Life with Picasso (New York Review Books Classics)
Category: Books,Arts & Photography,History & Criticism
Life with Picasso (New York Review Books Classics) Details
Review “[A] completely fascinating volume, one of the most illuminating we have had on the mind and spirit of Picasso.” —Irving Stone, Los Angeles Times“[N]ot only a vivid account of her life with [Picasso] but an intimate panorama of life in Paris during and after the German occupation, a Paris populated by Georges Braque, Henri Matisse, Alberto Giacometti, and Gertrude Stein” —Wendy Goodman, New York Magazine“Françoise Gilot’s gift of total recall seems scarcely human, but in her account of the ten years she spent with Picasso...everything he said to her about his work rings true even in English.” —Robert Melville, New Statesman “Fascinating and brilliant, and crucial to the understanding of Picasso.” —John Richardson, author of A Life of Picasso “A valuable interior view of a genius on the hearth.” —The Observer “Although there is much anguish to be found...there are also moments of tenderness and elation, forming what must be one of the most agonizingly honest and one of the most touching accounts of the life of a painter in the history of art.” —Jean Boggs, The Art Bulletin “What it is like actually to live with the most publicized artist in history—as chauffeur, secretary, pupil, companion, mother, lover, and ex-lover—is now told for the first time.” —Selden Rodman, Saturday Review “The portrait of Picasso that emerges...has a monumentality, a richness and diversity and intensity of being that could have been captured only by a woman of uncommon gifts.” —Paul Pickrel,Harper’s Magazine “She is a superb witness to Picasso as an artist and to his views on art....Picasso’s intentions, his way of working and his fearless invention are brilliantly revealed.” —Aline Saarinen, The New York Times Book Review “Astonishing, crowded, intimate...a biographer of true Boswellian blood...a convincing portrait, painted with knowledge that comes only from absolute intimacy, of a fascinating monster, a geyser of energy, a complex character.... We are shown pictures of Malraux, Cocteau, Matisse, Hemingway...Gertrude Stein, Braque, Paul Éluard, Giacometti, Gide, Aragon, Chagall, Leger, Chaplin.... The reader feels that he is in Picasso’s studio, and at times even in Picasso’s mind.” —Clifton Fadiman, Book-of-the-Month Club News “[The]world owes Miss Gilot a tremendous debt, as well as a salute for what can only be described as a sensational ability to report and comprehend.” —Emily Genauer, New York Herald Tribune Read more About the Author Françoise Gilot is a French painter, critic, and writer. Born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, she began writing and painting at a young age. In 1938, she graduated from the Sorbonne with a BA in philosophy and in 1939 from Cambridge University with a degree in English. In 1943, when Gilot was twenty-one, she met Pablo Picasso, who was sixty-one, and theyhad two children, Claude and Paloma. Their relationship lasted ten years, and Gilot published the bestselling Life with Picasso eleven years after their separation. In 1970, she married Jonas Salk, who pioneered the polio vaccine, and they remained married until his death in 1995. Gilot lives in Paris and New York, works on behalf of the Salk Institute in California, and continues to exhibit her work internationally. Carlton Lake (1915–2006) was an art critic and collector, and the Paris art critic for The Christian Science Monitor. He contributed essays, short stories, and conversations with Matisse, Picasso, Chagall, Henry Moore, and Giacometti to several publications. He donated his vast collection of art—350,000 French literary materials—to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Austin, where Lake was once the director and where the items can still be viewed today. Lisa Alther is the author of six novels, a memoir, a short story collection, and the book About Women: Conversations Between a Writer and a Painter, co-authored with Françoise Gilot. She lives in Hinesburg, Vermont. Read more
Reviews
After viewing the National Geographic Genius series on Picasso, I became interested in Francoise Gilot. This book is remarkable and this woman is brilliant. Her accounts of her life with Picasso, his association with other prominent artists, political figures and his philosophy on art and living, are fascinating. This book is a peek behind the curtain of the daily life of this multifaceted "genius". As far as I am concerned, Francoise Gilot is a genius in her own right. The book is well written and the stories are warmly entertaining.