Contemporary Art from China

Today’s book is On the Edge of the Millennium: New Art from China, by Michael Goedhuis. Softcover published 2002 by Goedhuis Contemporary. 47 pages; full-page color photos. Cover shows detail of ‘Interior with Mosquitoes and Moths’ by Guo Wei.

This is an exhibition catalogue for 2002 show at the gallery’s New York and London locations.  Full-page color photos and a short essay are provided for each of the artists:  Zhou Tiehai, Zhou Chunya, Shen Xiaotong, Geng Jianyi, Mao Yan, Zhao Nengzhi, Gu Gan, Guo Jin, Guo Wei, Liu Xiaodong, Ding Yi, Hong Hao, Hai Bo, Zhao Bandi, Yu Hong, Wang Jinsong, Wang Dongling, and Qiu Deshu.

The well-written Introduction by Michael Goedhuis briefly discusses the history of art in China in the past hundred years:

Chinese art of the twentieth century developed falteringly between the dominant influences of European aesthetics at the beginning of the century and Western, mostly American, modernism at the end.  At the same time it incorporated an ambivalent relationship with the powerful, albeit fading, legacy of its historic culture. – p. 2.

Goedhuis describes how the founding of the People’s Republic of China and the political control of the Cultural Revolution relentlessly impeded the development of free artistic expression.  By the 1980s the cultural situation began to change for the better, and artists began a period of intense experimentation with, and exploration of, modern Western art.  Now the artists have become more self-assured and less deferential to Western art and the Western art market:

So, although the artistic environment is extremely complex in China today, with striking regional differences and many different styles, some more traditional, others more Western, jostling for prominence, a new completely Chinese sensibility has taken hold in the last few years.  It has enabled Chinese artists, for the first time in a century, to face up to international criteria with a quiet self-confidence — no longer the idiosyncratic chroniclers of a desperate and mysterious passage in history but men and women willing and able to compete on their own terms as artists of the world. – p. 5.

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The Paintings of Wang Jinsong – Goedhuis Contemporary, New York, 20th November – 3rd December, 2002

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Witch hunt in West Memphis

The final book in our Halloween countdown is Devil’s Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three, by Mara Leveritt.  Softcover 7th printing 2003 Atria Books, NY.  419 pages; Index; Notes; black-and-white photos.

The crimes at the heart of this book are horrific and heinous, no matter from which side of the controversy they are viewed.  This review from Publishers Weekly provides a good outline of the case:

Arkansas investigative journalist Leveritt presents an affecting account of a controversial trial in the wake of three child murders in Arkansas.  In May 1993, three 8-year-old boys were found mutilated and murdered in West Memphis, a small and tattered Arkansas town.  The crime scene and forensic evidence were mishandled, but a probation officer directed the police toward Damien Echols, a youth with a troubled home life, antiauthoritarian attitudes and admiration for the Goth and Wiccan subcultures.  Amid rumors of satanic cult activity, investigators browbeat Jesse Misskelley, a mentally challenged 16-year-old acquaintance of Echols, into providing a wildly inconsistent confession that he’d helped Echols and a third teen, Jason Baldwin, assault the boys.  Leveritt meticulously reconstructs the clamorous investigation and two jury trials that followed.  All three boys were convicted on the basis of Misskelley’s dubious statements and such evidence as Echols’s fondness for William Blake and Stephen King.  Leveritt, who makes a strong argument that the convictions were a miscarriage of justice, also suggests an alternative suspect: one victim’s stepfather, who had a history of domestic violence, yet was seemingly shielded by authorities because he was a drug informant for local investigators …. Leveritt’s carefully researched book offers a riveting portrait of a down-at-the-heels, socially conservative rural town with more than its share of corruption and violence. – Publishers Weekly, 2002.

The same case was the subject of the riveting HBO documentaries Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills and Paradise Lost 2: Revelations.  We recommend that the films be viewed before reading the book, because they preceded the book chronologically.

