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Philip Guston: Roma

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In late 1970, after being panned by critics (Hilton Kramer, Robert Hughes...) following his notorious Marlborough Gallery exhibition in which he had revealed his conversion to figurative cartoonish painting, Philip Guston literally escaped to Rome, at the American Academy, where he stayed all through the year 1971 as a trustee and artist in residence. There he created a body of works, the Roma series, inspired by his surroundings, but still populated by his trade mark hooded figures or brick walls, many of those works oils on paper. This book illustrates an exhibition at the Phillips Collection, which earlier appeared in Rome, centered on this little-known series, and is full of high-quality illustrations and previously unpublished documents, such as his wife's journal entries during that period which constitute a precious and moving document on this important trip in Guston's career. The book is also a breakthrough study on Guston's Italian influences (Piero dela Francesca, De Chirico...) and is a welcome addition to the growing literature on the artist.