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Loading... Modernists & Mavericks: Bacon, Freud, Hockney and the London Painters (edition 2019)by Martin Gayford (Author)
Work InformationModernists and Mavericks: Bacon, Freud, Hockney and the London Painters by Martin Gayford
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The development of painting in London from the Second World War to the 1970s has never before been told before as a single narrative. R. B. Kitaj's proposal, made in 1976, that there was a 'substantial School of London' was essentially correct but it caused confusion because it implied that there was a movement or stylistic group at work, when in reality no one style could cover the likes of Francis Bacon and also Bridget Riley. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)759.2The arts Painting History, geographic treatment, biography England and British IslesLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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I guess the topic is always overshadowed by the big three of the title and the reader is possibly expecting more about them. To his credit Martin Gayford sticks to his guns and puts them in context.
The writer, perhaps to his credit, uses a wide variety of sentence types which makes reading easier. But it is his longer ones with the use of em-dashes (long ones) which are challenging. They occasionally have one reading a sentence several times to get the meaning. An example:
p.6 Nonetheless, that such a record could be set at all makes a point: painting done in London in the decades after the Second World War has come to seem hugely more significant - internationally - than it did, for the most part, when it was being created.
The reader is called on to observe what happened - he or she can only truly see what happened in this period by looking at the works of these painters. Perhaps Gayford's book is required reading before looking again.