously held research positions at the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles, the University of Tokyo and Tokyo Keio University, the IMEC Research Institute in Paris, the Berlin Free University and the Berlin University of the Arts.

My research has been funded by a wide range of research councils and foundations, including the AHRC, the German Ministry for Research and Education, the Gerda Henkel Foundation, the Japan Foundation, the Getty Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Leverhulme Trust, and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art. My research is focused on urban cultures and their relationship to art and moving-image forms.

I have published many books in my areas of research, most recently 'Berlin Bodies: Anatomising the Streets of the City' (2017), 'Film's Ghosts: Tatsumi Hijikata and the Transmutation of 1960s Japan' (2019) and 'The Projectionists: Eadweard Muybridge and the Future Projections of the Moving Image' (2020). In 2022, a book of my translations of Antonin Artaud's final writings, 'A Sinister Assassin', will be published. I am now developing a new research project, 'Into the Wastelands', spanning art, film and urban topographies, on the subject of the future of urban wastelands.

I have presented my research at such venues as the Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Royal Academy, the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, the Japan Society in New York, the Mori Museum in Tokyo, and the Rockefeller Center in Bellagio.

In June 2020, David Peace wrote about my books in the Times Literary Supplement: ‘Beginning in 1993 with Artaud: Blows and Bombs, Stephen Barber has quietly, independently forged one of the most singular and enriching bodies of work in contemporary writing.'

Academic responsibilities

Research Professor in Art History

Qualifications

  • BA (Hons)
  • PhD

Research

Research student supervision

Main supervision

Other supervision

Publications

Number of items: 47.

Article

Barber, Stephen (2017) A War of Fragments : J.G. Ballard's World Versus America. Diaphanes: Art, Fiction, Discourse, ISSN (print) 2504-2017

Barber, Stephen (2017) Corporeal Disintegration as Last Gasp Vocal Act: the Final Works, of Murobushi, Artaud and Chereau. New Theatre Quarterly, 33(2), pp. 169-178. ISSN (print) 0266-464X

Barber, Stephen (2010) The Skladanowsky Brothers: the Devil knows. Senses of Cinema(56), ISSN (online) 1443-4059

Barber, Stephen (2010) Coma: the art of unconsciousness. Mute,

Barber, Stephen (2009) Vers la zone. Europe: revue litteraire mensuelle(961), pp. 160-173. ISSN (print) 0014-2751

Barber, Stephen (2009) Genealogies of film's ruination. Vertigo, 4(2), p. 30. ISSN (print) 0968-7904

Barber, Stephen (2008) Pasolini and Sade: a maleficient obsession. Vertigo, 4(1), pp. 50-51. ISSN (print) 0968-7904

Barber, Stephen (2008) The last words of Antonin Artaud: on the cinematic dimension of the envisioned final notebooks. Vertigo, 3(8), pp. 10-11. ISSN (print) 0968-7904

Book

Barber, Stephen (2020) The projectionists : Eadweard Muybridge and the future projections of the moving image. Chicago, U.S. : University of Chicago Press. 208p. ISBN 9783035802894

Barber, Stephen (2019) Film's ghosts : Tatsumi Hijikata's Butoh and the transmutation of 1960s Japan. Zurich, Switzerland : Diaphanes. 248p. ISBN 9783035801477

Artaud, Antonin and Barber, Stephen [Editor] (2019) Artaud 1937 Apocalypse. Zurich, Switzerland : Diaphanes. 80p. ISBN 9783035801538

Barber, Stephen and Gough, Richard, eds. (2018) On disfiguration. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. 118p. (Performance Research, (23(8))) ISSN (online) 1352-8165

Barber, Stephen (2017) Berlin bodies : anatomizing the streets of the city. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 280p. ISBN 9781780237206

Barber, Stephen (2016) Pierre Guyotat : revolutions and aberrations. London, U.K. : Vauxhall & Company. 74p. ISBN 9780992835521

Barber, Stephen (2014) Performance projections : film and the body in action. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 256p. ISBN 9781780233697

Barber, Stephen, ed. (2013) Pasolini : the massacre game : terminal film, text, words 1974-75. New York, U.S. : Sun Vision Press. 96p. ISBN 9780985762506

Barber, Stephen (2012) Muybridge, the eye in motion: tracing cinema's origins. Washington, D.C., U.S. : Solar Books. 200p. (Solar Film Directives) ISBN 9780983248057

Barber, Stephen (2011) The walls of Berlin: urban surfaces: art: film. Chicago, U.S. : Solar Books. 189p. ISBN 9780982046463

Barber, Stephen (2010) Abandoned images: film and film's end. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 189p. ISBN 9781861896452

Barber, Stephen (2010) Hijikata: revolt of the body. Chicago, U.S. : Solar Books. 144p. ISBN 9780982046432

Barber, Stephen (2008) Artaud: terminal curses: the notebooks 1945-48. Chicago, U.S. : Solar Books. 152p. ISBN 9780979984761

Cunningham, Gail and Barber, Stephen, eds. (2007) London eyes: reflections in text and image. New York, U.S. : Berghahn Books. 228p. (Polygons: Cultural Diversities and Intersections, (13)) ISBN 9781845454074

Barber, Stephen (2006) The vanishing map: a journey from LA to Tokyo to the heart of Europe. Oxford, UK : Berg Publishers. 160p. ISBN 9781845205102

Barber, Stephen (2006) Caligula: divine carnage. Chicago, U.S. : Solar Books. 156p. ISBN 9780971457812

