Best known for his barbed and brilliant art for the
New Yorker, Saul Steinberg (1[zasłonięte]914-19) did much more. He
executed public murals, designed fabrics and stage sets,
was an inventive collagist and printmaker, and turned
his magic touch to the fields of painting, sculpture,
advertising, and even wartime propaganda. This is the
first comprehensive look at Steinberg's extraordinary
contribution to twentieth-century art, which was that of
a modern-day illuminator, putting word and image in play
to create art that spoke to the eyes, and minds, of
readers. An introduction by poet Charles Simic tracks
the origins of Steinberg's darkly comic sensibility in
the 'Balkan bazaar' of his native Romania. Joel Smith
shows how architectural training and an early rise to
fame as a cartoonist in Fascist-era Milan honed the
artist's gift for subtle graphic invention, and explores
why one of the most visible, prolific, potent, and
cosmopolitan careers in postwar American art has so
thoroughly evaded serious study.Tracing the evolving
motives that underlie Steinberg's multi-layered
activity, this handsome volume also raises fundamental
questions about the historiography of modernism and the
vexed status of 'the middlebrow avant-garde' in an age
of museum-bound art. Previously unseen sketches,
documents, and printed matter from the artist's papers
illustrate the essay, career chronology, and entries for
120 objects featured in this important book. |
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