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Austin Osman Spare: The Life and Legend of London’s Lost Artist
London has harboured many curious characters, but few more curious than the artist and visionary Austin Osman Spare (1886-1956). A controversial enfant terrible of the Edwardian art world, the young Spare was hailed as a genius and a new Aubrey Beardsley, while George Bernard Shaw reportedly said “Spare’s medicine is too strong for the average man.” But Spare was never made for worldly success and he went underground, falling out of the gallery system to live in poverty and obscurity south of the river. Absorbed in occultism and sorcery, voyaging into inner dimensions and surrounding himself with cats and familiar spirits, he continued to produce extraordinary art while developing a magical philosophy of pleasure, obsession, and the subjective nature of reality. Today Spare is both forgotten and famous, a cult figure whose modest life has been much mythologised since his death. This groundbreaking biographical study offers wide-ranging insights into Spare’s art, mind and world, reconnecting him with the art history that ignored him and exploring his parallel London; a bygone place of pub pianists, wealthy alchemists and monstrous owls. “…an elegant and comprehensive biography… [Baker's] deep sympathy for his subject is nicely balanced by his scepticism towards some of Spare’s sources of esoteric thought. There is a wealth of detail here … A stunning tribute to an unjustly neglected artist.” – Noel Rooney, Fortean Times ‘I cannot recommend Austin Osman Spare too highly. Phil Baker has done a wonderful job of bringing the complexities and contradictions of Spare’s life to the fore, and in making the London of Spare’s time come to life vividly and richly. Hopefully this book will encourage a reassessment of Spare which is long overdue’ – Phil Hine
323 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
July 18, 2014
AOS is such an enigma
Two years before the publication of the work, I had the opportunity to ask one of the leading authorities on Austin Osman Spare if he thought there would ever be a definitive biography of AOS . " I hope there never will be " was his passionate response. I was surprised and somewhat confused. How could a man who dedicated so much his life to research and proliferation of this amazing artist's life and work hold such an opinion. Years later when I enthusiastically dove into this work I begin to understand and sympathize with his points of view.
AOS is such an enigma that what fragments of his life and work remain quickly becomes fodder for our own personal mythology of the man.Baker’s biography of AOS succeeds on many levels, but falls victim to this very tendency. Readers unfamiliar with AOS may find this biography compelling but those of us who are familiar with his work and hold him in high regard may be disturbed by the author's impressions of AOS.
Baker, perhaps subconsciously uses the many blank spaces and unknown aspects of AOS’s life to paint his own narrative, and form seemingly solid opinions about topics that are intrinsically nebulous.
An example that pops up many times in the biography is AOS’s tendency to enrich stories of events from his past, or remember ( fabricate) events only years after their occurrence... It is these deficits, that we all suffer from on one level (and especially in the generation that survived WWI) that Baker uses to paint a portrait of Spare as a trickster, a charlatan & a fabricator of tales, a kind of evil and perverse old uncle.
Fortunately the preceding works about AOS named below paint a much more favorable portrait, in the words of those who actually knew AOS over his lifetime. It is in works like these, and Spare’s own writing, that I would invite those who possess imagination and an open mind to create their own personal mythology of the enigma that was a Austin Osman Spare.
Recommended
BOROUGH SATYR: The Life and Art of Austin Osman Spare. Ansell, Robert. (comp. & ed.)
London: Fulgur Limited, 2005
THE IMAGES AND ORACLES OF AUSTIN OSMAN SPARE by Kenneth Grant
London: Fulgur Ltd., 2003
ZOS-KIA: An Introductory Essay on the Art and Sorcery of Austin Osman Spare by Semple, Gavin.
London: Fulgur, 1995
THE BOOK OF PLEASURE: The Psychology of Ecstasy Spare, Austin Osman. (With Michael Staley and a excellent introduction by Alan Moor)
London: Jerusalem Press, 2011
Two years before the publication of the work, I had the opportunity to ask one of the leading authorities on Austin Osman Spare if he thought there would ever be a definitive biography of AOS . " I hope there never will be " was his passionate response. I was surprised and somewhat confused. How could a man who dedicated so much his life to research and proliferation of this amazing artist's life and work hold such an opinion. Years later when I enthusiastically dove into this work I begin to understand and sympathize with his points of view.
