Art Book Group

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April 17 – “With Darkness Came Stars” by Audrey Flack
Only in the darkest moments of our lives do the brightest stars appear. An artist, mother, teacher, and rebel, Audrey Flack is counted among the most important American artists of the twentieth century. In With Darkness Came Stars, she recounts and reflects upon a life fully lived. Flack came up in the New York art scene when the city was fast becoming a world arts center. She had a studio in the Bowery and frequented the Cedar Tavern, where she rubbed elbows with Jackson Pollock, Willem and Elaine de Kooning, Grace Hartigan, and other giants of the Abstract Expressionist movement. After leaving that scene and starting a family, she spearheaded Photorealist painting, alongside the likes of Chuck Close and Richard Estes.Flack has lived a remarkable life, successfully navigating a vibrant and virulently sexist art world

May 15 – “Raphael – Painter in Rome” by Stephanie Storey
Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling is one of the most iconic masterpieces of the Renaissance. Here, in Raphael, Painter in Rome, Storey tells of its creation as never before: through the eyes of Michelangelo’s fiercest rival—the young, beautiful, brilliant painter of perfection, Raphael. Orphaned at age eleven, Raphael is determined to keep the deathbed promise he made to his father: become the greatest artist in history. But to be the best, he must beat the best, the legendary sculptor of the David, Michelangelo Buonarroti. When Pope Julius II calls both artists down to Rome, they are pitted against each other: Michelangelo painting the Sistine Ceiling, while Raphael decorates the pope’s private apartments. As Raphael strives toward perfection in paint, he battles internal demons: his desperate ambition, crippling fear of imperfection, and unshakable loneliness. Along the way, he conspires with cardinals, scrambles through the ruins of ancient Rome, and falls in love with a baker’s-daughter-turned-prostitute who becomes his muse.

June 19 – “I Always Loved You”  A Story of Mary Cassatt and Edgar Degas by Robin Oliveira
A novel. The young Mary Cassatt never thought moving to Paris after the Civil War to be an artist was going to be easy, but when, after a decade of work, her submission to the Paris Salon is rejected, Mary’s fierce determination wavers. Her father is begging her to return to Philadelphia to find a husband before it is too late, her sister Lydia is falling mysteriously ill, and worse, Mary is beginning to doubt herself. Then one evening a friend introduces her to Edgar Degas and her life changes forever. Years later she will learn that he had begged for the introduction, but in that moment their meeting seems a miracle. So begins the defining period of her life and the most tempestuous of relationships.
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Bring names of books to consider.  Books should be about art or artists, fiction or non-fiction.  Also please have a little blurb about the book.  Ahead of the meeting, any books you are considering should be sent to wpw@womenpainterswest.org