Cindy Sherman: Retrospective (Paperback)

~ Cindy Sherman (Author), Amada Cruz (Author), Elizabeth A. T. Smith (Author), Calif.) Museum of Contemporary Art (Los Angeles (Author), Ill.) Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

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 Paperback edition.

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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Product Details

• Paperback: 219 pages
• Publisher: Museum of Contemporary Art (October 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0933856490
• ISBN-13: 978-0933856493
• Product Dimensions: 12.2 x 9.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #904,670 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars loved it, October 14, 1999

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.

19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars At last a superb compilation of a great artist's works., September 29, 2000

By	inframan (the lower depths) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cindy Sherman: Retrospective (Paperback)

I can't believe it's taken this long for a compilation of Cindy Sherman's body of work to appear. But maybe that's the real measure of a major artist in this place at this time. Sherman is one of the strongest,most meticulous and most original artists to appear since the early 1930s. I'm not going to analyze the photographs, they've been analyzed to death and are far beyond analysis in any case. Suffice to say the quality and layout are excellent. A thrilling book! I do have one reservation which has nothing to do with CS. The accompanying essays are highly ideological (which CS ain't) and serve Sherman far less than their own agendas plus at least one of them is almost unreadable mumbo jumbo.

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., January 19, 2006

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.