Author:Arthur Lubow
Diane Arbus was one of the greatest photographers of the last century. Her portraiture of freaks, circus performers, twins, nudists and others on the social margins connected with a wide public at a deep psychological level. Her suicide in New York in 1971 overshadowed the reception to her work. Her posthumous exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art a year later drew lines around the block.
She was born into a Russian-Jewish family, the Nemerovs, who owned a department store on Fifth Avenue. They were family friends with the Avedons. Richard Avedon later championed Arbus’s work. Avedon rose to greater and greater commercial success through the magazine world. Arbus died in a rent-protected apartment scrambling to earn her keep with odd teaching assignments. Lubow’s biography begins at the moment Arbus quit the world of commercial photography to be an artist. She was uncompromising in that ambition. The book ends with her death. The entire narrative is a slow march towards that event.
[A] fascinating biography… Lubow has performed miracles in gleaning so much fascinating material from Arbus’s friends, colleagues and assistants
—— Lynn Barber , Sunday Times[A] Deeply researched, sometimes prurient, new biography.
—— Sean O'Hagan , ObserverLubow’s excavation of the private life of a great artist is...welcome.
—— Olivia Cole , New StatesmanIt paints a convincing picture of a lost soul.
—— Bryan Appleyard , SpectatorThis is the most personal sort of book one can read: an account of a love affair. ... You learn everything you could possibly need to know about porcelain. ... You don't want to stop reading, because de Waal, with his sharp curator's eye, has excellent judgment when it comes to showing readers things that they will find fascinating, funny or moving.
—— Daily ExpressDe Waal writes beautifully, wears his learning lightly and charmingly and makes sure anyone and everyone will care deeply about the white stuff too.
—— Robert Bound , MonocleEdmund de Waal's The Hare with Amber Eyes, the story of a collection of netsuke owned by his relatives, was a surprise bestseller. ... This account of china clay should claim an even greater readership. It deserves to. It is an even better book. I already have it marked down as my book of the year.
—— The TabletEdmund de Waal's poetic book is like a porcelain cup richly and delicately painted with the story of a mysterious substance and an alchemical art that have combined to enrich, enchant and sometimes ruin aficionados and artists alike.
—— Saga MagazineThis is a haunting book, a book that amasses itself piece by piece, gaining in weight.
—— Olivia Laing , New StatesmanEdmund de Waal has a way of making you care about handmade ceramics in a way no other writer does
—— Ysenda Maxtone Graham , Country Lifeengaging and erudite
—— EconomistA single porcelain pot is sufficiently beautiful to behold, as is this dramatic, gloriously theatrical and irresistibly passionate pilgrimage into a dark hall of mirrors
—— Eileen Battersby , Irish Timesa lyrical yet admirably unflinching tale
—— Moira Jeffrey , Scotsmana fascinating voyage
—— Alex Sarll , UK Press SyndicationA quirky memoir that engagingly weaves together a history of porcelain with his personal history
—— Good HousekeepingA mighty achievement
—— Kathleen Jamie , GuardianA compelling and thoroughly absorbing amalgam of history, autobiography, travelogue and philosophical ruminations on the nature of creativity and many other things besides
—— Monica Bohm-Duchen , Jewish ChronicleDe Waal…sees the world in a shard of white porcelain, thoughtfully and poetically tracing its invention and material production from imperial China through medieval Europe, and Cherokee creeks to the satanic factories of Nazi Germany. Global cultural history, structural and individual: this should be a humanising core text on the now sadly abandoned liberal arts curriculum.
—— Professor E. Stina Lyon , Times Higher EducationAn intimate and lyrical writer with a sophisticated grasp of cultural history… De Waal’s prose thrives on exchanges of curiousity… The White Road feels like a long book, and a long book may sometimes have qualities peculiar to its size. It may be by turns capricious, slow-drifting, and affected. It may yet enlarge your world.
—— Julian Bell , New York Review of BooksA stylishly written account with a surprisingly spiritual dimension. Engrossing.
—— Rebecca Wallersteiner , LadyDe Waal’s charm lies in his ability to undertake obsessive research, to pile up and accrue, to involve the reader in almost frantic travelling, note-taking and reading. There’s no doubting that The White Road is a mighty achievement.
—— Kathleen Jamie , GuardianHis enthusiasm is infectious... This is not just about one ancient industry – somehow, superbly, it's about industry itself
—— William Leith , Evening StandardCombining what is clearly a life-long love of art with an admirable depth of knowledge, Barnes brings a novelist’s eye to the gallery wall and, with this, a fresh, accessible approach to the stories being told in each painting.
—— Lucy Scholes , IndependentThought-provoking, beautifully presented, tender.
—— Rachel Joyce , ObserverBarnes has a wonderful eye for what makes a good picture, and a command of language that again and again allows readers to share what he sees.
—— Andrew Scull , Times Literary SupplementWell-informed and deeply admiring, but never didactic.
—— Prue Leith , Woman and Home[It] gave me a new confidence in how to engage with, understand and, more importantly, enjoy wandering around an exhibition.
—— Mariella Frostrup , ObserverFor those…insecure when viewing art, not always sure how to decode it or emotionally engage with it, this offers a lifeline…Utterly compelling.
—— Mail on Sunday , Mariella FrostrupA typically elegant ad absorbing book by one of t great contemporary English Writers, and with strong Gallic undertones – a wonderful set of essays about artists, many of them French, covering the period from Romanticism through to modernism.
—— Terry Lempiere , GuardianOpinionated, enthusiastic, witty and beautifully written.
—— Charlotte Heathcote , Sunday ExpressJulian Barnes is best known for his fiction...but he's also an excellent art writer... Peppered with personal insights and select historical detail, each piece is as engaging as the next
—— Millie Watson , Citizen FemmeUnusually moving.
—— William Leith , Evening Standard