Andrew Wyeth: The Helga Pictures [Paperback]

John Wilmerding (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1987

Wyeth's acclaimed masterworks are now available in paperback. This book launched the celebrated exhibition seen by millions at museums around the world. "The Abrams book is so handsomely reproduced one might be tempted to take the reproductions for the real thing".--The Wall Street Journal. 194 illustrations, including 96 in full color.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The announcement nine months ago that 240 hitherto unknown paintings and drawings by Andrew Wyeth had been bought by collector Leonard Andrews and would go on show was front-page news. Abrams, which helped to arrange the initial exhibit at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., here publishes the entire collection of Wyeth's renderings of his neighbor Helga Testorf, with a text by the gallery's deputy director. There is also a rather foolish piece by Andrews ("I personally feel he is so far ahead of any other living artist that it is hard to name the second best"). The pictures, meticulously reproduced, range widely in mood, from sensuous nudes to somber studies of Helga in assorted rustic landscapes and interiors; they are examples of fine craftsmanship but continue to leave open the question of whether Wyeth is more than a highly skilled illustrator with a flair for drama and atmosphere. In any case, the controversy in the art world about Wyeth's stature (merely hinted at in a footnote here), and the traditional romantic speculation about artist and model, seem certain to fuel sales. 400,000 first printing; BOMC main selection.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

For 15 years, America's most popular living artist worked in secret with neighbor Helga Testorf as model. The resultsome 240 pencil sketches, watercolors, drybrush, and temperas, concerned with Helga in all aspects, nude and clothedare here shown in 100 high-quality color plates and 160 black and white illustrations. Works in progress reveal the artist's methods; finished works, an obsession with his model as awesome as his technique. Wilmerding, deputy director of the National Gallery, contributes an informative text, further clarified by the artist's own observations. Gloria K. Rensch, formerly with Vigo Cty. P.L., Terre Haute, Ind.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Harry N Abrams (March 1, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810923645
• ISBN-13: 978-0810923645
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 9.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,906,455 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Wyeth Book, October 19, 2005

By 

David Adams (Minnesota) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Andrew Wyeth: The Helga Pictures (Hardcover)

Yes, this IS one of the great Andrew Wyeth books. Everyone interested in this great American artist will love it. This was my first Wyeth book. It was on my shelf for a long time, and I knew I liked his work. After my retirement in 2001, I began painting with watercolors and looked around for some work I liked for inspiration and found only Winslow Homer and Andrew Wyeth. Later, I was fortunate to see the Helga show in Omaha and found out how amazing Wyeth really is. I spent hours looking at these paintings trying to figure out how he was able to balance areas of color that looked almost poured on next to areas of almost photographic detail. I have read that that's what they call drybrush technique. Well, maybe so, but I call it sheer genius. As with all Wyeth reproductions in books, this one is good, but after you have seen the actual paintings, they are but pale shadows. Nevertheless, I love this book. It is the next best thing to being near a museum where you can see the originals. Wyeth is indeed an inspiration.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars He must have been in love, June 18, 2005

By 

wiredweird "wiredweird" (Earth, or somewhere nearby) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Andrew Wyeth: The Helga Pictures (Hardcover)

I don't mean that Helga was his lover. Still, the artist has an intense experience of his model, and Helga was his model for 15 years.

This is an outstanding book in lots of ways. The subject matter is beyond belief, and the reproductions are good. The visual content is organized well: major pieces are chronological, and sketches and studies are gouped with the pieces they support. I find it very helpful to see the sketches, and see all the variations that Wyeth tried before committing to a more dmanding piece. Those groups of drawings are drawing lessons themselves, in how to explore a visual idea. The text is a bit thin, and says nearly nothing about Helga herself - not a flaw in the book, so much as a step short of what it could have been.

Most of all, the pictures are simply lovely. Helga was a very handsome woman, in her 50s in the lastest of these pictures. Not 'pretty' maybe, but very beautiful - at least, she is presented as very beautiful, and very real. Some of the nudes studies show her arms crossed, oddly compressing her natural curves. That just makes the pictures more genuine for me, showing her as she is, not made up to some anatomical ideal.

Explanatory text could have been more explanatory, but that's OK. The large majority of the book is just the pictures themselves, and I don't mind being alone with them.

//wiredweird

5.0 out of 5 stars Best of American art., December 25, 2010

By 

S. Rivera - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Andrew Wyeth: The Helga Pictures (Paperback)

I love this bk. I have been fascinated by Andrew Wyeth's art since the 1980's. I am just as fascinated now. In this collection as well as his other art we see not only a man's mastery of technique but his passion for beauty. If we could all apreciate the world around us with the same intensity that Mr. Wyeth had then I think we would all be better off.