Jed Perl

Alexander Calder is one of the most beloved and widely admired artists of the twentieth century. Anybody who has ever set foot in a museum knows him as the inventor of the mobile, America's unique contribution to modern art. But only now, forty years after the artist's death, is the full story of his life being told in this biography,which is based on unprecedented access to Calder's letters and papers as well as scores of interviews. Jed Perl shows...

"From one of our most astute art critics, an impassioned and elegant book that questions the demand for art's political relevance or its need to deliver a message, and insists on its power to take us out of the everyday world, and its most important role: to excite, disturb, inspire or unsettle us. As more and more critics and enthusiasts insist that art needs to promote a particular idea or message, be it political or social, as a brand, a means...

Watteau, one of the most mysterious painters who ever lived, is the inspiration for this delightful investigation of the tangled relationship between art and life.

Multum in Parvo highlights the complex relationship between scale and size in the oeuvre of Alexander Calder (18981976) over a period of more than 30 years. As its title--translating to much in little--implies, the volume features over 40 rare small-scale sculptures, ranging from the size of a thumb to 30 inches tall, all of which feature the same physical qualities as Calders largest mobiles in the most miniature of detail. In addition to archival...