Arshile Gorky: His Life and Work

Product is excellent. The bookstore was very very slow in sending out the book

I became interested in Arshil Gorky after watching, "Ararat," Atom Egoyan's masterful film about the Armenian holocaust. I knew nothing about his art or his place in the annals of art history. Hayden Herrera does a wonderful job giving us a portrait of a troubled eccentric who is also a genius. In particular, she does a terrific job showing his complicated relationship with his homeland. His wife didn't learn until after Gorky was dead that he was Armenian. He told her he was Russian. Herrera also does a good job of interpreting his art, helping the reader make sense of his semi-abstractions. The book includes more than one hundred prints of his artwork and that helps show his artistic journey.The book is less successful in providing a look at the milieu of New York City art world. There is much discussion in a summary way about the conflicted role Gorky held in relationship to the surrealists but I didn't get a good sense of who the surrealists were and how they interacted with Gorky. Nor are we sure of how Gorky interacted with the abstract expressionists. Some of this failing maybe intentional as Herrera focuses on Gorky's marriage in the nineteen forties and quotes extensively from his wife's letters. Herrera may feel that her job is to help us understand the man through the most significant relationship in his life rather than by focusing his relationship with his peers.Despite these failings, I think this biography provides an extremely vivid portrait of Gorky the man and the artist. Although his life was often hard and he died relatively young (at age 48), Gorky emerges from these pages a glorious artist who created art that was both self-consciously derivative and highly original. Go figure!

When I bought this book I didn’t realize it was a 400 page life story of Gorky. Although they do have some pictures of his work it is mainly a book very intimate portrayal of his life both good and bad.

I loved the text in the book....even though the beginning chapters were a bit confusing because of the complicated names of people and places. What should have been included is a map of Armenia as it was at the turn of the 19th century. It was also very annoying to keep flipping to the photo sections to look at the paintings in question. These references were not in order. Better to have had the photos reproduced on the pages in which they were pointed out. Since all is in black and white, this could easily have been done. Major disappointment was lack of color reproductions. Most books of this kind have a section with several pages of the artist's works in full color.

Arshile Gorky: His Life and Work An unusually excellent artist biography, fascinating and knowledgeable. Ms Herrera was related to Mr. Gorky through her father's marriage to Gorky's widow. For anyone who is a fan of Gorky's work which stems from his deep passion and knowledge of art, this is a must read. Ms Herrera writes well about the man, his life, and his painting. And since Gorky was one of the most (and certainly one of the finest) painters of the 20th century, this is one of the essential books about art to read. Arshile Gorky: His Life and Work