The first film created a huge interest in the case, and the West Memphis Three have been a cause celebre ever since.  There is great anger at what is considered to be a modern-day witch trial.  Rock stars, famous actors, and visual artists continue to speak out in support of the three men through benefit concerts and art auctions.  Investigators and legal experts offer their services pro bono to try to get the convictions overturned.  New evidence is still being uncovered.  An extensive website — WM3.org — is devoted to the case and to a fund supporting the release of the three men.

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

The Kirtland Massacre: The True and Terrible Story of the Mormon Cult Murders, by Cynthia Stalter Sasse and Peggy Murphy Widder

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Weirder still

Continuing our Halloween countdown, today’s book is Still Weird, by Gahan Wilson.  Softcover published 1994 by Forge / Tom Doherty Associates.

287 pages of ghoulish, warped cartoons in black-and-white by a master of the macabre.  Many of these cartoons originally appeared in National Lampoon, Playboy, and The New Yorker, but this collection also includes 100 brand-new cartoons and 100 more that have never before been published in book form.

From STILL WEIRD by Gahan Wilson

From STILL WEIRD by Gahan Wilson

Wilson’s drawing has a distinctive loopy style that perfectly suits his blend of grotesqueness and wit.  His fascination with horror was honed in childhood by the works of H. P. Lovecraft, and he was influenced by the cartoons of Charles Addams.

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

MAD Magazine No. 89, September 1964

Charles Addams: A Cartoonist’s Life, by Linda H. Davis

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Witchcraft in High Places

Today’s Halloween-countdown book is Witchcraft in Britain, by Christina Hole.  Wonderfully creepy illustrations by the great Mervyn Peake.  Cover art by Linda Garland.  Softcover reprint 1979 Granada U.K.  Previously published as Witchcraft in England.

This popular history of British witchcraft was written by one of England’s leading folklorists.  It draws extensively from trials and court cases.  In the chapter entitled “Witchcraft in High Places,” the author relates the following:

A very famous witchcraft-trial in the fifteenth century was that of Eleanor Cobham, Duchess of Gloucester, who was charged in 1441 with conspiring with certain other people to bring about the death of Henry VI by magic.  She was the wife of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who was the King’s uncle, and Regent during his minority, and she was already near enough to the throne to make any magical practices of which she might be suspected extremely dangerous.  She was accused of making enquiries into her own political future, and also of causing a waxen image to be made which was intended, according to the evidence, to destroy the King.  She did not, of course, make these enquiries herself because she had not the requisite skill, nor could she construct the wax figure that was to kill her nephew.  She needed accomplices in the matter, and these she had in the persons of two priests named Roger Bolingbroke and Thomas Southwell, and that of a woman called Margery Jourdemayne, who lived in the Manor of Eye-next-Westminster, and was known as the Witch of Eye.  [. . .]

The Duchess and her accomplices had, on their own admission, meddled with very dark powers, and practiced divination, image-making, and the blacker forms of magic.  What they all denied was any treasonable intent behind their actions.  All four were condemned.  Thomas Southwell was the most fortunate member of the little band, for he died in prison.  Margery Jourdemayne  was burnt at Smithfield.  Bolingbroke was hanged, drawn, and quartered.  His severed head was set up on London Bridge, and his four limbs sent to the four cities of Oxford, Cambridge, Hereford and York, there to be exposed as an awful warning to all other learned clerks who might be tempted to commit the same sin.  The Duchess was condemned to do public penance on three separate occasions in London, walking barefoot and bare-headed through the streets, and carrying a candle…. The rest of her life was passed as a prisoner, first at Chester, and afterwards at Peel Castle in the Isle of Man.  – from Witchcraft in Britain, by Christina Hole, pp. 118, 119, 121.

See also Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part Two.  (There, Margery Jourdemayne is referred to as Margery Jourdain.)

