Calvin Tomkins

Tomkins's collection of his firsthand observations of the art world as he reported them for The New Yorker includes a piece on the importance of corporate collecting and offers a look behind the scenes at the gallery of Leo Castelli.

The Art World of the 1980s

Post- to Neo-

Giovanni Garcia-Fenech 

While this book might be an accurate account of what was happening in the New York art world of the '80s, the "Post- to Neo-" part is misleading--most of the essays deal with figures from earlier eras, including Noguchi, Picasso, Frank Stella, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, and Leo Castelli; maybe three articles deal with young artists who emerged that decade. It's a little like calling a book Punk and New Wave and having it deal mostly with the Rolling Stones and Aretha Franklin. That said, Tomkins is a good writer: smart, thorough, and amusing.

Post- to Neo- The Art World of the 1980s

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