AOS is such an enigma that what fragments of his life and work remain quickly becomes fodder for our own personal mythology of the man.Baker’s biography of AOS succeeds on many levels, but falls victim to this very tendency. Readers unfamiliar with AOS may find this biography compelling but those of us who are familiar with his work and hold him in high regard may be disturbed by the author's impressions of AOS.
Baker, perhaps subconsciously uses the many blank spaces and unknown aspects of AOS’s life to paint his own narrative, and form seemingly solid opinions about topics that are intrinsically nebulous.
An example that pops up many times in the biography is AOS’s tendency to enrich stories of events from his past, or remember ( fabricate) events only years after their occurrence... It is these deficits, that we all suffer from on one level (and especially in the generation that survived WWI) that Baker uses to paint a portrait of Spare as a trickster, a charlatan & a fabricator of tales, a kind of evil and perverse old uncle.
Fortunately the preceding works about AOS named below paint a much more favorable portrait, in the words of those who actually knew AOS over his lifetime. It is in works like these, and Spare’s own writing, that I would invite those who possess imagination and an open mind to create their own personal mythology of the enigma that was a Austin Osman Spare.
Recommended
BOROUGH SATYR: The Life and Art of Austin Osman Spare. Ansell, Robert. (comp. & ed.)
London: Fulgur Limited, 2005
THE IMAGES AND ORACLES OF AUSTIN OSMAN SPARE by Kenneth Grant
London: Fulgur Ltd., 2003
ZOS-KIA: An Introductory Essay on the Art and Sorcery of Austin Osman Spare by Semple, Gavin.
London: Fulgur, 1995
THE BOOK OF PLEASURE: The Psychology of Ecstasy Spare, Austin Osman. (With Michael Staley and a excellent introduction by Alan Moor)
London: Jerusalem Press, 2011
March 16, 2012
Efforts to rescue Austin Osman Spare from obscurity have proceeded apace over the last decade or so. There’s been a plethora of exhibitions, catalogues and books devoted to the analysis of his art and contributions to contemporary occultism. Phil Baker’s new biography fills a welcome gap in the development of “Spare Studies” by shedding some welcome light not only on Spare the artist and occultist, but on his life and the social milieu of his age. Strange Attractor have produced a marvellous book in all respects – the presentation of Spare’s illustrations, the colour plates & the typography quickly leave the reader in no doubt that this is a superb effort, and well worth the asking price; a perfect complement to Phil Baker’s easily and accessible prose style, which whilst vividly evoking the atmosphere of Spare’s London and the unwinding of the tangled threads of his story, never feels laboured or ponderously analytical. Phil Baker deserves our applause for taking on Spare, and as Alan Moore says so eloquently in his introduction:
The Spare that emerges here is quite a different figure from the “occulted” Spare – the romanticised reclusive glimpsed through the fictive arcanums of Kenneth Grant and other primarily occult-oriented treatments.. He is, as Baker remarks, both ahead – and behind – his “time”. Ably steering a course through the maze of mythologies which have accrued around Spare (some from his own tendency to self-mythologise), Phil Baker has unearthed an amazing wealth of biographical detail, such as the fact that Spare was interviewed by the Edwardian boys’ paper Chums, or that he hung out with Cafe Royale regulars such as Andre Raffalovich and John Gray; that E.M. Forster owned an album of Spare erotica, or that some of his friends considered him to be a repressed homosexual. Some of Baker’s presentation may be perturbing for those who have worked hard to slot Spare into the contemporary occultism’s self-image. Baker at times demolishes or at the very least provides a different perspective on Spare’s mythos, showing for example that Spare was more influenced by Theosophy, Spiritualism and Buddhism than he was by the Golden Dawn or Crowley, and his psychology owes much more to Frederick Myers than to Freud or Jung. There are a few eye-openers along the way, such as Spare’s brief marriage, and the possibility that he had some kind of fling with Crowley. There are also quite funny moments, such as Spare writing to Kenneth Grant and asking him for a definition of apparently unfamiliar terms such as “Qlipoth” or “Besz-Mass”.
