Anthony is currently researching two volumes, Zones of Indistinction: Contemporary Art and the Cultural Logic of Late Modernity (forthcoming, Sternberg Press, 2018) and Unbearable States: New Media, Performativity and Contemporary Art Practices in the Middle East (forthcoming, 2019). He is the Founding Editor and Editor-in-Chief of Ibraaz; an Editor at Third Text; and a consultant editor for the Open Arts Journal, published by the Open University.
Anthony will be supervising students with a research interest in Contemporary Art and the Politics of Cultural Production in the Maghreb, the Middle East and Global South; Neoliberalism, Globalisation, and Cultural Institutions; Human Rights, Bio-politics, and Migration in Contemporary Art Practices; and New media, Performativity and Civil Society in the Middle East.
Books
- Zones of Indistinction: Contemporary Art and the Logic of Late Capitalism (forthcoming, Sternberg Press, forthcomimg, 2018)
- Don’t Shrink Me to the Size of a Bullet: The Works of Hiwa K (Walter Koenig Books, 2017)
- Future Imperfect: Cultural Institutions and Contemporary Art Practices in the Middle East (Sternberg Press, 2016)
- Dissonant Archives: Contemporary Visual Culture and Contested Narratives in the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2015)
- Mirrors for Princes: Slavs and Tatars(JRP Ringier and NYU Press, 2015)
- Art and Politics Now (Thames and Hudson, 2014)
- Uncommon Grounds: New Media and Critical Practice in North Africa and the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2014)
Selected Chapters in Books
- “A New Piety: Episode III and the Ethics of Ethical Art Criticism”, in Episode III: Enjoy Poverty: Receptions, edited by Els Roelandt, Sternberg Press, 2017, pp. tbc.
- “Exemplary Subjects: Camps and the Politics of Representation”, in Giorgio Agamben: Legal, Political and Philosophical Perspectives. Ed. Tom Frost. Oxon, UK: Routledge, 2013. 119-42.
- “Zones of Indistinction: Giorgio Agamben's 'Bare Life' and the Politics of Aesthetics”, in Theory in Contemporary Art Since 1985. Eds. Zoya Kocur and Simon Leung. 2nd ed. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. 416-35.
- “Zu Giorgio Agamben: Das Nackte Leben' Und Die Politik Der Asthetik”, in Open Space: Schnittpunkte Aktueller Kunstpraxis. Ed. Gulsen Bal. Vienna: Divus, 2010. 64-79.
- “The Production of Cultural Knowledge in the Middle East Today”, in Art & Patronage in the Middle East. Eds. Hossein Amirsadeghi and Maryam Homayoun. Eisler. London: Thames & Hudson, 2010. 10-15.
- “127 Cuerpos: Teresa Margolles and the Aesthetics of Commemoration”, in Understanding Art Objects: Thinking through the Eye. Farnham: Lund Humphries, 2009. 104-13.
- “An Ethics of Engagement: Collaborative Art Practices and the Return of the Ethnographer”, in Third Text 23.5, 2009. 593-603.
- “Towards a Politics of (Relational) Aesthetics”, in Third Text 3rd. 21.3, 2007: 267-75.
- “Critical Imperatives: Notes on Contemporary Art Criticism and African Cultural Production"”, in Wasafiri 21.1, 2006. 39-48.
- “Yinka Shonibare in conversation with Anthony Downey”, in BOMB 93, Fall 2005.
- “Curating Africa: ‘Africa Remix’ and the Categorical Dilemma”, in Wasafiri 45.2, 2005. 47-55.
- “The Spectacular Difference of Documenta 11”, in Third Text 17.1, 2003. 85-92.
To download copies of Professor Downey's essays and books, please see his website.