Barber, Stephen (2004) Jean Genet. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 160p. (Critical lives) ISBN 1861891784

Barber, Stephen (2004) The art of destruction: the films of the Vienna action group. London, U.K. : Creation Books. 148p. (Persistence of vision, 5) ISBN 1840680970

Barber, Stephen (2002) Projected cities. London, UK : Reaktion Books. 208p. (Locations) ISBN 186189127X

Barber, Stephen (2001) Extreme Europe. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 128p. (Topographics) ISBN 1861890915

Barber, Stephen (2001) Tokyo vertigo. London, U.K. : Creation Books. 147p. ISBN 1840680369

Barber, Stephen (2000) Edmund White: the burning world : a biography. London, U.K. : Picador. 310p. ISBN 0330376535

Barber, Stephen (1999) Artaud: the screaming body. London, U.K. : Creation Books. 126p. ISBN 9781840680096

Barber, Stephen (1996) Weapons of liberation. London, U.K. : Faber & Faber Ltd. 128p. ISBN 9780571172771

Barber, Stephen (1995) Fragments of the European city. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. 107p. (Topographics) ISBN 0948462663

Book Section

Barber, Stephen (2022) Hijikata Tatsumi at the Osaka World Exposition's Pepsi Pavilion, 1970. Multiple Historiographies of a Lost Performance. In: Fisher-Lichte, Erika , Sugiera, Małgorzata , Jost, Torsten , Hartung, Holger and Soltani, Omid, (eds.) Entangled performance histories : New approaches to theater historiography. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. pp. 106-124. (Routledge Advances in Theatre and Performance Studies) ISBN 9781032405131

Barber, Stephen (2017) Lovers: corporeal projections and ocular demands. In: Eckersall, Peter , Scheer, Edward and Shintarō, Fujii, (eds.) The Dumb Type reader. Copenhagen, Denmark : Museum Tusculanum Press. pp. 191-202. (In between states) ISBN 9788763544931

Barber, Stephen (2014) Cinemas' Sonic Residues. In: Gandy, Matthew and Nilsen, BJ, (eds.) The Acoustic City. Berlin, Germany : Jovis. pp. 138-144. ISBN 9783868592719

Barber, Stephen (2011) Traces and surfaces. In: Gandy, Matthew, (ed.) Urban constellations. Berlin, Germany : JOVIS Verlag. pp. 174-177. ISBN 9783868591187

Barber, Stephen (2011) The films of the Skladanowsky Brothers. In: Langford, Michelle, (ed.) Germany. Bristol, U.K. : Intellect. (Directory of World Cinema) ISBN 9781841504650

Barber, Stephen (2010) August Walla: Devil/God, image/text. In: Hunt, John Dixon , Lomas, David and Corris, Michael, (eds.) Art, word and image: two thousand years of visual/textual interaction. London, U.K. : Reaktion Books. pp. 317-328. ISBN 9781861895202

Barber, Stephen (2010) The films of the Vienna Action Group. In: Weiner, Robert G. and Cline, John, (eds.) Cinema inferno: celluloid explosions from the cultural margins. Plymouth, U.K. : Scarecrow Press. pp. 217-225. ISBN 9780810876569

Barber, Stephen (2007) Introduction: Part II: The modern age: London in image. In: Cunningham, Gail and Barber, Stephen, (eds.) London eyes: reflections in text and image. New York, U.S. : Berghahn Books. pp. 119-121. (Polygons : cultural diversities and intersections, (13)) ISBN 9781845454074

Barber, Stephen (2007) An indescribable blur: film and London. In: Cunningham, Gail and Barber, Stephen, (eds.) London eyes: reflections in text and image. New York, USA : Berghahn Books. pp. 123-134. (Polygons : cultural diversities and intersections, (13)) ISBN 9781845454074

Barber, Stephen K. (1999) La matiere de lecriture: sur Pierre Guyotat. In: Forest, P and Sollers, Philippe, (eds.) De Tel quel a L'infini: L'avant-garde et apres : colloques de Londres et de Paris, mars 1995. France : Pleins Feux. pp. 123-135. ISBN 9782912567611

Conference or Workshop Item

Kim, Seoyoung and Barber, Stephen (2022) Coming home : Eadweard Muybridge's return to Kingston. In: Artist's Homes in Kingston : Gordine and Muybridge; 10 Jun 2022, Held online. (Unpublished)

Barber, Stephen (2018) 'Thatcher's tomb' : a talk and reading. In: Loving, Kingston Writers' Centre; 11 Jan 2018, Kingston Upon Thames, U.K..

Barber, Stephen and Lloyd, Fran (2014) Challenging the frames of performance: memory, trauma and activism in the multimedia and interdisciplinary performance practices of dumb type in 1990's Japan. In: Trauma and Utopia: Interactions in Post-War and Contemporary Art in Asia; 09-10 Oct 2014, Tokyo, Japan. (Unpublished)

Barber, Stephen [Speaker], Davies, Rachel [Speaker], Horrocks, Chris [Speaker], Mancke, Carol [Speaker] and Maude-Roxby, Alice [Speaker] (2009) The art of intervention: Kingston University responses: Japanese mob. In: The art of intervention: critical perspectives on the intersections of private and public memory; 14 Feb 2009, Kingston upon Thames, U.K.. (Unpublished)

This list was generated on Tue Apr 23 06:58:06 2024 BST.