Spare comes across as a warm-hearted and deeply social person, whose relationship with his early degree of stardom was at times quite conflicted – it was not the simple matter of Spare turning his back on society in the way that it is often represented to be. In a way, he reminds me of another early hero of mine – Syd Barrett, who also found the pressures of sudden stardom difficult. Spare at times seems to be happy in his self-imposed exile; at other times yearning for the bright lights of his earlier success.
I cannot reccomend “Austin Osman Spare” too highly. Phil Baker has done a wonderful job of bringing the complexities and contradictions of Spare’s life to the fore, and in making the London of Spare’s time come to life vividly and richly. Hopefully this book will encourage a reassessment of Spare which is long overdue, both in terms of his place in British art and his influence on occultism.
“….shines a light upon the artist and the individual that is at once sufficiently bright to illuminate the foggier and more occluded corners of Spare’s life, whilst at the same time being soft enough to never quite dispell or scare away the ragged phantoms that surround Spare like a robe of ectoplasm..”
The Spare that emerges here is quite a different figure from the “occulted” Spare – the romanticised reclusive glimpsed through the fictive arcanums of Kenneth Grant and other primarily occult-oriented treatments.. He is, as Baker remarks, both ahead – and behind – his “time”. Ably steering a course through the maze of mythologies which have accrued around Spare (some from his own tendency to self-mythologise), Phil Baker has unearthed an amazing wealth of biographical detail, such as the fact that Spare was interviewed by the Edwardian boys’ paper Chums, or that he hung out with Cafe Royale regulars such as Andre Raffalovich and John Gray; that E.M. Forster owned an album of Spare erotica, or that some of his friends considered him to be a repressed homosexual. Some of Baker’s presentation may be perturbing for those who have worked hard to slot Spare into the contemporary occultism’s self-image. Baker at times demolishes or at the very least provides a different perspective on Spare’s mythos, showing for example that Spare was more influenced by Theosophy, Spiritualism and Buddhism than he was by the Golden Dawn or Crowley, and his psychology owes much more to Frederick Myers than to Freud or Jung. There are a few eye-openers along the way, such as Spare’s brief marriage, and the possibility that he had some kind of fling with Crowley. There are also quite funny moments, such as Spare writing to Kenneth Grant and asking him for a definition of apparently unfamiliar terms such as “Qlipoth” or “Besz-Mass”.
Spare comes across as a warm-hearted and deeply social person, whose relationship with his early degree of stardom was at times quite conflicted – it was not the simple matter of Spare turning his back on society in the way that it is often represented to be. In a way, he reminds me of another early hero of mine – Syd Barrett, who also found the pressures of sudden stardom difficult. Spare at times seems to be happy in his self-imposed exile; at other times yearning for the bright lights of his earlier success.
I cannot reccomend “Austin Osman Spare” too highly. Phil Baker has done a wonderful job of bringing the complexities and contradictions of Spare’s life to the fore, and in making the London of Spare’s time come to life vividly and richly. Hopefully this book will encourage a reassessment of Spare which is long overdue, both in terms of his place in British art and his influence on occultism.
December 15, 2014
Little is known about enigmatic artist Austin Osman Spare, and Phil Baker does an excellent job sorting through myth and reality in this biography. An unenviable task in some ways, Baker goes out of his way to point out inconsistencies and half-truths in the lore surrounding Spare, much of it propagated by the artist himself. The resulting portrait is incomplete by necessity though still manages to give the reader a sense of Spare and the obsessions that drew him down a rabbit hole of introspection. Meticulously researched, insightful, and well-written, I recommend this book to anyone interested in Spare's art or the occult.
September 17, 2024
I’ve yet to read a bad book published by Strange Attractor and this is no exception, a perceptive and warm book about an astonishing figure who must be incredibly hard to write about. It has plenty of surprising cameos but I particularly enjoyed the references to Enoch Soames which seems wildly appropriate considering the sometimes slippery nature of truth and fiction in Spare’s biography
April 22, 2012
Indispensable book for any serious student of A.O.S.. Baker shakes the dirt off the long dead master magician /artist and reveals a very human Spare. I seriously could not put this down.
