Customer Reviews (2)

A good bargain book on Gorky.
This edition is a good overview of the life and work of Gorky, at a very affordable price.Not the most scholarly volume about this very important abstract-expressionist painter, but for the price it is a very useful addition to any art library.

valuable book on Gorky
Lader has done an excellent job of delineating Gorky's work. The color reproductions are fair.They are not top of the line but,then very few books on Gorky have good repros. I find the back sections on Gorky's theory and his techniques interesting. Gorky states his case that he is aclassical artist. His interest in the old masters backs this up..such as Ucello.an index and these special sections help to look things up when you want to reviewhis ideas and ambitions for art.The paperback edition will serve you well. It is light enough to put in your kit bag and carry it with you something that Gorky deserves. ... Read more

Book Description
The first full-scale new biography of Arshile Gorky, the charismatic, controversial genius of 20th Century art.

Arshile Gorky is one of the most mysterious of major twentieth-century artists. Born Armenian, he adopted the cover of a famous Russian name, and paradoxically helped to change the course of American art. The art critic Robert Hughes wrote in The Shock of the New, "Gorky's life as a mature artist formed a kind of Bridge of Sighs between Surrealism and America; he was the last major painter Breton claimed for Surrealism and the first Abstract Expressionist as well." In this first full-scale biography, Nouritza Matossian charts Gorky's tumultuous life from his childhood to his evolution into a key figure on the New York art scene of the 30s and 40s to his tragic last years.

Handsome and deeply intense about art, he cut a dramatic figure among the Abstract Expressionists, influencing a generation of painters including de Kooning, Rothko, and Pollack. This powerfully revealing biography sheds crucial new light on Gorky's passionate life and monumental legacy.

"A profoundly moving, illuminating biography leaves us with the image of a man of monumental will and spirit, who embraced life with every fibre, and whose sufferings never undermined his integrity either as a man or as an artist."--The Independent ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Fascinating man / Great artist
"Warts & all"

Here is a fascinating and loveable soul/

A CANNOT PUT DOWN READ/

This read made me appreciate his painting much more/ backgroundREALLY enlightens imagery here/

& Photos, too / Here was oneintriguinglooking fellow,to attest/

One of the most enjoyable bios I have yet read

And for the used price,you can't go wrong ...

Worthy of a great artist
Allow me to add an "amen" to the previous reviews.Matossian's background in Armenian culture is a great advantage in exploring Gorky's childhood, and her obvious patience in organizing material from the many first-hand interviews of Gorky's survivors pays off in a vivid, scrupulously detailed account of his rise and cataclysmic final years.As an arist I brought a huge respect and admiration for Gorky's work to the book, and wasn't disappointed to find that the Gorky the author describes matches the intensity and dazzle and complexity of the works.So vivid was her writing that the ending left me moved almost to tears.This is our American Van Gogh, a giant arguably greater than Pollock, and his story is one of the great tragic--and ultimately triumphant--dramas in all of biography.

Life changing book
I read this book during a recent illness and I am glad of it because I was able to concentrate fully and stay within the world which the author so skilfully evokes. I have rarely found a biography of an artist, especially a modern one, so lovingly and painstakingly portrayed with brushstrokes just like a painter to produce image after image and make the man come alive in such an engaging way.I learned about the history of the ARMENIANS but through his eyes and yet the scholarship and objectivity shone through. So many insights and beautiful stories, such a strong sense of place, whether in long-lost Armenia or Boston of the 20s or New YOrk of the 30s and 4os , the characters who weave through this incredible tapestry, no a carpet. This writer belongs to the tradition of Armenian troubadours who were storytellers and sang their songs in verse in many languages. I felt the narrative had a poetic lilt and yet she kept back her obvious involvement in the subject.In her introduction which is worthy of attention Nouritza Matossian tells of her own family and their wanderings because of the Genocide, her desire to keep an even balance and not to succumb to the despair of her foretfathers. This book is a vindication of a culture which has been hammered and a Genocide which needs to be acknowledged. It tells of the courage of exiles and immigrants who brought such skills and moral values to this country which did not accept them very often. The accounts of Gorky's pursuit of excellence in art, his love for his mother and her inspiration are universal themes. I saw him as a quixotic, temperamental and charming character whom I would have loved to know. She brought him alive and I cared for him so much that I could hardly bear to finish the book, knowing that he would die. I received a great gift in understanding how it is possible for someone who has lived at traumatic life to transcend his suffering and 'give something to the world' as he said to Leger, something good. His paintings are incredibly beautiful and I see l know that he paid an even greater price than the loss of his childhood for those canvases, he paid for them with his health and security. Gorky's suicide has always puzzled me and I understand it for the first time after reading Matossian's book twice.The discussion of art and ideas, her ability to interpret him and even to depict the work is accurate and vivid. I saw from her website www.arshile-gorky.com that she performs a one-woman show in which she tells his story with slides and music as his mother, sister, sweetheart and wife. Those four characters are in the book and she pays tribute to them. It must be wonderful to hear this author tell her extraordinary story in her own words because this is a book which rings with her love and commitment for her subject and that is a rare and generous gift. All I could wish is that this book were even longer because I hated putting it down at the end. It changed my attitude to many things in my own life. This book deserves to win prizes.

