Art Lives!

Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older 

New York, NY : Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., c2015.    

297 p. ; 20 cm. 

I had been wanting to read this book for quite a while. I was going to read it during Hispanic Heritage Month, but a students checked out the copies we had (which is great!). So when they came back in I checked it out to myself and read it.

Shadowshaper is the debut novel writers dream of - it was a "Top Ten" on ALA and YALSA lists, a "Best Book of the Year" at NPR and Publishers Weekly, and received stellar reviews, etc. The praise was not undeserved. It's a wonderfully creative novel - undergirded by concerns of ethnic heritage, sexism, gentrification, cultural appropriation - that manages to be a supernatural thriller, urban fantasy, and coming of age story all at once.

At the heart of the story is Sierra a Puerto Rican teen artist/muralist living in Brooklyn. As the story unfolds she learns that her powers are not just artistic, but connected to an age old spiritual power that allows her to bring spirits into her works of art - literally bringing them to life.  This of course would be a ho-hum story without an evil force that seeks to destroy shadowshapers like Sierra so as to gather all that power into himself.  It is a life-and-death danger and Sierra must confront it head on with the help of a another shadowshaping artist - Robbie - and her friends and brother.  The battle between the forces of Sierra and her allies and their nemesis provides the action of the novel.

For some this action will be what draws and holds them in the story.  For me this was the weakest part of the novel. The climactic battle scenes feel like they owe too much action movie staging. I found the most moving parts of the novel were the beginnings of Sierra's understanding of her powers and the descriptions of the art works coming to life, and her meeting with her grandmother's spirit.  But that's me, and I recognize that the gruesome creatures and the bone-crunching fights will be what keeps many readers going right to the satisfying end.

A Terrible Beauty

Vincent and Theo: the Van Gogh Brothers by Deborah Heiligman

New York : Goldwin Books, Henry Holt and Co., 2017.

454 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 24 cm. 

This book brings up some of the problems I find with the whole YA book marketing enterprise.  This is a superb book - one that anyone with the slightest interest in the visual art of painting should read, and by anyone I mean young person, young adult, middle-aged adult, or senior citizen.  It is a wonderful book that lovingly tells the story of artist Vincent Van Gogh and his slightly younger brother Theo, who devoted himself to supporting and championing the work of Vincent. But it is packaged as a YA nonfiction selection - and has deservedly won awards in that category. It may seem I'm nitpicking, but it really seems wrong to me that this book didn't get equal promotion as an adult nonfiction book - it's that good! Also, as much as I hate to say it, it's length (454 pages) is just going to turn off a lot of younger readers - even those with an interest in art.

With all that said, I can say that I loved this book.  I learned a lot from it (e.g. how Theo correctly pushed Vincent to add more color to his palette which was originally muted and grounded in earth tones). The book really opens up the terrible mental anguish and affliction that Vincent suffered and also does justice to the truly inspiring (and sometimes difficult and contentious) love between these two brothers.  Both Vincent and Theo emerge from this telling as very, very human and also very heroic figures.  One finishes the book with a great appreciation for how doggedly Vincent worked at teaching himself and practicing his art and how unstinting Theo was in supporting him.  Importantly, Heiligman gives credit to Theo's wife Jo, who also (in spite of being married to Theo for only the last year and a half of his short life) ensured that Vincent's work and legacy was championed and preserved.

Another positive feature of this book is that it includes excellent end material: a descriptive list of prominent characters, a timeline, copious notes, and a thorough index.

I'll add in closing that I was surprised at the emotional impact of the book. Heiligman's retelling of Vincent and Theo's deaths (just six months apart) left me teary eyed. This is a wonderful book and it is one that I'll be recommending to young and older readers alike.

Boldly Going

This is What I Know About Art by Kimberly Drew

New York : Penguin Workshop, [2020]

63 p. ; 16 cm. 

This short, little book packs a punch!  I'm always on the lookout for small books that I can drop for a student, hoping that the size and design will not scare them off.  This is one of those.

I had no idea what to expect from this book, but it was a pleasure and an education.  The book is essentially the art-map story of Kimberly Drew's journey from from being a financially pinched and very smart (but unknown) Black college student who feels the pressure to pursue a "realistic" major (e.g. architecture, engineering, medicine) even though what she loves is art.  On the recommendation of a professor, she applies for and lands an internship at the Harlem Studio Museum that changes her life and launches her on the way to become a force in the art world.  

