Place, Art, and Self
A legendary geographer revisits a beloved work on art, environment, and personal history
One of the most influential and decorated scholars of his time, Yi-Fu Tuan transformed the study and understanding of place through his thirty seminal books in humanistic geography and environmental perception. Among his most notable books was Place, Art, and Self, a small, beautifully illustrated volume first published in 2004, in which he addressed the questions: “What do place, art, and self have in common? To what extent do place and art define who we are?” A favorite of Tuan’s many diverse readers, it was revisited by the author near the end of his life, and this new edition expresses his updated take on how and why the arts are emblematic and revelatory of the self and our place in the world. Integrated throughout are 32 amazing artworks by contemporary visual artists of places around the world, each complementary of Tuan’s text with their respective message.
Through memoir and exceptional insights gained from a lifetime of reading, writing, teaching, and study, Tuan explored art in its myriad forms — paintings, photographs, poetry, novels, films, dance, music — and how it interacted with home and place to shape, define, and expand the self and a sense of who we are.
- Steven Hoelscher, Stiles Professor of American Studies and Geography, Director of Liberal Arts Honors Programs, and Faculty Curator of Photography at the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at AustinReading Yi-Fu Tuan’s Place, Art, and Self: A Second Look is like walking through your favorite museum, attending a soulful concert, or watching an inspiring dance performance with a masterful guide: his finely-wrought observations, although uniquely his own, unfailingly resonate in unpredictable ways. The visually arresting artwork, made by an esteemed group of contemporary photographers and visual artists, brilliantly complement Tuan’s text by illustrating the creative juxtapositions that lie at the book’s center.
- Joseph S. Wood, Provost (2009–2016) of the University of Baltimore and author of The New England VillagePlace, Art, and Self: A Second Look takes us on a modern journey of curiosity and discovery, sharing for the reader how to be grounded through the experience of place, art, and human meaning. Much as Emerson promoted individuality and wonder in a time of increasing mechanization, so Tuan offers an antidote to the siren call of information technology and artificial intelligence.
- William K. Wyckoff, Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences and author of How to Read the American West: A Field GuideAs a humanist geographer and omnivorous reader and scholar, Yi-Fu Tuan has always been willing to take us to the intersecting worlds where place, art, and life meet. This compact set of meditations, freshly and beautifully illustrated, reveal both the power of Tuan’s mind and the beauty of his spirit.
Yi-Fu Tuan (1930–2022), John K. Wright Professor of Geography at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, was a Fellow of both the British Academy and American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and in 2012 received the prestigious Vautrin Lud International Geography Prize, the highest award given in the field of geography. He was author of numerous works, including Humanist Geography: An Individual’s Search for Meaning.
