Simon Shaw-Miller is Chair of History of Art, University of Bristol, UK. He is an Honorary Associate and Research Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Shaw-Miller’s brilliant new volume is a virtuosic critical riff on improvisation as aesthetic principle and artistic practice. Productively entwining histories of jazz and abstraction in 20th-century visual art, this text is a revelatory account of modernism at its most playful and creative.

• Introduction & Theoretical Preliminaries: Art, Abstraction and All That Jazz1. The Sight and Sound of Nascent Jazz: Words, Definitions & Rags2. Orphism and a New Tune I: Dance, Music, Painting3. Orphism and a New Tune II: Words, Music, Image4. Orphism in America: Art, Machines and Jazz Rhythm5. Objects, Improvisation and Rhythm: Kandinsky, Duchamp and Beyond

Simon Shaw-Miller is Chair of History of Art, University of Bristol, UK. He is an Honorary Associate and Research Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Shaw-Miller’s brilliant new volume is a virtuosic critical riff on improvisation as aesthetic principle and artistic practice. Productively entwining histories of jazz and abstraction in 20th-century visual art, this text is a revelatory account of modernism at its most playful and creative.

• Introduction & Theoretical Preliminaries: Art, Abstraction and All That Jazz1. The Sight and Sound of Nascent Jazz: Words, Definitions & Rags2. Orphism and a New Tune I: Dance, Music, Painting3. Orphism and a New Tune II: Words, Music, Image4. Orphism in America: Art, Machines and Jazz Rhythm5. Objects, Improvisation and Rhythm: Kandinsky, Duchamp and Beyond

Simon Shaw-Miller is Chair of History of Art, University of Bristol, UK. He is an Honorary Associate and Research Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Shaw-Miller’s brilliant new volume is a virtuosic critical riff on improvisation as aesthetic principle and artistic practice. Productively entwining histories of jazz and abstraction in 20th-century visual art, this text is a revelatory account of modernism at its most playful and creative.

• Introduction & Theoretical Preliminaries: Art, Abstraction and All That Jazz1. The Sight and Sound of Nascent Jazz: Words, Definitions & Rags2. Orphism and a New Tune I: Dance, Music, Painting3. Orphism and a New Tune II: Words, Music, Image4. Orphism in America: Art, Machines and Jazz Rhythm5. Objects, Improvisation and Rhythm: Kandinsky, Duchamp and Beyond