An illuminating commentary on much more than art, demonstrating how new ideas and cultural shifts take hold.
A globetrotting survey of the role women and spiritualism have played in modern art.
For art historian Higgie, author of The Mirror and the Palette, it is a matter of fact that as long as humans have been making art, women artists have been on the periphery. Readers can easily corroborate the author’s contention by noting the dates when women were finally admitted to various art schools or the percentage of works by women at any given show or exhibition. Indeed, what’s remarkable about this book is that Higgie doesn’t approach the subject with a particularly feminist lens. The artists she profiles are women who happened to have interest in or connection to spiritualism, but with few exceptions, the author doesn’t make a case for their gender informing either their art or their connection to the otherworldly. As readers meet unsung heroes of art and spirituality across time and space, they also travel with Higgie on her personal journey as she discovers and explores this fascinating facet of art history. Near the end of the book, she describes a conversation with an artist friend: “I ask Liliane what the word ‘spirituality’ means to her. She thinks for a moment and shakes her head. ‘Although the ultimate goal is to be enlightened, I don’t think you can pin it down. It’s different for everyone. It’s just a path and you never reach the end of it because you want to keep going.’ ” Like Liliane, Higgie eschews definitive conclusions about the connections among spiritualism, women artists, and modern art, but she paints a variety of compelling portraits. For more in-depth profiles of women artists, check out Katy Hessel’s The Story of Art Without Men.
An illuminating commentary on much more than art, demonstrating how new ideas and cultural shifts take hold.Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781639365432
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Pegasus
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.
Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.
“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9780063304413
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
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
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