Focusing on the art of self-portraiture, this effortlessly engaging exploration of the lives of artists sheds fascinating light on some of the most extraordinary portraits in art history. Self-portraits catch your eye. They seem to do it deliberately. Walk into any art gallery and they draw attention to themselves. Come across them in the world's museums and you get a strange shock of recognition, rather like glimpsing your own reflection. For in picturing themselves artists reveal something far deeper than their own physical looks: the truth about how they hope to be viewed by the world, and how they wish to see themselves. In this beautifully written and lavishly illustrated book, Laura Cumming, art critic of the Observer, investigates the drama of the self-portrait, from Durer, Rembrandt and Velazquez to Munch, Picasso, Warhol and the present day. She considers how and why self-portraits look as they do and what they reveal about the artist's innermost sense of self -- as well as the curious ways in which they may imitate our behaviour in real life. Drawing on art, literature, history, philosophy and biography to examine the creative process in an entirely fresh way, Cumming offers a riveting insight into the intimate truths and elaborate fictions of self-portraiture and the lives of those who practise it. A work of remarkable depth, scope and power, this is a book for anyone who has ever wondered about the strange dichotomy between the innermost self and the self we choose to present for posterity -- our face to the world.
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Editorial Reviews
Review
'Intelligent, humorous, swinging freely between erudition and colloquialism. I immediately found myself at home in this book, feeling as though I'd been reading and thinking about this subject all my life.' Jonathan Coe 'Positively fizzes with ideas; just about every single paragraph contains a fresh observation' Nick Hornby, Observer, Books of the Year 'A literary as well as an artistic triumph' David Cox, Evening Standard, Books of the Year 'Laura Cumming combines great clarity of style with a wide range of taste. All aspiring critics of any art form should take a look at how much she can say in a short space.' Clive James 'A beautiful and intriguing book!though Cumming's book is stacked with visual masterpieces, it is her writing that most claims admiration. She notices every detail in a painting, the way a carpet folds, the varying textures in a dog's fur, and registers them with a poet's precision!she relies on keen observation, linguistic power and lots of knowledge. It adds up to the most enjoyable art book I have read for years' John Carey, Sunday Times "Books that combine scholarship, insight, knowledge and a beguiling prose style are as rare as hen's teeth. But this book is one of them. Cumming writes like a dream, making sharp, revealing observations about artists and their work!.I have read nothing better on art this year" Frank Whitford, Sunday Times Books of the Year 'A vivid, insightful, superbly illustrated study!the most enthralling thing about "A Face to the World" is that Cumming writes about paintings as if they are alive' Jackie Wullschlager, Financial Times 'Thought-provoking!excellent!authoritative!the most informative and entertaining art book you are likely to read this year' TLS 'Excellent !Cumming is firmly on the side of the expressive as opposed to the scholarly: she herself is an intense and passionate writer!in an important sense she is showing the way towards a new, civilian discourse of art. This way passes confidently and purposefully through the lives of the artists themselves, and hence liberates the language of art from its unease, its fusty atmosphere of suppression.' Rachel Cusk, Observer 'Well informed, extremely well written, and laced with a broad knowledge of the history of art and the lives of artists.!Cumming's book is informed by looking at paintings, rather than reading about them, and by a strongly literary attitude towards her subject.!enjoyable to read and elegantly written' Charles Saumarez Smith, TLS 'Original and thought-provoking' Evening Standard 'Her intelligence and humanity is used less to impress us with theories than persuade us, with sumptuous superlatives, how great her subjects are. I closed this delightful book inspired by genuine insights into how some mostly long gone but very brilliant talents "chose, as we all must choose, to present themselves"! Cumming has achieved her own modest telescoping of time' Daily Telegraph 'Marvellous!that the narrative of this book is consistently coherent despite its episodic character is due to its resemblance to an unusually perceptive self-portrait!it is an entirely engaging and convincing portrait, vivid and human!Cumming reanimates self-portraiture so that!these pictures "act upon you with the full force of vitality"' Sunday Telegraph 'Irresistibly engaging!her writing is precise, personable, perspicacious!unforgettably vivid!delightfully fresh!compelling!The book swarms with startling characters and remarkable incident: it is art history made as vivid and vivacious as a giant canvas executed by a master!gorgeous' Simon Callow, Guardian "positively fizzes with ideas; just about every single paragraph contains a fresh observation" Nick Hornby, Observer, Books of the Year "a literary as well as an artistic triumph" David Cox, Evening Standard, Books of the Year "Richly thoughtful, perceptive and well written, it's that rare item: an art book where the text is so enthralling that the pictures, however necessary, almost seem like an interruption" Julian Barnes, The Guardian, Books of the Year "a clever collection of thoughts on what artistic self-representation has meant down the years" Daily Telegraph, Books of the Year "This intelligent, insightful book discusses self-portraiture's formal games and celebrated images across six centuries" Financial Times, Books of the Year "the perfect Christmas present for anyone with an interest in art history!an intensely readable book" Jonathan Coe, New Statesman, Books of the Year "a lively, thoughtful and extremely interesting book on the autobiographical art of the self-portrait" Hermione Lee, TLS, Books of the Year Books of the Year, Independent Selected 10 times as through Books of the Year
About the Author
Laura Cumming is art critic for the Observer. Previously, she was Arts Editor for the New Statesman and Arts Producer for the BBC.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Five stars for the text, two at most for the illustrations,
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This review is from: Face to the World (Hardcover)