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

The Way of Witches, by Perle Epstein

Witchcraft, by Charles Alva Hoyt

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For your Mini-Monster

Today’s Halloween-associated book is Monsters (Hologram World), by Dugald Steer. Illustrated by Justine Peek. Hardcover book for children, published 1996 by Little Simon.  The cover has a hologram of the Medusa.

This is a fun book for kids aged 7-12 who are fascinated by the strange and terrifying creatures of folklore, legend, and myth.  A small, slim book with only 14 pages, its main attraction are the 5 cool holograms showing a dragon, the Medusa, an alien from outer space, the Loch Ness Monster, and Bigfoot.  The lively illustrations are quite attractive, offering plenty of eerie thrills without being overly frightening or gory (although they are probably too scary for the youngest crowd).  There are brief informative mentions of many other legendary beings from various world cultures; e.g.: “The ghostly baykok is a night spirit of the North American Chippewa tribe.  It preys on warriors, shooting them with invisible arrows and striking them down with a terrible club.”

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How to Draw Monsters, Weirdoes and Aliens, by Renzo Barto

Of Witches and Monsters and Wondrous Creatures, by Lisl Weil

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I am — Dracula

Beginning a Halloween theme for the remainder of the month, today’s book is An Illustrated History of the Horror Film, by Carlos Clarens.  Softcover 8th printing published 1979 by Paragon Books.  Includes 48 pages of black-and-white photos, and the Cast and Credits of more than 300 horror films.

The author, well known to film buffs as an original and cogent critic, brings his encyclopedic knowledge of films and film makers to this outstanding history and analysis of the horror film.  Whether discussing the erotic aspects of King Kong, examining the works of Val Lewton, contrasting the director’s attitude toward the monster in Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein, … or comparing the various versions of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Mr. Clarens entertains as he enlightens.  His fascinating study of a popular genre explains both the genre and its popularity. – from back cover.

Dracula (75th Anniversary Edition) (Universal Legacy Series)

From Clarens’s discussion of Dracula:

If Dracula, the film, has retained any power to impress after thirty-five years of repeated showings, it is due in the main to [Bela] Lugosi himself.  It is useless to debate whether he was a good actor or not: Lugosi was Dracula: the actor’s identification with the part is complete.  He may not conform to the [Bram] Stoker description (as does John Carradine, for example), but he left an indelible mark on the role and, consequently, on the horror film as well.  Where [Lon] Chaney remained human and pathetic, Lugosi appeared totally evil.  As Count Dracula, he neither asked for nor needed the audience’s sympathy.  Even Lugosi’s nonvillain roles he imbued with malevolence, as in The Black Cat and The Invisible Ray.  To other roles — mad scientist, necromancer, monster, or mere red herring — he brought a kind of corn-ball, demented poetry and total conviction.  At the height of his popularity, he received as many letters as any romantic screen idol, 97 per cent of which, he announced to the press in 1935, came from women.  Quite effective too was Lugosi’s mellifluous, Hungarian-accented voice, which helped create a barrier of unfamiliarity (and something too ambiguous to be charm) that was as effective in its way as Chaney’s doleful silence before the Sound Era.  There is a world of difference between Christopher Lee’s hoary, modern-English introduction of himself (in the British remake) and Lugosi’s ominous, remote “I am — Dracula.”  Lee may indeed be the better actor but Lugosi pretty permanently claims the part.  The movies do not often bring about such happy matches. – from The Illustrated History of the Horror Film, by Carlos Clarens (p. 62)

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The Independent Film and Video Monthly, May 1998 [cover shows image from Martha Coburn's film Evil of Dracula]

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Swamis, masters of self

Today’s book is Swami, by Doug Boyd.  Hardcover with dustjacket published 1976 by Random House.

Doug Boyd (1935-2006), author of ‘Rolling Thunder,’ a highly praised study of a contemporary American Indian medicine man, based this book on his travels in India and his experiences as personal assistant to Swami Rama during psychophysiological research and testing at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka, Kansas.

