A welcome appreciation of the greatest painter of German Romanticism.
An art historian documents the achievement of one of Germany’s most important painters.
Historian Illies writes in this admiring biography that Friedrich (1774-1840) was “the most famous German painter of the nineteenth century” yet suffered an inexplicable “descent into oblivion.” Many factors influenced that decline in interest in this painter of allegorical landscapes who “inhaled nature to exhale it again as art.” Illies alternates between stories of Friedrich’s personal life and the creation of his works. He divides the book into sections dedicated to the four classical elements—fire, water, earth, and air—that inspired Friedrich’s paintings or affected their fate, as when a blaze at the home of Princess Mathilde of Saxony destroyed two inherited Friedrichs, Morning in the Mountains and Mountain Scene in Evening Light. The book shows the influence Friedrich had on other artists, from Samuel Beckett, who had a “prototypical experience” that inspired Waiting for Godot after he viewed Friedrich’s landscapes, to Kurt Vonnegut, who was in prison during the Dresden bombing of World War II and later had his character Billy Pilgrim describe “the sunsets over the destroyed city as if they were skies by Caspar David Friedrich” in Slaughterhouse-Five. Sometimes, Illies sledgehammers square pegs into round holes and forces events to fit this arrangement, as when, in the water section, he writes of the Nazis’ efforts to embrace Friedrich as “a stout, seaworthy Teuton who would stand in the bow during their misguided expeditions to come.” Most of the book, however, is more restrained. Sprinkled throughout are amusing if unnerving anecdotes, such as the one about Walt Disney’s 1935 trip to Munich to see a compilation of his work titled In the Realm of Mickey Mouse. “The Nazis allowed the glorification of other rulers,” Illies writes, “as long as they were mice.”
A welcome appreciation of the greatest painter of German Romanticism.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781509567546
Page Count: 220
Publisher: Polity
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
A cheeky, gossipy dual biography.
A study of two writers uncomfortably entwined.
After Eve Babitz (1943-2021) died, her biographer Anolik came upon a letter from Babitz to Joan Didion (1934-2021) that startled her. Filled with “rage, despair, impatience, contempt,” it read like a “lovers’ quarrel.” “Eve was talking to Joan the way you talk to someone who’s burrowed deep under your skin, whose skin you’re trying to burrow deep under.” That surprise discovery suggested a “complicated alliance” between the two. In sometimes breathless prose, with sly asides to the “Reader,” Anolik draws on more than 100 interviews with Babitz and many other sources to follow both women’s lives, tumultuous loves, and aspirations before and after they met in Los Angeles in 1967, sometimes straining to prove their significance to one another. “Joan and Eve weren’t each other’s opposite selves so much as each other’s shadow selves,” she asserts. “Eve was what Joan both feared becoming and longed to become: an inspired amateur.” At the same time, “Joan was what Eve feared becoming and desired to become: a fierce professional.” Didion had just won acclaim for Slouching Towards Bethlehem when Babitz, newly arrived from New York, began socializing with her and her husband, John Gregory Dunne. The reticent Didion and the sensual, energetic Babitz could not have been more different, and Anolik clearly prefers Babitz. “I’m crazy for Eve,” she admits, “love her with a fan’s unreasoning abandon. Besides, Joan is somebody I naturally root against: I respect her work rather than like it; find her persona—part princess, part wet blanket—tough going.” Their relationship—hardly a friendship—fell apart in 1974 when Didion and Dunne were assigned to edit Babitz’s autobiographical novel, Eve’s Hollywood. Babitz, resentful of Didion’s attitude and intrusion, “fired” her, pursuing her writing career on her own. Didion soared to literary fame; not, alas, Babitz.
A cheeky, gossipy dual biography.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781668065488
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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