BOOK: Exotic-Phaidon Publications

What is truly exotic when Moroccan earthenware, Persian carpets, African masks, Chinese Buddhas and Indian deities are all available from Ikea and Amazon – and deliverable the same day? A world in which every home heaves with all this stuff and where what was once so alien and exciting is now – for better or worse – commonplace and ‘culturally appropriated’ in art and fashion and design and architecture and cuisine, and routinely served up with lager and chips and a side salad. “Exotic” by Phaidon Publications explores our obsession with the lure of distant lands and their promise of the weird and wonderful, the beautiful and grotesque. Through a host of evocative images, this book shows how the absorption of ‘the foreign,’ through arts, design, architecture, and other cultural elements, has consistently enriched Western society, contributing to it cultural dynamism and artistic energy. Exotic’s focus is especially relevant to the modern globalized world in which our engagement with cultures and traditions from around the globe is easier – and potentially more fraught – than ever before. This book is a fascinating survey of the enduring human love affair with the exotic and the strange, and its impact on Western culture.-Efi Michalarou