Art in Its Own Terms: Selected Criticism 1935-1975According to the important American poet John Ashbery, "To read Fairfield Porter is to rediscover art through the eyes of someone whose intuitive love and understanding of it has been matched by few contemporaries," while fellow New York School poet Barbara Guest wrote, "Blunt, intuitive, scholarly, inspired--I believe no other critic has so tackled the meaning of twentieth century art, has tightened our vision of it." Known as one of America's finest and most influential painters, Fairfield Porter (1907-1975) was also a prolific and highly insightful art critic. His writing not only reflects the independent, original mind that presided over his own visual works, but also covers an extraordinary period in American art, in which he played the double role of protagonist and witness. This new edition of Art in Its Own Terms restores to print a key statement in the ongoing discussion between Modern art and its past, as Porter reviews such figures as de Kooning, Johns, Cornell, Rodin, Cézanne, Leonardo and many others. Equally seminal are his considerations of the relations between art and science and art and politics. Rackstraw Downes' introduction beautifully sets the stage for this indispensable and wide-ranging volume. |
Contents
LIST OF PLATES | 9 |
INTRODUCTION | 19 |
CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS | 36 |
Copyright | |
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Common terms and phrases
abstract painting aesthetic Alex Katz Alfred Leslie American painting architecture Armory Show art criticism ARTnews attention beautiful believe Bonnard CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO century Cézanne color contour Cubism Degas DIEGO THE LIBRARIES drawing Eakins Elaine de Kooning emotion exhibition existence experience expressed Expressionism Fairfield Porter figure French Gallery Greek human idea Impressionism Impressionists Italian Jane Freilicher Jasper Johns John Joseph Cornell Kooning Kooning's landscape LIBRARIES SAN DIEGO light logic look material Matisse matter means medium modern art Mondrian murals Museum nature ness non-objective painting object Oil on canvas organized painters Photo photographs Picasso poet portrait present realist reality Review revolution Richard Stankiewicz Rothko SAN DIEGO Sargent scientific sculpture seems sense separate social society space Stankiewicz tactile texture things thought tion tradition ture UNIVERSITY Vuillard watercolors Whistler whole Willem de Kooning workers York School