Skip to main content

Distributed for Reaktion Books

Beyond Vision

Essays on the Perception of Art

Distributed for Reaktion Books

Beyond Vision

Essays on the Perception of Art

Beyond Vision is the first English-language collection of essays on art by Pavel Florensky (1882–1937), Russian philosopher, priest, linguist, scientist, mathematician – and art historian. In addition to seven essays by Florensky, the book includes a biographical introduction and an examination of Florensky’s contribution as an art historian by Nicoletta Misler. Beyond Vision reveals Florensky’s fundamental attitudes to the vital questions of construction, composition, chronology, function and destination in the fields of painting, sculpture and design. His reputation as a theologian and philosopher is already established in the English-speaking world, but this first collection in English of his art essays (translated by Wendy Salmond) will be a revelation to those in the field.

Pavel Florensky was a true polymath: trained in mathematics and philosophy at Moscow University, he rejected a scholarship in advanced mathematics in order to study theology at the Moscow Theological Academy. He was also an expert linguist, scientist and art historian. A victim of the Soviet government’s animosity towards religion, he was condemned to a Siberian labor camp in 1933 where he continued his work under increasingly difficult circumstances. He was executed in 1937.

Distribution by the University of Chicago Press only to customers in the USA and Canada. Customers elsewhere should visit the UK website of Reaktion Books.


256 pages | 5.75 x 8.75

Art: Art--Biography


Reaktion Books image

View all books from Reaktion Books

Be the first to know

Get the latest updates on new releases, special offers, and media highlights when you subscribe to our email lists!

Sign up here for updates about the Press