Customer Reviews

Birth Of The Cool

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Miles Davis gave us "Birth of the cool" at the time of the 'triumph of American painting', but the connection to 'cool' becomes stretched beyond this timely coincidence. The name of Miles Davis is the greatest presence of black art in a book about visual art not music. The title sounds good, the art inside is arguably among the best of this century, and the discussion within the interviews is engaging - but it is difficult to connect them to "Cool". And the picture of Andy Warhol with Miles Davis doesn't help. Yes, it is "cool" that most of my favorite artists are represented within these covers, but I don't think that was the point. But don't let the awkward title dissuade you. The artists collected for the text do represent the greatness of individuals, not movements or styles, in the 20th century. These individuals represent an emergence of a new "individualist" movement in this century. The author is on to something but it is not yet cool enough to be Jello. Oldsters such as Pollock, O'Keefe, and Newman and the persistent such as Celmins, Katz, and Morley are combined with artists such as Prince, Taaffe, Williams and Wool who were born years after Miles' cool album was cut. But they all belong together because of their uniqueness, specific individual focus and inquisitiveness. Each is at the head of individual directions that may become movements some day. Their work is beautiful and thoughtful, and in some cases a spiced with a bit of mischief. Cool? Hot? Within the interviews, even the artists themselves cannot come to an agreement about that. But the book is cool because it does contain words and images from 15 of the hottest individual contributors to the latest directions art has taken in the 20th century.