The only drawback of this book is that it lacks an index and has no photographs/illustrations to accompany all the amazing artwork Drew introduces to the reader. And there is A LOT of art she discusses and most of it is stunning, and not widely known.  If she ever puts together a YA book of these artists and their works, I'll buy it in a heartbeat.  

To help me (and you if you're reading this) find/remember the artists she touches on I'm diverging from my usual review and posting the following list of art/artists/collectives in the order that they come up in the book.  Where possible, the first reference is to Drew's Tumblr - Black Contemporary Art.  Just a glance there will show you how superb many of the artists she highlights are!

Any omissions or link/spelling mistakes are mine. I hope you'll read her little book and visit her big world of activism and art.  You won't be sorry.
___________________________________________________________

Glenn Ligon - https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Glenn+Ligon
http://www.glennligonstudio.com/
 
Jean-Michael Basquiat - https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Jean-Michael+Basquiat
https://www.thebroad.org/art/jean-michel-basquiat (Los Angeles)
 
Trenton Doyle Hancock – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/trenton+doyle+hancock
https://www.jamescohan.com/artists/trenton-doyle-hancock
 
Lorna Simpson – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/lorna+simpson
https://lsimpsonstudio.com/
 
Jamel Shabazz – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/jamel+shabazz
https://www.annenbergphotospace.org/person/jamel-shabazz/
 
Samuel Fosso – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/samuel+fosso
https://www.walthercollection.com/en/collection/artists/samuel-fosso
 
Nick Cave – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/nick+cave
https://jackshainman.com/artists/nick_cave
 
Mickalene Thomas – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/mickalene+thomas
https://nmwa.org/art/artists/mickalene-thomas/
 
Stephen Wiltshire – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Stephen+Wiltshire
https://www.stephenwiltshire.co.uk/
 
Coco Fusco – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/coco+fusco
https://www.cocofusco.com/
 
Guillermo Gómez-Peña – https://www.guillermogomezpena.com/
 
Creative Time - https://creativetime.org/

“Tribute in Light” – https://creativetime.org/projects/tribute-in-light/

Gran Fury’s “Kissing Doesn’t Kill” – https://creativetime.org/projects/kissing-doesnt-kill-greed-and-indifference-do/

Felix Gonzalez-Torres’ “Untitled” – https://creativetime.org/projects/untitled-1995/

 
Felix Gonzalez-Torrres (Foundation) - https://www.felixgonzalez-torresfoundation.org/about/foundation-statement
 
Blues for Smoke exhibition - https://whitney.org/exhibitions/blues-for-smoke
 
Rodney McMillian - https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/rodney+mcmillian
https://vielmetter.com/artists/rodney-mcmillian
 
Alma Thomas – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Alma+Thomas
https://americanart.si.edu/artist/alma-thomas-4778

Kerry James Marshall – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Kerry+James+Marshall
https://jackshainman.com/artists/kerry_james_marshall
 
Zoe Leonard’s “1961” – https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/33792
 
Guerilla Girls - https://nmwa.org/art/artists/guerrilla-girls/
 
Dread Scott – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/dread+scott
https://www.dreadscott.net/

Black Lives Matter at Black Contemporary Art – https://blackcontemporaryart.tumblr.com/search/Black+Lives+Matter

It's Complicated

Frida & Diego: Art, Love, Life by Catherine Reef
Boston : Clarion Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014
168 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 26 cm. 

Most people have some passing familiarity with the art of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, but this is one of those great non-fiction books for young adults that really expands the range of information about these two stunning Mexican painters.

The book is richly illustrated with photos and includes back matter featuring a nice selection of famous works by the two artists.  The back of the book also includes a timeline and copious notes by the author.

I really loved how this book does not condescend to young adults and manages to objectively convey the very unconventional nature of Rivera and Kahlo.  The book also skillfully conveys the artistic excellence of both artists - showing that Rivera was definitely more famous, prolific and well paid, while Kahlo was truly both a skilled (and self-taught) and truly original painter.  The book conveys the deep and complex love that existed between these two as they married, split up, and eventually remarried.