August 22, 2024
I love a good biography and this one was truly a joy to read, although Spare remains a mystery, still
August 6, 2019
This review was previously posted on the Side Real Press website in 2011.
I have been a fan of the artist Austin Osman Spare (1886-1956) for many years now and was really looking forward to this biography.
I am very pleased to say that it does not let me down. Baker has done an excellent and (judging by the bibliography) thorough job assembling as many sources as possible on Spare and then trying to make sense of it all, a job made difficult because Spare, and his previous biographer Kenneth Grant, were both individuals who knew how to tell, or invent, a good story when it suited. This needed to be unravelled, as whilst Spares posthumous reputation owes a huge amount to the Grants, their works have a magickal agenda which has fed the myth of the occultist/artist and often uses language/concepts that are daunting for the general reader.
Of course Spares magical philosophy underpins much of his artwork, and Baker plays a decent hand of explaining it in layman's terms. This is no mean feat as Spares writings are, at times, very difficult to grasp, often using words or terms invented or misunderstood by the writer himself which makes life, and sentence structure, difficult for the reader.
The 'legend' is that Spare was a feted very early in his career and decided to withdraw from the world to practise his art in relative reclusiveness. Whilst the first part is certainly true, the latter hides a sadder story. Baker suggests that Spare was actually an artist 'out of time' in that his idiosyncratic style(s) were really just behind the times, his early work too '1890s', in that he acknowledged spirits and automatic drawing; while his later work was not 'modernist' enough; and/or his subject matter too grotesque. Baker notes how many of the newspaper reviews speak of Spares work (with the benefit of hindsight of course) as being great but that the material under review was too odd or old fashioned in style.
Spare was fortunate to have a number of patrons and enthusiastic collectors and friends through the years, ranging from George Raffalovich, through Hannen Swaffer, Dennis Bardens, Frank Letchford and of course the Grants (Steffi and Kenneth) though generally speaking it seems that their help only just kept Spare from the metaphorical workhouse as he seems chronically short of money from the mid 1920s. Spare could have made a decent living painting portraits (Baker rightly points to his paintings of London 'types' as among his best works) but he was unwilling to work outside his various studios (ie his flats) and potential clients probably baulked at visiting them as they sound pretty squalid. Bakers descriptions are very evocative of south London immediately post war, and chime well with tales told by my mother who was a social worker in that area at the same time.
Bakers style is direct and down to earth, which are good traits in a biographer. He has affinity with his subject but maintains critical distance. He has certainly discovered a lot of new material and makes the most of it.
The book is a handsome affair a nice format, and selection of colour plates as well as numerous b/w illustrations within the text itself.
Of course every Spare lover will already have it, but this is also essential reading for anyone interested in 'outsider' or 'inspired' artists in the manner of Blake, or with an interest in post war occultism in general. Will this bring him more recognition from the mainstream art world? I fear not. I think it will take a monograph from the likes of Taschen to do that. I hope Baker is sending them a copy.
I have been a fan of the artist Austin Osman Spare (1886-1956) for many years now and was really looking forward to this biography.
I am very pleased to say that it does not let me down. Baker has done an excellent and (judging by the bibliography) thorough job assembling as many sources as possible on Spare and then trying to make sense of it all, a job made difficult because Spare, and his previous biographer Kenneth Grant, were both individuals who knew how to tell, or invent, a good story when it suited. This needed to be unravelled, as whilst Spares posthumous reputation owes a huge amount to the Grants, their works have a magickal agenda which has fed the myth of the occultist/artist and often uses language/concepts that are daunting for the general reader.
Of course Spares magical philosophy underpins much of his artwork, and Baker plays a decent hand of explaining it in layman's terms. This is no mean feat as Spares writings are, at times, very difficult to grasp, often using words or terms invented or misunderstood by the writer himself which makes life, and sentence structure, difficult for the reader.
