David J. Getsy is Goldabelle McComb Finn Distinguished Chair in Art History and Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

“Far too often the seriousness of high art has been invoked at the expense of compelling art’s sheer gratuitousness, irrepressible impertinence, and spontaneous playfulness. A welcome and particularly bracing overturning of this staid approach is David J. Getsy’s From Diversion to Subversion, a collection of lucid essays by established and emerging scholars, which focuses insightfully on the oxymoronic turns of serious humor, games played in earnest, and ludic research.”—Robert Hobbs, Virginia Commonwealth University

• ContentsList of IllustrationsIntroductionDavid J. GetsyPart I: Games and Play in Twentieth-Century Art HistoryFrom Judgment to Process: The Modern Ludic FieldSusan LaxtonThe Duchamp CodeGavin ParkinsonMy Utopia: Play in Bauhaus PhotographyKevin MooreSerious Play: Games and Early Twentieth-Century ModernismClaudia MeschSurrealist Gaming: Rules and the RestMary Ann CawsPlaying in the Sand with Picasso: Relief Sculpture as Game in the Summer of 1930David J. GetsyJoseph Cornell’s Dangerous GamesStephanie L. TaylorPlaying with Dada: Hannah Wilke’s Irreverent Artistic Discourse with DuchampDebra WacksDick Higgins, Fluxus, and Infinite Play: An “Amodernist” WorldviewOwen F. Smith1Subversive Toys: The Art of Liliana PorterFlorencia Bazzano-NelsonPart II: Contemporary Artists’ Views on Play and Games in New Media and Public PracticesDissolving the Magic Circle of Play: Lessons from Situationist GamingAnne-Marie SchleinerRunning and Gunning in the Gallery: Art Mods, Art Institutions, and the Artists Who Destroy ThemJon CatesCoda: Distinguishing Art from PlayZigzagging with Full Stops from Play to ArtEllen Handler SpitzList of ContributorsIndex