I also appreciated that Reef was able to honestly portray what a sexist user Diego Rivera was, but she also conveys the poignant tenderness that he held for Frida, and the deep bond between them.

"Stuck in the hospital [1950], Frida missed seeing Diego receive the National Prize for Plastic Arts....She saw her husband often, though, because he took the room next to hers, to be nearby at night.  Diego's presence comforted Frida like nothing else.  He read poetry to her and rocked her to sleep.  About once a week he brought in a borrowed movie projector and showed her the old Laurel and Hardy films....he did whatever he could think of to lighten her mood, even if he had to shake a tambourine and dance around the room, or roar like a bear with his arms raised and fingers curved like a claws." (p.101)

I would definitely recommend this book to any student interested in knowing more about Frida Kahlo or Diego Rivera... or both!

Made in Mexico - ¡Si!

Photographic: the life of Graciela Iturbide by Isabel Quintero + Zeke Peña
Los Angeles : The J. Paul Getty Museum, [2018]
95 p. : chiefly ill. ; 24 cm.

What a great little book! I love that this introduction to the photography of Graciela Iturbide is published by the Getty Museum.  Using the medium of the graphic novel (along with inserted actual photos by Iturbide - such as this phenomenal one of a woman with iguanas on her head) is a brilliant way to introduce a visual artist. 

I also appreciate the writing of this book.  The movement of the narrative is both informative and clear, but also dreamy and poetic. Take for instance this passage from page 18 - where Iturbide has taken her first photo while on a plane:

I become a bird in the heavens
and am filled with birds.
The camera awakens wings.
The wings give me new eyes.
And I will never stop flying.

It is also great that a book celebrates a living artist - a woman artist, and a Mexican artist, too! Wonderful!

Talent and Ego

Drawing Blood by Molly Crabapple
New York, NY : Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, [2015]
338 p. : ill. (chiefly col.) ; 23 cm.

I added this book to our collection this year since it had received such glowing reviews.  Booklist in a starred review stated, "Jaw dropping, awe inspiring, and not afraid to shock....There's no one else like her; prepare to be blown away by both the words and pictures."

I was not so taken with this memoir.  Crabapple is a talented and hardworking artist, and she does have a lot of daring and moxie as she jumps into risky adventures of international travel and pushes and pushes to have her intense drawing-based artworks accepted in the competitive New York art world (and she works constantly at improving her drawing and painting skills). So far so good, but her tale is also one of a massive ego, and also one of ethical contradictions where she is both entranced with the debauched world of the super-rich, while at the same time disdainful of it.  It's interesting, but problematic.  

There is also her use of her conventional attractiveness to both support herself and gain access to the exclusive realms of the super rich.  She works as a nude model, works with strippers and burlesque performers - and writes about the interesting, hard, exploitative and dangerous work that entails, but also seems to accept and at times endorse the sexualization and commodification of women.  Again, it makes for interesting reading, but it is troubling in that it goes largely unchallenged.

So would I recommend this memoir?  Well, I'd definitely mention it to someone curious about contemporary bohemian life and about ways that people make it in the art world.  Did I find it inspiring or wonderful?  Not so much.

Too Sunny, but It is the Sun!

I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson
New York, N.Y. : Dial Books, an imprint of Penguin Group, 2014
371 p. ; 24 cm.

This is a book that won me over.  Thirty or forty pages in, I was thinking, "It's just too overwrought; the writing is trying too hard." However, by the time I finished it, I was lost in it, and - honestly - kind of sad to be done with it.  Nelson achieves something that is very hard to do: the writing style captures the inner and emotional life of the narrator's point of view - and does this with two alternating narrators. Additionally, her novel manages to be interesting, thoughtful, emotional, and at times, truly profound.

I told a friend that I had really enjoyed I'll Give You the Sun, and they said, "What's it about?" I ended up saying things like,  "It's about a family falling apart.  It's about the passion for art.  It's about the secrets people keep.  It's about making art.  It's about falling in love.  It's about coming of age.  It's about death." So you get the idea.  There's a lot to like about this book.

I recommend checking out Jandy Nelson's web page, where you can see all the crazy praise that her book has received, and - what I loved best - take a look at the "Gallery" to see some of the art and hard work that inspires this novel.

This is definitely a book I'll be pointing students to. And yes, that is a hanging preposition!