The 'legend' is that Spare was a feted very early in his career and decided to withdraw from the world to practise his art in relative reclusiveness. Whilst the first part is certainly true, the latter hides a sadder story. Baker suggests that Spare was actually an artist 'out of time' in that his idiosyncratic style(s) were really just behind the times, his early work too '1890s', in that he acknowledged spirits and automatic drawing; while his later work was not 'modernist' enough; and/or his subject matter too grotesque. Baker notes how many of the newspaper reviews speak of Spares work (with the benefit of hindsight of course) as being great but that the material under review was too odd or old fashioned in style.
Spare was fortunate to have a number of patrons and enthusiastic collectors and friends through the years, ranging from George Raffalovich, through Hannen Swaffer, Dennis Bardens, Frank Letchford and of course the Grants (Steffi and Kenneth) though generally speaking it seems that their help only just kept Spare from the metaphorical workhouse as he seems chronically short of money from the mid 1920s. Spare could have made a decent living painting portraits (Baker rightly points to his paintings of London 'types' as among his best works) but he was unwilling to work outside his various studios (ie his flats) and potential clients probably baulked at visiting them as they sound pretty squalid. Bakers descriptions are very evocative of south London immediately post war, and chime well with tales told by my mother who was a social worker in that area at the same time.
Bakers style is direct and down to earth, which are good traits in a biographer. He has affinity with his subject but maintains critical distance. He has certainly discovered a lot of new material and makes the most of it.
The book is a handsome affair a nice format, and selection of colour plates as well as numerous b/w illustrations within the text itself.
Of course every Spare lover will already have it, but this is also essential reading for anyone interested in 'outsider' or 'inspired' artists in the manner of Blake, or with an interest in post war occultism in general. Will this bring him more recognition from the mainstream art world? I fear not. I think it will take a monograph from the likes of Taschen to do that. I hope Baker is sending them a copy.
July 7, 2024
Baker, Phil - Austin Osman Spare: Life And Legend Of London's Lost Artist
Fascinating, frustrating, entertaining, baffling biography.
Primarily because the subject was so elusive. Misremembering, fabricating, or simply confusing.
Spare, whose cult fame continues to rise, was an artist and occultist spanning the Edwardian period into the 1950’s. Some of his work mirrors Beardsley, yet the bulk is assuredly his own style.
Baker is on solid footing with the chronology of the man.
With details, anecdotes, history, he confesses when some events are outright dodgy.
Spare, to be kind, was a unreliable source.
Success wise, Spare, like many of us, was generally his own enemy. Perhaps his roots, the premature acclaim as genius, his temperamental encounters with others.
An early Surrealist, dabbler in automatic writing, side real perspective, creator of sigils, acquaintance of Crowley, illustrator of common folk, forgotten people, not the rich nor influential.
Filled with numerous illustrations, color and black and white, although I longed for more.
Overall, enlightening and informative.
Will likely reread.
Fascinating, frustrating, entertaining, baffling biography.
Primarily because the subject was so elusive. Misremembering, fabricating, or simply confusing.
Spare, whose cult fame continues to rise, was an artist and occultist spanning the Edwardian period into the 1950’s. Some of his work mirrors Beardsley, yet the bulk is assuredly his own style.
Baker is on solid footing with the chronology of the man.
With details, anecdotes, history, he confesses when some events are outright dodgy.
Spare, to be kind, was a unreliable source.
Success wise, Spare, like many of us, was generally his own enemy. Perhaps his roots, the premature acclaim as genius, his temperamental encounters with others.
An early Surrealist, dabbler in automatic writing, side real perspective, creator of sigils, acquaintance of Crowley, illustrator of common folk, forgotten people, not the rich nor influential.
Filled with numerous illustrations, color and black and white, although I longed for more.
Overall, enlightening and informative.
Will likely reread.
