• The Atomic Kid: An Aesthetic Formed in the Nuclear Landscape: James Stanford Book Cover
  • The Atomic Kid Pages 6 and 7
  • Page 9, Rob McCoy, Atomic Museum
  • Page 15, The Atomic Kid, James Stanford
  • Pages 20 and 21
  • The Fractured Earth and Sky, Rosa JH Berland
  • Pages 56 and 57
  • Playing Hide and Seek with the Gamma Ray Source, Gemma Marmalade
  • Pages 80 and 81
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THE ATOMIC KID: AN AESTHETIC FORMED IN THE NUCLEAR LANDSCAPE: JAMES STANFORD

THE ATOMIC KID: AN AESTHETIC FORMED IN THE NUCLEAR LANDSCAPE: JAMES STANFORD

Edited by Jane Boyer and Gemma Marmalade

$65.00 USD
$65.00 USD
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It may seem a strange notion to consider the impact of a nuclear bomb in anything other than scientific, political, or moral terms. However, growing up with nuclear testing just outside the city limits of your hometown as a visible and sensory experience on the near horizon raises conundrums of value, entertainment, banality, and even of formal beauty. In short, it raises a paradox of aesthetics. Seminal Las Vegas artist and native, James Stanford, has taken up the challenge of this paradox with The Atomic Kid. Following his popular Shimmering Zen monograph, The Atomic Kid explores the existential condition of growing up in the nuclear landscape of Las Vegas and the impact it has had on the development of his visual aesthetic.

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  • PAPERBACK

    ISBN: 9781733857475
    11.8 x 11.8 inches | 300 x 300 mm
    96 pages
    $65 | €60 | £55
    Publication date: October 2, 2024 United States
    February 3, 2025 United Kingdom

    Jane Boyer, PhD, is an independent lens-based artist, curator, art writer, and academic researcher. She exhibits internationally, both in print and in exhibitions. Gemma Marmalade, PhD, is a British artist and senior academic in photography at the University of Derby, UK. She is also Visiting Professor for the Creative Industries in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. Together, they head [cloud], a multi-national artist-based collective working in the UK, France, Europe at large, and America. As cultural producers, they specialize in art production, curation, critical analysis of visual culture, publication, and conference delivery.

  • REVIEWS

    “His work in The Atomic Kid touches on our shared experiences of growing up in Nevada’s nuclear landscape. It’s our DNA brought to life. Granted, those of us who call Las Vegas home have a lot to work with. An untrained eye sees clutter or an empty desert where atomic bombs were tested. And while we do have more than our share of visual stimulation, Jim sees something much more. Fortunately for us, he has captured it in his art in a way that has never been attempted or done before. I hope you enjoy his work as much as I do.”
    —Rob McCoy, Chief Executive Officer, The Atomic Museum

    “The oppositional qualities of the sublime and the profane, good and evil, light and dark as captured by Stanford’s work are unparalleled in terms of his creative and unusual technological and artistic skills. These oppositions are brought before the viewer in new visuals that smash prior understandings, yet connect us to historical artistic renderings as well.”
    —Jan Olandese

    “It’s a book and a set of pieces that are at once specific in their frame of reference but also timeless. There’s also a feeling that it’s tapping into a wider cultural zeitgeist of re-engagement of fascination with, and dread of, the genesis of the nuclear world, as demonstrated by the success of Nolan’s Oppenheimer and the Fallout TV adaptation. In a geopolitical landscape characterised by increasing uncertainty and anxiety, it’s little surprise that people are returning to this theme, and Stanford’s work reflects our inability to look away from it.”
    —Dan Mahoney

    “This BRILLIANT work can be summed up in several fictitious words: Bomber-ific, Blast-tif-erous, and Explo-mazing!”
    —Diane Bush
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