Louise Bourgeois

by Robert Storr, Paulo Herkenhoff

One of the century's most distinguished artists, Louise Bourgeois is an utterly unique figure. Born in Paris in 1911, Bourgeois spent most of her career receiving little recognition from the art community. She has worked closely to many of the century's key artistic moments, from Surrealism to Abstract Expressionism to feminist art, and yet she remains distinct from all of them. An extraordinarily influential sculptor, she has worked, often experimentally, with materials varying from alabaster, plaster, latex, bronze and marble. Bourgeois is equally admired for her intimate drawings, often combining fragments of text, and her highly personal writings, which often address her long and complex life story. With the backdrop of a conflicted and sexually complicated family upbringing, her struggles as an artist in a world reserved for men, as well as her experiences as a mother, the subject of her work is as broad as the materials in which she expresses them. As a figure of outstanding significance in contemporary art, her stature has been recognized by such awards as the American National Medal of the Arts (1991), the French Grand Prix National de Sculpture (1991) and the Venice Biennale's Golden Lion Prize (1999), among others.

Critic Paulo Herkenhoff (with Thyra Goodeve) has been in discussion with Bourgeois for many years. Topics in their Interview range from her troubled relationship with her father, to men's fashions, to her recollections of Marcel Duchamp, whom she knew personally. Critic and curator Robert Storr's Survey chronicles the unique trajectory of Bourgeois' work and life from a highly personal point of view. In his Focus, critic Allan Schwartzman concentrates on Cell (You Better Grow Up) (1993), an intense cage-like space. For her Artist's Choice Bourgeois has selected extracts from the novel Bonjour Tristesse (1954) by Francoise Sagan, whose story about a young girl's response to her father's amorous relationships parallels to some degree the artist's own childhood experiences. The Artist's Writings include an early text, 'The Puritan', from 1947, alongside discussions of her own work, autobiographical writings and artist's projects.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, Visual Art

160 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2003

About the author

Robert Storr is an American curator, critic, painter, and writer.

Reviews

[Ocean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic, gorgeous, inspiring!

[Mikey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm never fond of the type of art where if a child or amateur made it, it would not even be considered by the critics- but as long as the artist has social prestige, it's considered genius. Although I find much of Bourgeois' art to fall under this category alongside people like Roman Signer or Mark Rothko, I nonetheless find her to be extremely interesting. The few sculptures that I like of hers I love however, such as her spiders creepily named mama, the golden "arch of hysteria," and her haunting sphinxlike "nature study" or "she-fox" which bring to mind some kind of strange archeological discovery. This book provides a lot of great insight into the artist, allowing room for both interpretations of her art by various critics and how she feels about it in her own words. She's a rather spooky and eccentric person, doing things like taking breaks from the interview to smell perfume and creating grisly, terrifying sculptures of disembodied human genitalia. I do wish this book had more pictures as I found it references works in the text that it does not always show, or shows later. Overall, it's a solid representation of the artist and offers valuable insight into her work. However, it could certainly be more thorough, particularly in its inclusion of illustrations

[Jessi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Her art was beautiful, graceful, seductive, and haunting. This is an excellent resource.

[Mills College Library]

709.2 B772s 2003