Black Angel The Life Of Arshile Gorky [Hardcover]

 

 

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Nouritza Matossian's Black Angel: A Life of Arhile Gorky is for the most part a riveting read on a difficult artist. It is easy to dismiss Gorky's mature style as just the latest Abstract Expressionist fashion when in fact it preceded many of that movement's most important works, serving in the process as a bridge from surrealism to abstract expressionism. Perhaps more than any other contemporary abstract painters, Gorky's background is crucial in terms of understanding his artistic vision. As such, Matossian does an incredible job of giving the reader the entire scope of this background, sometimes to the point of tedium. The book,however, though over 500 pages long, has an easy pace to it for the most part, and definitely lets the reader in on what surely must have been one of the most frustrating lives, from beginning to end, of any major artist in the 20th century. Gut-wrenching at times, Matossian's portrait of Gorky's life is a miracle: juxtaposing the lyrical work he produced with the unfortunate string of incidents that plagued this sensitive human being. If you are interested in understanding more about Arshile Gorky, then the sheer scope of this undertaking is a great place to start.

Allow me to add an "amen" to the previous reviews. Matossian's background in Armenian culture is a great advantage in exploring Gorky's childhood, and her obvious patience in organizing material from the many first-hand interviews of Gorky's survivors pays off in a vivid, scrupulously detailed account of his rise and cataclysmic final years. As an arist I brought a huge respect and admiration for Gorky's work to the book, and wasn't disappointed to find that the Gorky the author describes matches the intensity and dazzle and complexity of the works. So vivid was her writing that the ending left me moved almost to tears. This is our American Van Gogh, a giant arguably greater than Pollock, and his story is one of the great tragic--and ultimately triumphant--dramas in all of biography.

I read this book during a recent illness and I am glad of it because I was able to concentrate fully and stay within the world which the author so skilfully evokes. I have rarely found a biography of an artist, especially a modern one, so lovingly and painstakingly portrayed with brushstrokes just like a painter to produce image after image and make the man come alive in such an engaging way. I learned about the history of the ARMENIANS but through his eyes and yet the scholarship and objectivity shone through. So many insights and beautiful stories, such a strong sense of place, whether in long-lost Armenia or Boston of the 20s or New YOrk of the 30s and 4os , the characters who weave through this incredible tapestry, no a carpet. This writer belongs to the tradition of Armenian troubadours who were storytellers and sang their songs in verse in many languages. I felt the narrative had a poetic lilt and yet she kept back her obvious involvement in the subject. In her introduction which is worthy of attention Nouritza Matossian tells of her own family and their wanderings because of the Genocide, her desire to keep an even balance and not to succumb to the despair of her foretfathers. This book is a vindication of a culture which has been hammered and a Genocide which needs to be acknowledged. It tells of the courage of exiles and immigrants who brought such skills and moral values to this country which did not accept them very often. The accounts of Gorky's pursuit of excellence in art, his love for his mother and her inspiration are universal themes. I saw him as a quixotic, temperamental and charming character whom I would have loved to know. She brought him alive and I cared for him so much that I could hardly bear to finish the book, knowing that he would die. I received a great gift in understanding how it is possible for someone who has lived at traumatic life to transcend his suffering and 'give something to the world' as he said to Leger, something good. His paintings are incredibly beautiful and I see l know that he paid an even greater price than the loss of his childhood for those canvases, he paid for them with his health and security. Gorky's suicide has always puzzled me and I understand it for the first time after reading Matossian's book twice. The discussion of art and ideas, her ability to interpret him and even to depict the work is accurate and vivid. I saw from her website www.arshile-gorky.com that she performs a one-woman show in which she tells his story with slides and music as his mother, sister, sweetheart and wife. Those four characters are in the book and she pays tribute to them. It must be wonderful to hear this author tell her extraordinary story in her own words because this is a book which rings with her love and commitment for her subject and that is a rare and generous gift. All I could wish is that this book were even longer because I hated putting it down at the end. It changed my attitude to many things in my own life. This book deserves to win prizes.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Troubled Youth
For anyone convinced that crucial or shocking events during childhood have a major impact on psyche, this book is a must read to understand Gorky's art and his impact on American... Read more

Published on April 24 2000

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