Customer Reviews

Max Beckmann: Dream of Life

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This is a very elegant book.first rate reproductions in color. The text type is easy on the eyes. This is a catalogue for an exhibition of Beckman in the new Klee museum in Berne Suisse.The locals were somewhat aghast at Beckmann coming to the Klee museum. The curators had no trouble seeing similarities in the two artists work. Both were fans of theater. Beckmann wrote some plays himself. He was interested in Shakespeare ,as well as the circus.The comparison/contrast of Klee-Beckmann is the first chapter of the book.Other chapters are about his interest in music. His love of the carnival and circus. The chronology in the back of the book goes into many details of the artist's career. He sought beautiful ,talented wealthy women to advance socially. After he married Quappi he was accepted into advanced social circles in Frankfurt.I have several books on Beckmann and one a book of his landscapes ,a catalogue of the show at the Forum gallery that I saw in Vienna has work that isn't in any other book. Beckmann's "A Dream Of Life" has a few landscapes that are new to me as well.This book is well worth the Amazon price.It isn't so big that you can't read it while in bed.So, many art books might look good on a cocktail table but , when you want to read it you need to go to a library table.Another feature I liked is the addition of Beckmann's reading list...with commentary about the books by Tilman Osterwold.

This book is the catalogue for an exhibition held at the Zentrum Klee in Bern, Switzerland, in 2006. The idea of the exhibition, as pointed out in the beginning of the book, was to confront Beckmann's art to Klee's (the museum's Klee holdings are the largest in the world).This idea is not present here, since the catalogue is entirely centered on Beckmann, leaving Klee out.

It is a good survey of Beckmann's art, divided in several themes (Beckmann and music, Beckmann and the circus, Beckmann and women, Beckmann and nature...)and enables the reader to view some rarely seen aspects of the artist's oeuvre (I, for one, did not know he had painted still lives), as well as some of his celebrated self-portraits. One shortcoming, though: the quality of the illustrations could have been better.