    

Just Kids in a Lost City

Just Kids by Patti Smith
New York : Ecco, c2010.
xii, 278 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.

Have you ever wished you could travel back in time to New York City in the late 60s or early 70s? Wouldn't it be something to hang out with struggling artists around the Chelsea Hotel, or to meet with some of the successful artists of the time, such as Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Allen Ginsburg or Andy Warhol?

You can take just such a magic trip with renowned punk/rock/poet Patti Smith.  In her National Book Award winning memoir, Just Kids, she takes you with her when she was an unknown hopeful writer moving to the city from New Jersey

Her memoir is as much about her growth as an artist as it is about her rich relationship - as lover, collaborator, friend and confidant - with the late and famous photographer, Robert Mapplethorpe.

I would definitely recommend this autobiography to any student interested in the artistic life, in Rock and Roll, in the 60s and 70s, in women's history, in LGBT history, or in NYC.  I'd also recommend this book to any reader who enjoys a well written memoir.

The Sculptor is Like The Sculptor

The Sculptor by Scott McCloud
New York : First Second, 2015.
487 p. : chiefly ill. ; 23 cm.

It's hard not to like this book.  McCloud has obviously poured his heart into the work - it is a passionate work about art, fame, despair, love, and death.  He says it "took five years to write and draw and I used every minute to make it the best reading experience I could."  

The book captures the desperate hopes, passions, and frustrations of a young artist, but I wish it were not so overwrought at times.  I felt like the strongest parts were the lovely portrayals of NYC as in this page from the novel:

The narrative is a bit choppy at times and a little confusing, but criticisms aside, there is a lot to think about, and a lot to like about this graphic novel by Scott McCloud. 

Ahead of Her Time

Yoko Ono: Collector of Skies by Nell Beram and Carolyn Boriss-Krimsky
New York : Amulet Books, 2013.
177 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 27 cm.

I didn't expect to like this book as much as I did - and additionally, I learned a lot from reading it.

This is the second biography of a woman artist I've read this year, having read - and quite enjoyed - the biography of Georgia O'Keefe back in October.  In Collector of Skies, I really enjoyed discovering what an avant garde artist Yoko Ono was.  She really was a pioneer in the areas of conceptual and performance art.  The book has really nice reproductions of several of her installations, along with great archival photos from her work in the 1960s and 1970s (along with more recent photos).

Beram and Boriss-Krimsky's biography does a great job of detailing the interesting love, artistic and antiwar collaboration between Yoko and the mega-famous John Lennon while keeping the focus squarely on Yoko Ono's life and accomplishments. 

To me, the great strength of this book, is that not only do the authors provide a great deal of information about the life of Ono - her artistic, political and intellectual growth, and her personal life - but they manage to make it a very moving story, too.  I found myself lost in the joy and liberation that Yoko felt on meeting Lennon and realizing that he was someone who truly understood her work.  I also found myself near to tears reading about the murder of John in December of 1980, outside their Central Park apartment.

This book is a great introduction to the life and times of an important artist and pop figure.  I will definitely recommend it to students who might be interested.

& Wonderful

Wideness & Wonder: the life and art of Georgia O'Keeffe by Susan Goldman Rubin
San Francisco : Chronicle Books, c2010.
117 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 22 cm.

One of the things I love about biographies for young people is that they are often short, vivid, compelling and not overwrought with insignificant detail.  I found this biography of Georgia O'Keeffe to be a beautiful introduction to the painter.

The book is handsomely designed with many lovely reproductions and photos that bring alive O'Keeffe's long and productive life of painting.  I think the thing that I really enjoyed was how the book conveys just how new and avant garde the work of O'Keeffe was at the time she was creating it.  Her work seems so accessible and mainstream now, but there really was nothing like it when she was painting.  Her mix of stunning color, expressionist vision, realism, and large scale focus on the single simple subject are all really amazing.

I also appreciate how the biography both pays tribute to O'Keeffe as a trailblazing woman artist, but focuses on her mainly as an innovative, interesting and successful American artist.  The biography pulls together a great deal of interesting information - her early farm years in Wisconsin, her teaching experience in rural Texas, her time at the Art Institute of Chicago, and of course her productive years in New York City and New Mexico (where the O'Keeffe Museum is located)