Nancy Princenthal

Over the course of a career that spanned fifty years, Agnes Martin's austere, serene work anticipated and helped to define Minimalism, even as she battled psychological crises and carved out a solitary existence in the American Southwest. 'I paint with my back to the world', she claimed; when she died at ninety-two, in Taos, New Mexico, it is said she had not read a newspaper in half a century. Nancy Princenthal tells her whole story chronologically - from Martin's birth in Saskatchewan and her early years as an artist, living in derelict Manhattan shipping lofts as neighbour to Jasper Johns, Ellsworth Kelly and others of their ilk; to the seven years she stopped painting, just as her career was taking off; the months she spent roaming the country in a pick-up truck; and her last thirty years, in Taos, in an adobe house she built with her own hands. Nancy Princenthal has written the essential Agnes Martin biography; a must-read for anyone interested in abstract painting or the history of women artists in America.

Her Life and Art

Agnes Martin

Sue Scott

Helaine Posner

Eleanor Heartney

The Reckoning: Women Artists of the New Millennium

Women Who Transformed Contemporary Art

After the Revolution

Andreas Huyssen

Carlos Basualdo

Doris Salcedo

A contemplation of the renowned Colombian artist's uncanny sculptural works.

Dodie Bellamy

Lisa Jarnot

Alice Notley

Anne Waldman

C. S. Giscombe

Bernadette Mayer

David Antin

Kerry E. Sherin

Janet Zweig

Ron Silliman

Memoir/anti-memoir

A groundbreaking exploration of how women artists of the 1970s combined art and protest to make sexual violence visible, creating a new kind of art in the process.

Unspeakable Acts

A groundbreaking exploration of how women artists of the 1970s combined art and protest to make sexual violence visible, creating a new kind of art in the process, now in paperback.

Unspeakable Acts: Women, Art, and Sexual Violence in the 1970s

Mary Jane Jacob

Alfredo Jaar

Essays by Nancy Princenthal and Mary Jane Jacob.

The Fire this Time : Public Interventions 1979-2005

The authors of After the Revolution return with an incisive study of the work of contemporary women artists. In After the Revolution, the authors concluded that "The battles may not all have been won . . . but barricades are gradually coming down, and work proceeds on all fronts in glorious profusion." Now, with The Reckoning, authors Heartney, Posner, Princenthal, and Scott bring into focus the accomplishments of 24 acclaimed international women artists born since 1960 who have benefited from the groundbreaking efforts of their predecessors. The book is organized in four thematic sections: "Bad Girls" profiles artists whose work represents an assault on conventional notions of gender and racial difference. "History Lessons" offers reflections on the self in the context of history and globalization. "Spellbound" focuses on women’s embrace of the irrational, subjective, and surreal, while "Domestic Disturbances" takes on women's conflicted relationship to home, family, and security. Written in lively prose and fully illustrated throughout, this book gives an informed account of the wonderful diversity of recent contemporary art by women. "An indispensable contribution to the literature on contemporary art by women." (Whitney Chadwick, author of Women, Art and Society) "In the 2007 book After the Revolution: Women Who Transformed Contemporary Art, [the authors] set a new standard in documenting and evaluating the work of a dozen key women artists, spanning generations between the 1960s to the 2000s. . . The beat goes on with the appearance of The Reckoning, written by the same authors in the same accessible scholarly style, but reflecting important historical changes over the past decade and more. In line with the increased presence of women in mainstream art, the book includes twice as many artists as its predecessor. And its global reach has expanded vastly, stretching from Europe and the Americas to Africa and China." (Holland Cotter, The New York Times)

Women Artists of the New Millennium

The Reckoning

"Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?" asked the prominent art historian Linda Nochlin in a provocative 1971 essay. Today her insightful critique serves as a benchmark against which the progress of women artists may be measured. In this book, four prominent critics and curators describe the impact of women artists on contemporary art since the advent of the feminist movement.

Arthur C. Danto

Robert Storr

Richard Shiff

Robert Mangold

Sylvia Plimack Mangold

The majestic abstract paintings of the accomplished contemporary artist.

Bill Ivey

Jennifer Dowley

Two insiders provide powerful insight into this often controversial government program, revealing how artists are selected for awards and discussing the numerous success stories of artists whose careers were enhanced by its support.

A History of the National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artists' Fellowship Program

Creative Legacy

Glenn O'Brien

Trinie Dalton

Chris J. Martin

Drawing on inspiration from Buddhism to Amy Winehouse, Chris Martin creates bold abstract works that explore the unknowable psychological tendencies of art. His canvases are characterized by flat-yet-textured planes of saturated color, and will often incorporate found materials and highly personal paper ephemera. Works such as Untitled (2013) demonstrate the influence of Pablo Picasso's collages, and his canvases' strong geometries also elaborate a self-proclaimed attachment to Piet Mondrian. Martin's practice came of age in 1980s New York, which saw the explosion of the East Village art scene, led by Keith Haring. This monograph collects texts by Glenn O'Brien, Nancy Princenthal, Trinie Dalton and Dan Nadel: in detail essays are focused on Chris Martin as a young man in he 1970s (Glenn O'Brien); on Brooklyn in the 1990s and Martin's influence in the 2000s (Dan Nadel); on Chris Martin and the history of New York abstraction (Nancy Princenthal) and on the culture that has informed Chris Martin (Trinie Dalton).

Chris Martin

The first biography of visionary artist Agnes Martin, one of the most original and influential painters of the postwar period Over the course of a career that spanned fifty years, Agnes Martin’s austere, serene work anticipated and helped to define Minimalism, even as she battled psychological crises and carved out a solitary existence in the American Southwest. Martin identified with the Abstract Expressionists but her commitment to linear geometry caused her to be associated in turn with Minimalist, feminist, and even outsider artists. She moved through some of the liveliest art communities of her time while maintaining a legendary reserve. “I paint with my back to the world,” she says both at the beginning and at the conclusion of a documentary filmed when she was in her late eighties. When she died at ninety-two, in Taos, New Mexico, it is said she had not read a newspaper in half a century. No substantial critical monograph exists on this acclaimed artist—the recipient of two career retrospectives as well as the National Medal of the Arts—who was championed by critics as diverse in their approaches as Lucy Lippard, Lawrence Alloway, and Rosalind Krauss. Furthermore, no attempt has been made to describe her extraordinary life. The whole engrossing story, told here for the first time, Agnes Martin is essential reading for anyone interested in abstract art or the history of women artists in America.

Agnes Martin: Her Life and Art

Nancy Princenthal

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