December 13, 2020
The "shade" alone in this book is worth the read. From Crowley to Gardner to various other of Spares peers throughout the decades, Phil Baker has enough shade to throw for them all. Spare is definitely fleshed out to be more human in this work, and even though we all know how it turned out for him, as I read it there was still a sense of hope that it would turn out differently somehow. "As if" he had one more spell in him to blanket his fans in a new reality where he was able to enjoy the luxuries of both fortune and fame. Baker does an excellent job of setting the stage, socially, culturally, and environmentally, as Spare gets older to show a bigger picture of what was going on at the time and how Spare was influenced by it all. Spare will always be a mystery, but at least now that mystery has a little more color. Thank you to everyone who has recommended other Spare books in these reviews as they will now go on my want list.
October 28, 2019
Until Chaos Magic revived his work during the 1970s and 80s, Austin Osman Spare was a name that was becoming ever more obscure. Born in 1886 in Cheapside, London, Spare was received as a boy genius for his early art. Rejecting the art establishment, however, he is best known for his proto-Surrealist magical art and the invention of sigil magic (later used by British occult Orders the Illuminates of Thanateros and Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth). Phil Baker traces Spare's life, from its promising beginning to its somewhat depressing last few years. Contains lots of images (mostly black and white but also some color), including portraits and visionary drawings and some sigils. For anyone interested in British occultism or modern occultism, this is a book well worth reading.
September 10, 2011
Publicity nor fame fit Austin Osman Spare (AOS). Baker does a fantastic job at giving readers the broad sweeps of AOS, with just enough in the notes and bibliography to provide a hearty research base for beginners and adepts. For AOS it was about the unconscious and the self and his working(s) with automatic methods began well before Breton and the surrealists utilized them. Baker gets it right in aspects of art, in the social fabric of life in London during two wars, and in AOS' relationship with Kenneth and Steffi Grant. AOS obsessives might not find much 'new' material in this biography, but it should open up the landscape for new interpretations.
August 27, 2023
I don't read many, if any, biographies but I have to say this was a pleasure to read. No doubt Spare was an odd character but the times themselves, early 1900s England, seemed equally odd. The writing here is measured. Considering the amount of confabulation (new word!) and mystification that Spare and his apprentices, the Grants, were doing it seems a monumental task to have written this. Woven into his life are well known figures like Hitler, Aleister Cowley, Dali, W. B. Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, along with demons, working class women, sexual escapades, surrealism, and all sorts, making this a bizarre tale worth reading.
December 4, 2022
I really enjoyed the evocation of the London Spare was born into and grew up in.
His life covered such huge societal change, development of art movements, the rise of spiritualism, wars, it is quite astonishing to think of him plowing his own farrow throughout it all.
The insight into his struggles with health and money have added to my consideration of his art and ideas. I am very pleased to have read this book.
His life covered such huge societal change, development of art movements, the rise of spiritualism, wars, it is quite astonishing to think of him plowing his own farrow throughout it all.
The insight into his struggles with health and money have added to my consideration of his art and ideas. I am very pleased to have read this book.
November 16, 2017
"Spare opina que el hombre debe desprenderse de su dependencia de la seguridad material, que le envuelve en convencionalidad, e investigar el subconsciente detrás de su propia máscara.Semejante esfuerzo hacia el macrocosmos capacita al hombre para realizar su potencial íntegramente. Square llama ZOS a lo que el hombre es y puede obtener como individuo. Toda su teoría se basa en la relación existente entre KIA, la energía primaria, y el ZOS, vehículo humano para adquirirla (...) <>"
December 11, 2023
I feel like AOS is someone who has always been tangentially related to so many things I love. He seems to have influenced so many creatives that influenced me. It was nice to read an empathetic biography and learn so many details of his life.
November 7, 2019
half-read
January 6, 2022
One of the only biographical sources for one of the most significant occult figures. A true gem of incalculable value.
Read
July 5, 2022Read half of
December 20, 2023
Excellent look at Spare.
October 14, 2024
This was a really fun book. It goes into a lot of tangents that are only vaguely related to Spare, and they're probably the best part!
October 21, 2024
what a tenuous relationship with truth this guy had!
November 21, 2024
Gotta love Spare
January 31, 2013
Austin Osman Spare was nothing more than a dim name in my knowledge of twentieth century art. After reading Phil Baker’s magisterial history of his life, ‘Austin Osman Spare: The Life and Legend of London’s Lost Artist’, it is hard not to think that Spare should be a burning light in the history of the medium.