From the jacket flap:

Swamis — the popular images of them have fascinated Westerners for centuries: mysterious men with chants and beards, speakers of elliptical truths.  But what are they really like?  What do their teachings actually say? …

[This] book is at once two things: a profound look at just what East and West can mean to each other, at how we can achieve self-mastery and happiness both in the context of our own lives and of the world we live in; and a series of marvelous portraits of the swamis, babas, yogis, and ordinary Indians and Americans whom Boyd encountered: holy, irascible, pompous, benign, learned, and foolish.

Boyd quotes this anecdote that Swami Rama shared:

There was an aspirant with an unquenchable, burning desire for the darsan of a particular wise and powerful saint.  In his youth he traveled a great distance to see the saint, but as he was not received, he returned to his village and spent thirty years of his life preparing to try again.  For thirty years he worked perpetually and perseveringly to develop his faith and his concentration and he repeated his mantra so many times and developed such powerful concentration that he found he could produce fire from his mouth at will.  Ecstatic with joy he journeyed to find the saint, to implore him to be his spiritual teacher and lead him to knowledge.  Because the saint had been in the man’s thoughts for thirty years, the saint gave the man audience.

The moment the man saw the saint, he prostrated himself at his feet.  He could not help but say, “For thirty years I have dreamed of seeing you.  Thirty years I have spent in constant work and devotion!”

The saint said, “So?”

“I have developed intense faith,” the man declared, “and intense powers of concentration.”

Again the saint said, “So?”

“I can produce fire from my mouth.”

“Go and begin doing something useful,” the saint said calmly.  “When we are all having matches, why have you wasted your time?”

– Swami Rama, as quoted in Swami by Doug Boyd (p. 323).

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

Kripalu Yoga: Meditation-in-Motion, by Yogi Amrit Desai

The Avadhut and His Twenty-Four Teachers in Nature, by Babaji Bob Kindler

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About ‘About Rothko’

Today’s book is About Rothko, by Dore Ashton. Hardcover published 1983 by Oxford University Press, New York. Cover photo by Alexander Liberman.

We at Brainiac Books are enthusiastic fans of the television series Mad Men, which is set in the early 1960s.  In one episode from the 2008 season, “The Gold Violin,” a Mark Rothko painting plays a prominent role as it hangs in the office of the senior partner of Sterling Cooper, a Madison Avenue advertising agency.  The value of the painting, both aesthetic and monetary, is discussed by several characters; in some cases, they are judged by how they respond to the artwork.

From the jacket flap of About Rothko:

One of the major American painters of this century, Mark Rothko created a unique pictorial idiom for which he is celebrated throughout the world.  In the first full-scale critical biography of the artist, Dore Ashton deftly chronicles Rothko’s life, work, artistic formation, and philosophical preoccupation.

Ashton, who knew Rothko for almost 20 years, gives us a portrait of an intellectually restless man whose canvases were “his passport to a more luminous world, not encumbered by our nouns and adjectives, our interpretations that always fall short.” – from the publisher.

Artist Robert Motherwell praises the book:

Profoundly cultivated and a serious eye-witness, Dore Ashton has got inside the artistic mind of Mark Rothko and, in doing so, has come upon the sensibility, ultimate concerns, and ideas of the Abstract Expressionist milieu — which in the years following World War II moved the center of the art world from Paris to New York.  Ashton writes with an accuracy and insight that one had begun to despair of, after forty years.  She has ignored the melodrama and the false mythologies — some accidental, some deliberate — and concentrated on the deep roots, the artistic and ethical dilemmas, that led to some of the most daring and original works of the period….  No existing biography of an Abstract Expressionist compares with this one, and any future ones will have to refer to, and to steal from it. – from back jacket.

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Elaine and Bill: Portrait of a Marriage: The Lives of Willem and Elaine De Kooning, by Lee Hall

What Did I Do?: The Unauthorized Autobiography of Larry Rivers, by Larry Rivers with Arnold Weinstein

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Twittering in 1966, thanks to Industrial Design

Today’s title is Industrial Design Magazine, February 1966, Vol. 13, No. 2, edited by James R. Mellow. Published by Whitney Publications, Inc., New York.  Cover art by Peter McGuggart.

