C is for Cézanne (and Chagall, Cornell, collaboration, and cultural activism) in the revised, redesigned handbook of the Guggenheim Museum's New York collection. The format is unorthodox: it's a little encyclopedia on topics from action (illustrated by de Kooning's 1955 Composition and 300 words by high-IQ critic Dore Ashton) to Gilberto Zorio (with a photo of the Italian artist's star-and-javelin sculpture and two helpful paragraphs by Guggenheim contemporary art curator Nancy Spector explaining what stars and javelins symbolize in his work). The reproductions are smallish but mostly eye-delighting, capturing at a glance, for instance, Picasso's leap from his first Paris painting Le Moulin de la Galette (done at 19 in 1900), vibrant in a Manet-meets-Munch way, to his still-startling cubist breakthroughs. Even the book's superb wraparound cover is a work of art: the Guggenheim by night, lit up by Dan Flavin's neon sculptures in exuberant surfer hues.

The entries range from more traditional thumbnail descriptions of artists and objects in the celebrated collection to some fairly arcane sections devoted to concepts like the fourth dimension (illustrated by a Braque cubist painting). The formidable art theorist Rosalind Krauss writes an entry on informe, elucidating French philosopher Bataille's principle of "formlessness": "Although Bataille's analogue for the informe was the crushed spider or the blob of spittle, and though Miró's detour from painting took the form of working with trash, Giacometti's example of formlessness cannily assumed a highly polished, even geometrically simple set of shapes." If you're up on art, you're intrigued; if Krauss confuses you, don't panic--simply turn to the accessible entry on Giacometti, which is more straightforwardly biographical.

I'm not sure an alphabetical listing is the best way to put the Guggenheim's awesome 20th-century masterworks in the clearest possible context. But this handbook is concise, lively, handsome, and a bit perverse. --Victoria Ellison


From Library Journal
This first revision since 1992 of the official guide to the Guggenheim's collections adds 42 new entries to bring the total offerings to about 150 artists, from Max Beckmann to Bill Viola, as well as a few concepts, such as "action" and "materials," summing up just over 100 years of art. The relatively compact size of the book (6 1/4" 9 1/4" 1 3/4") and the space allotment (usually two pages per entry) mean that the illustrations are not large, especially when an artist is represented by two, three, or more images. But the image quality is good, and the texts are superior to those in a spate of recent dictionary-style art guides (e.g., The Art Book, LJ 12/94). The signed entries, by Spector's fellow Guggenheim curators as well as independent art historians, explain the illustrated works and also give sufficient biocritical information for the intelligent lay reader to begin to understand the artist. That said, the Guggenheim remains a quirky institution, and it shows here: Abstraction is covered in all its iterations, while photography seems to have begun in the last couple of decades. Too cursory for art libraries, this would make a fine, affordable addition to general collections, though consider that the full book is available at www.guggenheimcollection. org. Eric Bryant, "Library Journal" Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Book Description
Revised, expanded and completely redesigned, this latest edition of the Guggenheim Museum's popular guide to its New York collection is a beautifully produced volume, not only a handy overview of the museum's holdings but a concise, engaging primer on 20th-century art. Organized alphabetically, the book consists of entries on more than 250 of the most important paintings, sculptures and other artworks in the collection by artists from Marina Abramovic to Gilberto Zorio. Also included are definitions of key terms and concepts of Modern art, from "Action" to "Non-Objective" and beyond. The Guggenheim Museum Collection is beloved for this wealth of masterpieces by leading Modern artists, such as Marc Chagall, Vasily Kandinsky and Pablo Picasso. Reflecting the recent growth in the collection, this 2001 edition includes new entries on such artists as Matthew Barney, Robert Gober, Ann Hamilton, Robert Mapplethorpe and Cindy Sherman, among others. The text is by the museum's curators as well as prominent authors and scholars, including Dore Ashton, Gary Garrels and Rosalind Krauss. Edited by Nancy Spector.~Essays by Jennifer Blessing and Bridget Alsdorf. Hardcover, 6 x 9 in./392 pgs / 310 color 0 BW0 duotone 0 ~ Item D20384

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Revised, expanded, and completely redesigned, this new edition of the Guggenheim Museum's popular guide to its New York collection is a beautifully produced volume, not only a handy overview of the museum's holdings but a concise, engaging primer on 20th-century art.

Organized alphabetically, the book consists of entries on individual artists (ranging in date from Camille Pissarro to Matthew Barney) as well as definitions of key terms and concepts of modern art from ￯﾿ﾽAction "to ￯﾿ﾽInstallation. "Reflecting the exciting recent growth in the Guggenheim's permanent collection, this 2001 edition includes new entries on such artists as Francesco Clemente, Ann Hamilton, Robert Mapplethorpe, and Cindy Sherman, among others. The text is by the museum's curators as well as prominent authors and scholars including Dore Ashton, Rosalind Krauss, and Brian Wallis.

Author Biography: Nancy Spector is curator of contemporary art at the Guggenheim Museum, New York.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal