Books
Writing from Another World
Eric Baus’s sentences follow the rules of grammar, but something inexplicable happens by the time you reach the end.
John Yau
John Yau is an award winning poet, critic, curator, and publisher of Black Square Editions. He has published over 50 books of poetry, fiction, and art criticism.
Art
The Independent Spirit of Herbert Gentry
Gentry was one of a number of Black artists who had to navigate the art world’s demand to emphasize their racial identity in the “right” way.
Art
Rudy Burckhardt’s Innocent Eye
Burckhardt was never surreptitious; he did not hide his camera, and his subjects often knew they were being photographed.
Art
Some Thoughts About England’s Obsession With Portraits
With the possible exception of Howard Hodgkin, not a single English abstract artist has attained anything comparable to the status achieved by Lucien Freud or David Hockney.
Books
Did You Know That Robert Hershon Is a Major Poet?
I cannot think of another contemporary poet who is willing to expose his vulnerability, worry, and pettiness through the lens of humor.
Art
The Chance Meeting of Robert Rauschenberg and Coho Salmon in a Dream
Everything connects; you just have to find out how.
Art
Steve DiBenedetto’s Raw Nerves
Whatever the impulse that initiated the paintings, DiBenedetto clearly works everything out on the surface.
Art
George Condo’s Cutism
Condo’s paintings play to his viewers’ sense of superiority; it gives them something to smile at without thinking too deeply into the work.
Art
Anne Truitt’s Spiritual Quest
As her death approached, was the artist starting fresh or beginning to let go?
Art
Eric Fischl’s Privileged Bubble
Fischl finds a visual bond between the seclusion of the affluent white world and the pandemic’s enforced isolation.
Art
Theaster Gates and the Shapes of Black History
Gates reminds us of the many hidden, unacknowledged, and under-recognized histories of Black culture in America.
Art
Peter Saul, American Gadfly
Before he turned 30, it was clear that Saul had found his subject: an American society deeply rooted in consumerism, pervasive racism, and toxic masculinity.