French Literature Reviews - 2026

Vilém Flusser, Arts, Sciences, Technologies. Challenges to Research-Creation (ed. by Yves Citton & Marc Lenot)
Philosophy, Anthropology and Ideas

This essay brings together about fifteen previously unpublished texts by Vilém Flusser, philosopher, writer, communication theorist, and art critic. These writings invite us to reconsider research-creation both from its historical roots (looking back to the era of Arts-Sciences) and from its potential horizons (looking forward through alternative conceptions and practices of research-creation that depart from current frameworks and remain to be invented, perhaps even moving beyond the very term "research-creation").

Between his arrival in France in the mid-1970s and his untimely death in 1991, philosopher Vilém Flusser authored numerous texts seeking to articulate the challenges of approaches that intersect the arts, the sciences, and the emergence of new technologies. Through a piercing analysis of what he perceived as the "crisis" of technoscience and modern societies, he formulated brilliant outlines that anticipate not merely the advent, but rather the transcendence of what is today commonly called "research-creation." Black boxes, exile, creativity, objectivity, sociological art, educational institutions: the fourteen texts gathered here—published for the first time in their original French version—offer a dazzling display of writing that constantly pushes against the limits of the thinkable, not so much to breach them as to make their collisions dance.

Vilém Flusser (1920–1991) was a Czechoslovak-born philosopher, writer, communication theorist, and art critic. A singular figure in the philosophy of technology, communication, and media of the second half of the 20th century, he wrote numerous essays spanning the philosophy of language, cultural history, technology, writing theory, media archaeology, communication theory, the arts, and philosophical reflection on images.
Born in Prague, he went into exile in Brazil in 1940 due to his Jewish origins, making it his adopted home for 32 years before settling in Provence in 1975. Flusser was an atypical, eclectic, and singular intellectual who navigated diverse worlds, writing in Portuguese, German, English, and French, while exploring phenomenology, photography, design, history, and biology. Upon his death in a car crash on the Czech-German border, he left behind a vast body of texts and manuscripts. While Flusser is recognized today within German-language theory as a key figure in media studies, and his thought is gaining increasing traction in the anglophone world, it is paradoxical that in France—where he spent his final years—his thought and the scale of his project of philosophical communicology and anthropology of technique (in which the image holds a primary place) are only just beginning to be discovered.

Read a few pages on the publisher's website...

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You can read an article by C. Ruby on this book on nonfiction.fr...

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Table of Contents

Preface. A BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO VILÉM FLUSSER AND HIS WRITINGS ON RESEARCH-CREATION -- Marc Lenot

ARTS, SCIENCES, TECHNOLOGIES: CHALLENGES TO RESEARCH-CREATION -- Vilém Flusser

Frameworks for Research-Creation

Pilpul (c. 1981/1982)

For a School of the Future (1982)

Preliminary Reflections on Artist Residency Experiences Abroad (1987)

Creation – Discovery (1990)

Social Experimentations

Sociological Art (1975)

The Sociological Art of Fred Forest (1975)

Sociological Art or Dialogical Life (n.d.)

Fred Forest's m² (1977)

Artistic Square Meters (1977)

Ten Years of Sociological Art (1984)

Artistic Practices

Scientific and Artistic Creation (1982)

How Not to Be Devoured by the Box (1983)

“We Are All Writers” (1978)

Exile and Creativity (c. 1984)

Afterword. THE CHALLENGES OF RESEARCH-CREATION ACCORDING TO VILÉM FLUSSER -- Yves Citton & Élise Rigot

Edited by: Yves CITTON & Marc LÉNOT

Preface and notes: Marc LÉNOT

Afterword: Yves CITTON & Élise RIGOT

Co-published by: EUR ArTeC / Les presses du réel

This volume gathers approximately fifteen previously unpublished writings by the philosopher, writer, communication theorist, and art critic Vilém Flusser, produced between his arrival in France in the mid-1970s and his death in 1991. The collection features texts addressing themes such as black boxes, exile, creativity, objectivity, sociological art, and educational institutions, presenting an approach to the intersections of arts, sciences, and new technologies. Edited by Yves Citton and Marc Lenot, with a preface by Marc Lenot and an afterword by Yves Citton and Élise Rigot, the book reflects Flusser's multifaceted intellectual trajectory and his engagement with media, communication, and modern society.

Readers interested in the philosophy of technology, media theory, and the intersections of artistic and scientific practices may find this volume relevant. Within the broader context of twentieth-century intellectual history, Flusser remains recognized as a singular figure whose work spans the philosophy of language, cultural history, writing theory, and media archaeology. Although his thought has gained traction in German- and anglophone-language scholarship, these French-language texts contribute to the reception of his expansive project in France, offering further insight into his reflections on images, technoscience, and the evolving frameworks of research-creation.