Industrial Design was a monthly periodical “published for active designers and for executives throughout industry who are concerned with product planning, product design, packaging, and marketing.”  This issue looks at Design at Work, and Evolution of the Office.

In his editorial entitled “Learning to Live with the Box”, James R. Mellow (a distinguished art critic and biographer with a keen insight on modernism’s relationship with society) writes presciently:

[F]or some of us the contact with computer technology means only the telephone bill or the monthly selection card from a book club.  For many more, it is an increased reliance upon electronic equipment in the nine-to-five working environment. Learning to live with the machine in these circumstances puts a premium on efficiency.  These new machines require specialized skills.  In certain cases, like information storage and retrieval, a new language has had to be devised — a kind of machine “think” — which enables the operator and the machine to communicate on a level of mutual agreement.  Even so, the machines will be able to communicate with each other before we have learned to get along comfortably with them ourselves.  The vision of a roomful of multilingual computers, humming and twittering to each other in the presence of a lonely operator, may seem like something out of H. G. Wells, but it has its down-to-earth aspects.   The pace of these developments in the business world is bound to have broad social consequences…. – p. 19, Industrial Design Magazine, February 1966

Partial list of contents for this issue:

“The Big Business” — 6 well-known office design and space planning experts.
“Automation, Yes! Automata, No!” –  office machines.
“18th Century Dream — 20th Century Nightmare” — information retrieval systems.
“Design at CBS” — a look at the interiors of Eero Saarinen’s new CBS building in Manhattan.
“The Art of POP” — Point-of-Purchase display.
“Three-Dimensional Packaging and Display”.

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

Industrial Design Magazine, July 1964, Vol. 11, No. 7

Industrial Design Magazine, March 1964, Vol. 11, No. 3

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The further journeys of Maqroll

Today’s book is The Adventures of Maqroll: Four Novellas, by Alvaro Mutis.  Translated from the Spanish by Edith Grossman.  Hardcover published 1995 by HarperCollins.  Jacket illustration by Honi Werner.

Although these novellas — Amirbar; The Tramp Steamer’s Last Port of Call; Abdul Bashur, Dreamer of Ships; and Triptych on Sea and Land — can be read independently, they continue the saga of the wayfaring sailor/adventurer Maqroll begun with the novel Maqroll.  Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Nobel Prize-winning author, calls Mutis “one of the greatest writers of our time.”

From a 1995 review:

Colombian-born Mutis, now resident of Mexico, is for the most part a literary secret in this country, but his excellence needs exposure here.  His parity with Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Carlos Fuentes is apparent in his latest work of fiction, a four-novella sequence.  Together, the interrelated quartet is a vastly entertaining saga of high seas and high jinks, a cross between Sinbad’s adventures in The Arabian Nights and the novels of Joseph Conrad, with a heaping of Indiana Jones tossed in for good measure.  In a style that resonates with deep experience and wisdom, as much as it radiates the love of language and knowledge of fictional technique, Mutis narrates, as if he were one of his own characters, the adventures of his old buddy Maqroll, an adventurer.  Maqroll and the colorful individuals he’s known in his definitely unsedentary life occur and recur throughout the sequence of novellas; one novella concerns gold mining in South America, another a romance involving the captain of a tramp steamer, a third deals with a scheming Lebanese shipowner, and the final one presents a trio of particularly meaningful personal encounters for Maqroll. — Brad Hooper, Booklist.

The translator, Edith Grossman, noted for her translations of poetry and prose by contemporary Latin American writers, won an ALTA translation award for her rendering of the Mutis’s first Maqroll book.

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Also currently in stock at BrainiacBooks.com:

The General in His Labyrinth, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Translated from the Spanish by Edith Grossman

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