Philosopher and art historian

A philosopher and art historian, he is one of Europe’s most wide-ranging interdisciplinary thinkers. He is a lecturer at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris and is well known for his extensive studies of the uses and meanings of images in contemporary culture, especially with regard to their ethical, political and symbolic dimensions.

He has published such notable works as Images in Spite of All: Four Photographs from Auschwitz (University of Chicago Press, 2008) and The Eye of History: When Images Take Positions (The MIT Press, 2018). His book Passer, quoi qu'il en coûte (Minuit, 2017), which he wrote with the Greek poet Niki Giannari, taking an abstract view of the situation of refugees to discuss the concepts of pariah, statelessness and migrant, has been recently published in Spanish Pasar, cueste lo que cueste (Shangrila, 2018).

Update: 31 August 2018