Paintings

by Stan Rice

Vivid, passionate, primitive - 113 paintings by the poet Stan Rice. Here, his canvases explore the terrain of his poetry, as he captures the familiar and the mythical, the magical and the everyday.
Here are legendary beasts, card players; images inspired by Greek myths, Bible stories, nursery rhymes. Some pay homage to objects - others to living things. They belong to no contemporary school. They are at once childlike, ironic, and darkly humorous - paintings that attest to the original vision of a talented poet and painter.

112 pages, Hardcover

First published October 28, 1997

About the author

Stan Rice was an American poet and artist and husband of writer Anne Rice (married 1961). He was a Professor of English and Creative Writing at San Francisco State University and retired as Chairman of the Creative Writing Department in 1989. Stan Rice died from brain cancer and was survived by his wife, novelist Anne Rice and son, author Christopher Rice.

It was the death of the couple's first child, daughter Michele (1966-1972), at age six of leukemia, which sparked Stan Rice's becoming a published author. His first book of poems, based on her illness and death, was titled Some Lamb, and was published in 1975. He encouraged his wife to quit her work as a waitress, cook and theater usher in order to devote herself full time to her writing.

Both encouraged their son, Christopher, to write as well.

He is entombed in Metairie Cemetery in New Orleans.