American artist Cindy Sherman creates staged and manipulated photographs that draw on popular culture and art history to explore female identity. Her art embodies two developments in the art world: the impact of postmodern theory on art practice; and the rise of photography and mass-media techniques as modes of artistic expression. This volume, published on the occasion of an international touring exhibition, presents over 200 images from the breadth of Sherman's work, from the "Untitled Film Stills" of the 1970s to series such as "Centerfolds", "Fashion", "Disasters", "Fairy Tales" and "History Portraits". Essayists Cruz, Jones and Smith offer insights into Sherman's art from several vantage points, positioning it within the trajectory of feminist art history and revealing her influence since the 1970s.
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Editorial Reviews
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Cindy Sherman has taken self-portraiture and masquerade to the highest heights and the campiest lows, bringing the shady ambience of B-movies to art photography while exploring the plexus of narcissism, from its silliest manifestations to its most provocative expressions. Sherman explores the implications of role-playing and fantasy, seeing and being seen, and society's perceptions of women, eroticism, and consumerism in her photographs, creating resonant images and supplying art critics with much grist for their mills. In her contribution to this retrospective volume, Amelia Jones begins with the remark that "much ink has been spilled over Cindy Sherman," and, obviously, the flow continues, but Jones, Cruz, and their colleagues provide just the sort of commentary Sherman's work demands, and the photographs themselves are engaging, both viscerally and intellectually. Sherman has been in costume before her own camera for more than 20 years, earning the right to a major traveling exhibition and speculation as to what she'll come up with next. How many selves can a self be? Stay tuned. Donna Seaman
--This text refers to an alternate
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Review
After a brief interval of bawdy Old Master reenactments--boom, the props took over: dolls' limbs pulled off, naughty bits mangled together pell-mell as if to say "take that, Jesse Helms." You might want to keep some of the provocative, unlovely stuff away from the kiddies, but it's certainly crude for thought. -- Entertainment Weekly
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
loved it,
By "gozan3" (Maryland) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cindy Sherman: Retrospective (Paperback)
A great overview of Cindy Sherman's art with very few gaps. A quick response to an above statement: The disgust you feel is a great part of how one should look at her work. One of the most fascinating aspects in all her photos is the ability she has to construct blantant lies that we react to almost as passionately as what we feel to be genuine. As for her dolls, it's more along the lines of her very merrily reconstructing versions of the human body that are obviously false yet we still search for their anatomical processes. The aspects of them that one finds disgusting are more like the silly goo of a cheap horror movie or the ridiculous body part shots of the sleaziest silicone laden porno. Despite our knowing it's inherent phoniness, we still are frightened, disgusted, and aroused. As I said before, that's a key to her work. Frankly, if you are that disturbed by plastic excrement and genitalia, but not phased at all by the phycological twisting and tension so prevelant in her earlier work, then maybe modern art overall just isn't your cup of tea.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I saw the Retrospective Show, and I bought the book.,
By CanadianArtist (Toronto) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cindy Sherman: Retrospective (Paperback)
I saw the Retrospective show at the Art Gallery of Ontario back in 1999 and bought the book right after at the gallery bookstore. I later went back and saw the show two more times and also read the book from cover to cover. IT IS FABULOUS. It is no wonder Cindy Sherman is considered to be one of the top ten most influential artists of the 20th century. I especially love the notes in the book, showing how she arranges her ideas, how she deliberately uses feminism and ideas that are disgusting in order to make her social statements. Her artwork is deliberately controversial and its not for all people. (Jerry Falwell once said that Sherman was "spawn of the devil", but who actually listens to him?) But if you like controversy and if you like artwork that makes you think, buy this book. - A Fellow Artist.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great book of a great artist,
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This review is from: Cindy Sherman: Retrospective (Paperback)
A good retrospective of Cindy Sherman.
Decent printing and good editing.
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