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A rich, penetrating memoir about the author's relationship with a flawed but influential figure—the painter Lucian Freud—and the satisfactions and struggles of a life lived through art. One of Britain's most important contemporary painters, Celia Paul has written a reflective, intimate memoir of her life as an artist. Self-Portrait tells the artist's story in her own words, drawn from early journal entries as well as memory, of her childhood in India and her days as a art student at London's Slade School of Fine Art; of her intense decades-long relationship with the older esteemed painter Lucian Freud and the birth of their son; of the challenges of motherhood, the unresolvable conflict between caring for a child and remaining commited to art; of the "invisible skeins between people," the profound familial connections Paul communicates through her paintings of her mother and sisters; and finally, of the mystical presence in her own solitary vision of the world around her. Self-Portrait is a powerful, liberating evocation of a life and of a life-long dedication to art.
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A unique combination of memoir and artistic biography, interspersed with original artworks, from the acclaimed artist and author of SELF-PORTRAIT. We are both painters. We can connect to each other through images, in our own unvoiced language. But I will try and reach you with words. Through talking to you I may come alive and begin to speak. Celia Paul has felt a lifelong connection to the artist Gwen John. There are extraordinary parallels in their lives and work. Both have always made art on their own terms. Both were involved with older male artists. Both worked hard to keep themselves and the sacred flame of their creativity from being extinguished by others. Letters to Gwen John is Paul's imagined correspondence with this groundbreaking painter. These intimate, passionate, haunting letters offer a unique form of memoir and conversation, and an unforgettable insight into a life devoted to making art. 'Beautiful, tender, and riveting. I have taken this book into my heart' CLAIRE-LOUISE BENNETT 'A beguiling, singular work of art - a portrait of two lives, entwined through time and space' DAILY TELEGRAPH
'Painfully honest on what it means to be a woman who puts art first, no matter what' Olivia Laing I'm not a portrait painter. If I'm anything, I have always been an autobiographer. In Self-Portrait, Celia Paul reveals a life truly lived through art. She moves effortlessly through time, in words and images, from her arrival at the Slade School of Fine Art at sixteen, through a profound and intense affair with the older and better-known artist Lucian Freud, to the practices of her present-day studio. This intimate memoir is, at its heart, about a young woman navigating the path to artistic freedom, with all the sacrifices and complications that entails. 'Powerful' Zadie Smith 'Engrossing' Vogue 'Captivating... Mesmerising' New York Times **Shortlisted for the Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize **
Forces in Nature has been published to accompany an exhibition curated by celebrated US critic and author Hilton Als for Victoria Miro, London.The exhibition explores ideas of man in nature and includes works by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Verne Dawson, Peter Doig, NS Harsha, Alice Neel, Chris Ofili, Celia Paul, Tal R, Sarah Sze, Kara Walker, and Francesca Woodman.Artists have long sought to represent man's insoluble relationship to the natural world. Forces in Nature questions the male form and its absence in paintings, photographs, drawings, film and installation.Does nature mean more to us when seen alongside the human form? Or do we understand a landscape or seascape more acutely when the form is absent? And how much of our understanding of nature is filtered through experiences of the modern world? Forces in Nature is not only a celebration of these questions but an examination of them.
'Reveals an until-now hidden history of women's self-portraiture. A gift that keeps on giving' ALI SMITH, NEW STATESMAN, Books of the Year 'A fascinating survey . . . Extraordinary' DAILY MAIL 'A bewitching, invigorating history' OLIVIA LAING 'Grips from the opening pages' FINANCIAL TIMES 'Important and brilliantly accessible' VOGUE Until the twentieth century, art history was, in the main, written by white men who tended to write about other white men. The idea that women in the West have always made art was rarely cited as a possibility. Yet they have - and, of course, continue to do so - often against tremendous odds, from laws and religion to the pressures of family and public disapprova...
This study of British painters examines the work of Francis Bacon, Frank Auerbach and R.B.Kitaj, and compares their passion for the imagery and materials of paint with the paintings of Lucien Freud, Howard Hodgkin, Michael Andrews and many other young and promising artists.
Shortlisted for the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize 2022 Longlisted for the William M B Berger Prize for British Art History 2022 Guardian Art Book of the Year 2021 A dazzling, boldly original work that tells the powerful and passionate stories of a group of extraordinary women as glimpsed through their still life paintings What is contained in a still life – and what falls out of the frame? For women artists in the early twentieth century, such as Dora Carrington, Vanessa Bell and Gwen John, this art form was a conduit for their lives, their rebellions, their quietly subversive loves for men and women. But for every artist whom we remember, there are those whose work is almost forgotten. In This Dark Country, Rebecca Birrell conducts a dazzling fusion of group biography and art criticism, exploring, from the celebrated to the overlooked, the structures of intimacy that make – and dismantle – our worlds. 'A brilliant book ... A truly radical aesthetics fit for the twenty-first century at last!' - Thérèse Oulton '[A] wonderful book. I am impressed and fascinated. It is beautifully written' - Celia Paul
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