Books by David Anfam
Jackson Pollock's Mural: Energy Made Visible
by David Anfam
An astute, beautifully illustrated examination of the recently restored touchstone of modern art Jackson Pollock’s major early work Mural (1943) was commissioned by Peggy Guggenheim for the entrance hall of her East 61st Street New York residence. Mural-sized, though not actually a mural―the work is painted on a six-meter-long canvas, not directly onto the wall―this vast, frieze-like panorama would be hugely influential in twentieth-century American art.
In Jackson Pollock's Mural:Energy Made Visible, David Anfam explores the painting and its impact by way of the different themes it incorporates, including the imagery of action and process, the big picture, the “gothic,” the body, dance, and Romanticism, relating them to art historical precedents, Abstract Expressionism, Pollock’s psychology, and the context of American art and culture in the pre- and postwar years. This analysis is accompanied by reproductions of Pollock’s work as well as imagery from the period that sheds light on the artist’s development.
Gifted to the University of Iowa Museum of Art in 1948, Mural has rarely traveled, and it is now the focus of a traveling exhibition curated by Anfam. This accompanying volume offers crucial analysis and historical background on one of Pollock’s most significant works. 106 illustrations, 67 in color
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Edward Hopper
by Edward Hopper, David Anfam, Carol Troyen, Judith Barter, Elliot Davis, Sheena Wagstaff, Brian O'Doherty
One of the most enduringly popular painters of the twentieth century, Edward Hopper produced many works now considered icons of Modern art. Canvases such as Drugstore, New York Movie, and the universally recognized (and often parodied) Nighthawks not only reshaped what painting looked like in America, but created a visual language for middle-class life and its discontents. This extensive new assessment of Hopper, which accompanies a major traveling exhibition, examines the dynamics of the artist's creative process and discusses his work within the cultural currents of his day--examining the influence not only of other painters, but also of such media as literature and film. And while most studies have tended to see Hopper as the great painter of alienation, this one takes a much broader, more nuanced, and ultimately more representative view. Spanning the entirety of Hopper's career, but with particular emphasis on his heyday in the 30s and 40s, Edward Hopper highli
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Edward Hopper
by Edward Hopper, David Anfam, Carol Troyen, Judith Barter, Elliot Davis, Sheena Wagstaff, Brian O'Doherty
Edward Hopper (1882-1967) made the visual iconography of the American city his own. All-night diners, filling stations, motel rooms and office interiors take on the foreboding atmosphere of abandoned stage sets, onto which his isolated human protagonists seem to have wandered.
Fully illustrated in colour, with oils, etchings, drawings and watercolours from throughout his career, and with essays by leading authorities on American art, this is a comprehensive survey of one of the iconic artists of the twentieth century.
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Edward Hopper
by Edward Hopper, David Anfam, Carol Troyen, Judith Barter, Elliot Davis, Sheena Wagstaff, Brian O'Doherty
Edward Hopper is as quintessentially American as Jackson Pollock or Andy Warhol. Like them, his imagery has reached far beyond the realm of art to impact on our culture in the broadest terms, so that we see early twentieth-century America through his work, as much as within it. The painter Charles Burchfield attributed Hopper’s success to his “bold individualism,” declaring that “in him we have regained that sturdy American independence which Thomas Eakins gave us.” Hopper’s art was profoundly of its time, both in its expression of the subtle melancholies of modern life and in its deeply cinematic qualities--perhaps Hopper’s greatest gift was his treatment of light--to which directors from Alfred Hitchcock to Wim Wenders have paid homage.
This volume presents a definitive Hopper monograph. Published for a massive retrospective at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid, and the Grand Palais in Paris, it approaches Hopper’s relatively small oeuvre in two sections. The first covers the artist’s formative years from approximately 1900 to 1924, examining a selection of sketches, paintings, drawings, illustrations, prints and watercolors, which are considered alongside works by painters that influenced Hopper, such as Winslow Homer, Robert Henri, John Sloan, Edgar Degas and Walter Sickert. The second section considers the years from 1925 onwards, addressing his mature output through chronological but thematic groupings. Comprehensive in its scope, with a wealth of color reproductions, Hopper is the last word on the artist.
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Abstract Expressionism
by Carter Ratcliff, Jeremy Lewison, David Anfam, Susan Davidson
The definitive study of the most important movement in postwar American art, now in paperback
Now available in paperback, this is the definitive book on abstract expressionism, with superb color plates of major works by the protagonists of the movement as well as lesser-known figures, and essays by key scholars. Working primarily in New York and San Francisco from the 1940s on, a generation of American artists injected a new sense of confidence in painting, experimenting with improvisation, spontaneity and color. This bold publication reevaluates the movement, making the case that, far from being unified, abstract expressionism was in fact complex and ever-changing. Included here are full-color plates of works by Willem de Kooning, Sam Francis, Helen Frankenthaler, Arshile Gorky, Adolph Gottlieb, Philip Guston, Franz Kline, Lee Krasner, Joan Mitchell, Robert Motherwell, Barnett Newman, Jackson Pollock, Richard Pousette-Dart, Mark Rothko, David Smith, Clyfford Still, Ad Reinhardt, Mark Tobey, Bradley Walker Tomlin and Jack Tworkov, among others. Among the abundant archival materials are images of Hans Hofmann’s famous classes; artists such as Krasner, Frankenthaler, Pollock and de Kooning in their studios; installation shots of some of the key international exhibitions of the era, both internationally and at the galleries of Betty Parsons and others; and photos of famous locations where these artists thrashed out their aesthetic concerns, such as the Cedar Street Tavern. Also featuring a superb chronology of the period, this landmark publication is a thrilling survey of an incredibly energetic moment in American art.
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Abstract Expressionism (World of Art)
by David Anfam
Curator and critic David Anfam’s crucial exploration of the Abstract Expressionist movement, updated to include scholarship of the past decade and a half Abstract Expressionism is arguably the most important art movement since the Second World War. Because the images created by such leading figures as Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Willem de Kooning, and Mark Rothko were so extraordinary, it is often thought to have been a revolution in painting only, but its radical spirit also encompassed David Smith’s sculpture and Aaron Siskind’s photography. With other key artists such as Barnett Newman and Franz Kline, this group was a nucleus united not just against the tensions of American society from the 1930s onward but also in its aim to forge a new visual language.
In this concise account, David Anfam examines the movement in terms of its political implications and cultural context, taking into account a wealth of recent scholarship on the subject and offering fresh insight into the works themselves. 176 illustrations
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