Troubled Youth
For anyone convinced that crucial or shocking events during childhood have a major impact on psyche, this book is a must read to understand Gorky's art and his impact on American art.It is also an enlighting read to better understand the rituals, culture, and methods used by Gorky's(Adoian's) Armenian kin to survive (or not survive!) opression at the handsof the Ottoman Turks.Matossian points to the ancient Armenianarchitecture, illuminated manuscripts, stone crosses, among other objectswhich Gorky saw and experienced as a child and which left a powerfulimprint on his future art.Once some of these objects are seen, it iseasier to understand the origin of Gorky's shapes, colors, and titles ofhis masterpieces.

Besides the extensive research that took Matossian toGorky's Armenia, her knowledge of the Armenian language gives powerfulinsight into the letters written by Gorky in his native tongue to hisfamily.Fantastic book which is part history, biography, art history,psychology, criticism and reads like a compeling historical novel! ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (3)

Gorky comes alive
I became interested in Arshil Gorky after watching, "Ararat," Atom Egoyan's masterful film about the Armenian holocaust.I knew nothing about his art or his place in the annals of art history.Hayden Herrera does a wonderful job giving us a portrait of a troubled eccentric who is also a genius.In particular, she does a terrific job showing his complicated relationship with his homeland.His wife didn't learn until after Gorky was dead that he was Armenian.He told her he was Russian.Herrera also does a good job of interpreting his art, helping the reader make sense of his semi-abstractions.The book includes more than one hundred prints of his artwork and that helps show his artistic journey.

The book is less successful in providing a look at the milieu of New York City art world.There is much discussion in a summary way about the conflicted role Gorky held in relationship to the surrealists but I didn't get a good sense of who the surrealists were and how they interacted with Gorky.Nor are we sure of how Gorky interacted with the abstract expressionists.Some of this failing maybe intentional as Herrera focuses on Gorky's marriage in the nineteen forties and quotes extensively from his wife's letters.Herrera may feel that her job is to help us understand the man through the most significant relationship in his life rather than by focusing his relationship with his peers.

Despite these failings, I think this biography provides an extremely vivid portrait of Gorky the man and the artist.Although his life was often hard and he died relatively young (at age 48), Gorky emerges from these pages a glorious artist who created art that was both self-consciously derivative and highly original.Go figure!

A Fitting Successor
This book is a fitting successor to Frida. Both books tell the story of tragic lives made triumphant through art. Both brilliantly evoke their respective art worlds in the first half of the last century. They also evoke the tumultuous political, economic, and social world of the times. The writing is graceful and clear. Herrera talks about paintings, realistic and abstract, with believablity and intelligence. The great empathy she shows for her subjects also illumines the aesthetic discussions. This is an heroic story of an artist overwhelmed by circumstance. Herrera's understanding of how experience molds character, how character lies at the foundation of art, her restraint and eye for significance, her effortless prose, make this as fine a biography as Frida. Both artists are lucky to have found such a biographer!

A Fitting Successor
This book is a fitting successor to Frida. Both books tell the story of tragic lives made triumphant through art. Both brilliantly evoke their respective art worlds in the first half of the last century. They also evoke the tumultuous political, economic, and social world of the times. The writing is graceful and clear. Herrera talks about paintings, realistic and abstract, with believablity and intelligence. The great empathy she shows for her subjects also illumines the aesthetic discussions. This is an heroic story of an artist overwhelmed by circumstance. Herrera's understanding of how experience molds character, how character lies at the foundation of art, her restraint and eye for significance, her effortless prose, make this as fine a biography as Frida. Both artists are lucky to have found such a biographer! ... Read more

Book Description
An immigrant from a small Armenian village in eastern Turkey, Arshile Gorky (c. 1900-1948) made his way to the U.S. to become a painter in 1920. Having grown up haunted by memories of his alternately idyllic and terrifying childhood--his family fled the Turks' genocide of Armenians in 1915--he changed his name and created a new identity for himself in America. As an artist, Gorky bridged the generation of the surrealists and that of the abstract expressionists and was a very influential figure among the latter. His work was an inspiration to Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko, among others. Matthew Spender illuminates this world as he tells the story of Gorky's life and career. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Gorky's son in law
Matthew Spender has something to offer for someone really curious about this artists work. I have been compairing the three biographies. Herrara's book has been much acclained. But, when it comes to getting into the nitty -gritty of an artist's work, Spender is better. Particularly when he writes of his work in the fields of Virginia.None of the other writers have really tackled this important part of Gorky's art. As a sculpture Spender must have wondered would Gorkylike me and my work.The Armenian backgound has been covered by quite a few books. None can surpass some of Spenders insight into Gorky's creative process.A shortcomihg of this biography is the lack of color reproductions of the paintings.His choice of photos of the family of Gorky ,give us a glimpse of his background. The paper back (a catalogue )"the breakthrough years /Arshile Gorky" would be a good companionbook of this bio as it has ample repros and an essay by Spender among others ;Aupling for one.