Spare was born in London in 1886, to a working class family in Snow Hill, close to Smithfield Market. During his early years he developed an interest in art, but also in theosophy and more esoteric matters, becoming involved with Aleister Crowley and his magical order. Such contacts began to shape Spare’s art – he transformed from being a young man praised to the highest levels in the contemporary art world, to a figure who existed on its periphery who art work confounded and confused many. He was a man ahead of his time, a proto-surrealist, and it has taken time for history to reclaim him. Fate dealt Spare some bad hands, and he suffered a number of set-backs, and for a man who once was believed to have good things in his future, his life ended in penury and obscurity.
It is thanks to a small clutch of ardent Spare-ites, that the life and work of this great man has not become entirely lost to history. As so much of his life was spent outside ‘ordinary’ life, much of his life remains undocumented. This, though, has allowed myth and legend to spring up about Spare – and sometimes it is difficult to tell what is true about him and what is false. Phil Baker has diligently researched as thoroughly as he can, tracking down obscure sources where others might have given up, and so what we have here feels a very authentic portrait of Spare.
His contemporary world might not have been kind to Spare, but history has judged him with kindness: within the last decade there have been gallery shows, and renewed interest in this figure. With much of his life and the world in which he lived now being unfamiliar to many, Phil Baker’s book is the perfect introduction. Be warned, though: it will leave you wanting to know more about Spare (and what more there is to know cannot be much, as Baker seems to have upturned every stone), and to know more about the world at the periphery of Spare’s life: the occult life of London, the poor life of London, about the world that could allow a man such as Spare to live by his own rules. Complemented by a generous spreading of prints of Spare’s work, Phil Baker’s biography is superlative. Highly recommended.
Spare was born in London in 1886, to a working class family in Snow Hill, close to Smithfield Market. During his early years he developed an interest in art, but also in theosophy and more esoteric matters, becoming involved with Aleister Crowley and his magical order. Such contacts began to shape Spare’s art – he transformed from being a young man praised to the highest levels in the contemporary art world, to a figure who existed on its periphery who art work confounded and confused many. He was a man ahead of his time, a proto-surrealist, and it has taken time for history to reclaim him. Fate dealt Spare some bad hands, and he suffered a number of set-backs, and for a man who once was believed to have good things in his future, his life ended in penury and obscurity.
It is thanks to a small clutch of ardent Spare-ites, that the life and work of this great man has not become entirely lost to history. As so much of his life was spent outside ‘ordinary’ life, much of his life remains undocumented. This, though, has allowed myth and legend to spring up about Spare – and sometimes it is difficult to tell what is true about him and what is false. Phil Baker has diligently researched as thoroughly as he can, tracking down obscure sources where others might have given up, and so what we have here feels a very authentic portrait of Spare.
His contemporary world might not have been kind to Spare, but history has judged him with kindness: within the last decade there have been gallery shows, and renewed interest in this figure. With much of his life and the world in which he lived now being unfamiliar to many, Phil Baker’s book is the perfect introduction. Be warned, though: it will leave you wanting to know more about Spare (and what more there is to know cannot be much, as Baker seems to have upturned every stone), and to know more about the world at the periphery of Spare’s life: the occult life of London, the poor life of London, about the world that could allow a man such as Spare to live by his own rules. Complemented by a generous spreading of prints of Spare’s work, Phil Baker’s biography is superlative. Highly recommended.
September 22, 2016
Austin Osman Spare's name is one that is bandied about heavily in certain magical circles. His Book of Pleasure, and his method of sigil making are often the first recommendations when branching out into more experimental paths. Outside of these references, I knew nothing about his quiet genius.
I hadn't even seen any of his art, other than his sigil workings.
I appreciate the author's confession that "[b]iography can only follow its subject so far, especially a character like Spare, whose real life was internal."
Several times Baker moves to another aspect of Spare's life because so little can be proven. What may remain is only heresay, or convoluted stories Spare gave in his later life--perhaps when his grasp of "reality" slipped enough he may not have remembered the facts in "this reality" with clarity.