I have always been fascinated by self-portraits, and so was delighted by the appearance of this book. Laura Cumming is a minute observer: her descriptions of the paintings have alerted me to many details of paintings of which I had previously been unaware. How many viewers of Van Eyck's Van der Paele Madonna, for example, would have noticed the portrait of (presumably) the artist in the tiny reflection on the armour of the attendant St George? The book has a detail of this passage in the painting, but the matt illustration is so muddy that it is completely useless and I had to go to Google Images to find a more readable version of it.The illustrations are the weak part of the book, and some are really poor, for you cannot see many of the details to which the author refers: the glove which Sofonisba Anguissola is carrying or the important key tucked into the belt of Velasquez in Las Meninas; nor can you make out the cat and the dog at the bottom of Gumpp's self-portrait. In the reproduction of Carracci's, you can just about make out the dog, but not `the spectral cat'. The illustration of Kahlo's `The Wounded Deer' is cropped so that the word `Carma', referred to in the text, is lost. Also, increasingly so as the book proceeds, Cumming discusses a number of self-portraits by lesser-known artists, which are not illustrated at all (and are not available on Google Images either); and there are some paintings which she describes without giving their titles, so those cannot be looked up on Google anyway. That's all more than a little frustrating. But the text is immensely rewarding. We learn such fascinating details as that the flowers in the mirror of Seurat's `La Poudreuse' were painted over what was originally a self-portrait, and Cumming's reflections on this are charming. Many fine essays have been written on Rembrandt's self-portraits, and, unavoidable as it is in a such a book, it cannot have been easy to produce another one; but she rises creditably to that challenge also. About the other great serial self-portraitist, Van Gogh, she argues eloquently that the pity they evoke is purely ours, and that there is no self-pity in the pictures themselves or in Van Gogh's mind. There are fine passages about how artists have portrayed their hands, and about the transition from the painters' busy workshops to their cell-like studios, as part of the story of Romanticism. Cumming's analysis of Philip Guston's `Studio' is a real tour de force; and there is a lovely analysis of a triple self-portrait by Norman Rockwell. The penultimate chapter, entitled `Falling Apart', shows how photography especially (but inspiring the work of painters also) can show the multiple aspects and/or masquerades of an artist's Self, or indeed convey the sheer elusiveness of what we mean by the Self: a very post-modern theme. These are just a few of the many felicitous passages in Cumming's text. You may not in every case agree with her reactions and interpretations, but they are always worth thinking about; and what is irrefutable is the acuity of her perceptions, the range of her knowledge, the philosophical dimension of her thoughts, and her intense engagement with her subject.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Far More than an Important Art History Book: A Brilliant Historical Novel!,
By Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (VINE VOICE) (TOP 50 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
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This review is from: Face to the World (Hardcover)
Laura Cumming, in addition to being the art critic of the distinguished British journal The Observer, is a learned communicator and extraordinary writer. Given that she has been influential in the grace of productions offered by the Tate Museum while at the same time being able to be arts producer and presenter for BBC, she comes by her depth of knowledge about the visual arts naturally - and at the same time communicates in a tone not dissimilar to that of Alistair Cooke of Masterpiece Theater fame. All of these assets she bestows on the reader of this amazingly original book, A FACE TO THE WORLD: ON SELF-PORTRAITS.Not content to simply list the artists of history and of now who shared their own perceptions of themselves with self-portraits, Cumming instead includes the vision, in her words, ' For all a self-portrait can ever be is the illusion of the artist's self. It can never be a substitute, an embodiment, the last word or the whole summation, and yet the artist paints, even as he doubts, uncertain whether anything of himself will ever get through......Now I am here - and yet I am not.' Her dialogue with the reader is infectious as she explores famous as well as not so famous artists who deigned to leave us 'self-portraits' - the ultimate evidence of vulnerability. Cumming divides her book into chapters of ideas rather than episodes delivered chronologically. The names of her chapters describe the contents of each well: Secrets; Eyes; Dürer (whose image serves as the cover of this book); Motive, Means and Opportunity; Rembrandt; Behind the Scenes; Velásquez; Mirrors; Performance; Stage Fright; Loners; Egotists; Victims; Pioneers; Falling Apart; and Farewells. Each of these chapter designations describes the approaches of the many painters she 'exposes' with both love and erudition and humor. After her extensive survey through the self-portraits of many artists she arrives at the 21st century ' Twentieth-century doubts about self-portraiture spill into this century too, doubts about the possibility of ever depicting oneself. The assertion 'This Is Me' does not work any of for many artists, and since we like to think of ourselves as complex and fragmented, not susceptible to concise description, unable to be pinned down, it is hardly surprising that is the way the modern self-portraitists show themselves too, from Francis Bacon's swerving body parts to Chuck Close's walls of pixels and Maurizio Cattelan's thousands of little sperm each with the artist's own, but always fractionally different, visage. Mass self-portraiture, serial self-portraiture, partial self-portraiture - it is safer that way, for there never has to be a limiting finality. There can be no last word because one never gets to the end of one's self.' Laura Cumming is a modern phenomenon and the reader of this book will gain more very comfortable information about art than with almost any other book. Highly Recommended! Grady Harp, April 10
5.0 out of 5 stars
Entertaining and interesting,
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This review is from: Face to the World (Paperback)
This book is written in a very accessible way. It goes over context and comparisons in an easy manner. I particularly enjoyed looking up the pictures that aren't listed in the book online. The whole experience was lovely - especially since it wasn't a course where I had to memorize and could spend as much time (or not) as I wanted on any part of it.
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