List of illustrations p. ix
Preface p. xi
Acknowledgements p. xiii
Introduction p. 1
In search of a civic aesthetics p. 1
Between critique and complicity p. 5
Showing seeing: the critical image p. 9
1 Can(n)ons of Israeli society p. 13
Frames and set-ups p. 13
Soldier figures, civilian militarism and Israeli art p. 17
Taking sides: exhibitions as framing agents p. 21
Visual performatives p. 25
Critical frictions p. 28
2 Bodies of the nation: eroticized soldiers p. 35
Serial quotations p. 37
National bodies p. 45
Rewriting the Jewish body, again p. 49
Women soldiers p. 52
Queer dreams of the nation p. 57
3 Looking through landscape p. 65
The landscape way of seeing p. 67
Tracing erasure: tso ob''ä and Zionist scopic regimes p. 71
The ''stifling of the gaze'' p. 76
Israeli mindscapes p. 82
4 Kebab in theory: mapping vision p. 91
Zooming in on the thinking image p. 91
Contesting mis/interpretations p. 94
The archaeology of the still life: bringing back the anti-image p. 97
Distortion and desire: the mapping impulse p. 100
Seeing green: shaping emplacement p. 104
5 Greetings to the soldier-citizen: consuming nostalgia p. 109
Peace, security and sparkles p. 112
From guns to cream cheese p. 118
The politics of nostalgia p. 120
Preposterous postcards p. 122
The limits of critical discourse p. 127
6 Fence art: re/framing politics p. 135
Bil''in and beyond: aesthetics of disagreement p. 135
Redistributing visibility p. 139
Changing contexts, shifting frames p. 148
Conclusion: the work, the world and the critical image p. 163
Notes p. 169
References p. 195
Index p. 219