Armenian Modern
Matthew Spender, son of poet Stephen, is a good writer who does a deft job of weaving his research into a lively story. But being the husband of Gorky's oldest daughter limits his interests to the "family" side of the artist's life: to hear Spender tell it, Gorky lived through three decades of New York's modern art revolution dreaming of butterchurns back in Armenia. He never really explains what drove Gorky to become an artist, let alone an abstract modern artist, in the face of family pressures, the trials of being an immigrant, and the burden he carried as a survivor of the Armenian genocide.

Gorky's idyllic memories of childhood clearly played a major role in his life and art, but so did Picasso and Cezanne, whose style he copied until the breakthrough near the end of his life. Spender plays down the endless hours Gorky spent in front of the canvas trying to insert himself into the history of Western art, preferring to read the artist's somewhat restricted interests (he steered clear of the tumultuous politics of Thirties New York, avoided bohemia, and refused to theorize about the inner sources of his art) as a gauge of how deeply Armenia held him. Maybe. But more attention to the exciting world his work unfolded in would have helped to explain Gorky's achievement a little more clearly. Hayden Herrera's more recent "Arshile Gorky: His Life and Work" may have replaced this biography and is probably the better place to turn for learning more about his life.
... Read more

Book Description
Arshile Gorky (1904-1948) was a seminal figure in the Abstract Expressionist movement. His drawings are beautiful, complex, and sensual creations, the products of a technical mastery that bespoke a new power of abstraction within modern art. They are also pivotal to the understanding of his art and play a major part in the development and realization of his paintings. This handsome volume, and the exhibition it accompanies-the first retrospective ever assembled of this influential artist's drawings-focus on how Gorky's drawings function both in relation to his paintings and as individual works of art.

Gorky's changing styles and precise approach to drawing are discussed in detail, and contrasted with the spontaneous and direct execution generally associated with Abstract Expressionism. The works range from small, intimate drawings to major, large-scale pieces; all are reproduced in superb full color. These rich and evocative drawings are an inspiration to new generations of artists and art lovers alike. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

praise from a top Abstract Expressionist enthusiast
Take a tip from Gorky, he always carried a small book or reproductions of favorite painters in his pocket. This is a good book to start this habit with the Grove series on modern artists.There is a Guston ,a Dubuffet an Arp in this series as well. Rosenberg knew most of the A.E. painters and Dekooning intimately so what he has to say about Gorky comes from a good source theDekoonings (Bill and Elaine.)I re-read this book the other night and believe that it inspired me to keep painting.Harold brings out Arshiles absolute devotion to painting.His self-eduction in libraries was as intense as it was in museums.I have added some postcards and repros from magazines to my copy.If you love Gorky , you are lucky to get a copy of this book ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

limited color reproductions
Although ,this book has good commentary on Gorky's work I don't find it anymore insightful than any other Gorky book. The Julian LevyGorky bookhas many more color reproductions . TheLevy has reprosthat are full page.Other books have several repros per page such as Herrara's book.The Jordan/Goldwater book has mostly black and white photos. ... Read more

Book Description
Harry Rand's critically acclaimed study of Gorky's brief, troubled life and artistic development is finally available in paperback.
All of Gorky's major themes are touched on and his major paintings dealt with in some depth, with attention to the details of the individual works, and frequently to the drawings and preliminary studies from which the paintings evolved. The discussion centers on the images that united the pieces as they develop from work to work. Rand explores Gorky as well as possible sources and their relationship to the body of Gorky's art. A concluding chapter reassesses Gorky's impact on the New York School in light of a new understanding of his aims and methods.
Through close study of Gorky's oeuvre, the author deciphers an iconography revealing the unexpected and systematic use of explicit ideas and symbols as well as commonplace objects, settings, and personas from the artist's life. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Excellent, Readable Analysis
A well structured thorough analysis of the formal derivations, composition and media techniques of this extremely important artist. One always wishes for endless illustrations so that the reader could extend the engaging search of motives revealed in the analysis. There are easily enough illustrations here to tempt you. An excellent companion to any illustrated collection of the artist's paintings and drawings.

Lacking Visual
Harry Rand's Book "The Implication of Symbols" is indeed well-written and full of important information.Furthermore, his interpretation of the symbolic aspects of Gorky's work as it relates to his life is competent stuff.But here's where to start with a book on visual art: how many paintings does the book show, and of these, how many are in color.An art book discussing artwork that is either not shown in the book, or that is shown only in black and white (when a colorplate is crucial), is a frustrating read.At $..., one expects more than 15 color plates, some of which are poorly reproduced.I'm grateful for the information Mr. Rand provides, but greatly disappointed at the amount of work reproduced in what could otherwise be a complete presentation of the artist and his painting. ... Read more