The best known biographical works about Spare are from Kenneth Grant. Baker's examination of that relationship demonstrates why there may be more than a few instances of mythologizing occurring. Also, Spare's idiosyncratic speech can make parsing out the details, or even the meaning, rather difficult, on a good day. Taking an intellectual stab can only reach so far into the true meat of the answer.
This work shares a love of the subject, and detached enough to examine. Simultaneously offering glimpses, as that is often all we have, at best, then placing these events into a larger context of who he met, befriended, and the times in which he lived to explain their impact, or uniqueness.
How a young man lauded as genius, leaps down the rabbit hole of mental exploration to the point of near complete neglect of his body, nor any-apparent- drive to live in better circumstances. This painter's prodigious output and variety of subject should make him a person of note to anyone concerned for Art. I particularly admire his depth in line drawings--as did many in his lifetime. The cover art is an enthralling example.
My only honest critique of the book is there aren't enough works shown to coincide with works described. A search engine didn't offer as much help as I had hoped. He certainly does his best to offer a mental image so the reader can touch a portion of Spare's genius.
I hadn't even seen any of his art, other than his sigil workings.
I appreciate the author's confession that "[b]iography can only follow its subject so far, especially a character like Spare, whose real life was internal."
Several times Baker moves to another aspect of Spare's life because so little can be proven. What may remain is only heresay, or convoluted stories Spare gave in his later life--perhaps when his grasp of "reality" slipped enough he may not have remembered the facts in "this reality" with clarity.
The best known biographical works about Spare are from Kenneth Grant. Baker's examination of that relationship demonstrates why there may be more than a few instances of mythologizing occurring. Also, Spare's idiosyncratic speech can make parsing out the details, or even the meaning, rather difficult, on a good day. Taking an intellectual stab can only reach so far into the true meat of the answer.
This work shares a love of the subject, and detached enough to examine. Simultaneously offering glimpses, as that is often all we have, at best, then placing these events into a larger context of who he met, befriended, and the times in which he lived to explain their impact, or uniqueness.
How a young man lauded as genius, leaps down the rabbit hole of mental exploration to the point of near complete neglect of his body, nor any-apparent- drive to live in better circumstances. This painter's prodigious output and variety of subject should make him a person of note to anyone concerned for Art. I particularly admire his depth in line drawings--as did many in his lifetime. The cover art is an enthralling example.
My only honest critique of the book is there aren't enough works shown to coincide with works described. A search engine didn't offer as much help as I had hoped. He certainly does his best to offer a mental image so the reader can touch a portion of Spare's genius.
February 23, 2012
A surprisingly detailed biography of one of the most important English occultists and artists of the early twentieth century. Baker manages to draw on many of the characters Spare flirted with throughout his time and gives a fair, if somewhat cynical view at times of their eccentricities.
The book itself is beautifully put together and constantly reminded me of the joy of reading physical books. Highly recommended and makes a good companion piece to Richard Kaczynsk's biography of Aleister Crowley.
The book itself is beautifully put together and constantly reminded me of the joy of reading physical books. Highly recommended and makes a good companion piece to Richard Kaczynsk's biography of Aleister Crowley.
July 17, 2011
Engaging examination of the life, artwork and times of a unique and uncompromising artist. Includes examples of Spare's artwork throughout his career, with some particularly striking color portraits. Provides intriguing glimpses into the characters, circumstances, and creative forces in Spare's life.
May 8, 2025
The best bit is of him dressing up as Crowley and posing about town making fun of "the Great Beast"! Also, having an unexploded bomb land in his living room during WWII AND how he just kept stepping around it as if all was well!
If you've had ANY interest in 20th Century occult figures, you need this.
If you've had ANY interest in 20th Century occult figures, you need this.
May 23, 2016
I really enjoyed every aspect about this sad but beautiful artist. The book is written with little bias but a lot of enthusiasm. Definitely worth it to try and get inside the many layers of Spare's mind.
July 19, 2014
i would like to an edition with more of his art.
but a wonderful book none the less.
but a wonderful book none the less.
October 7, 2014
Provisional review. Did not finish, hope to get back to it.
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