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A paean to many artists as well as various art forms often overlooked or dismissed, this exciting revisionist history of art turns the limelight on women artists' creativity and the way it has shaped and enriched our world.
Shortlisted for The British Book Awards 2023 Non-Fiction Lifestyle Book of the Year
How many women artists do you know? Who makes art history? Did women even work as artists before the twentieth century? And what is the Baroque anyway?
Discover the glittering Sofonisba Anguissola of the Renaissance, the radical work of Harriet Powers in the nineteenth-century USA, and the artist who really invented the Readymade. Explore the Dutch Golden Age, the astonishing work of post-War artists in Latin America, and the women artists defining art in the 2020s. Have your sense of art history overturned, and your eyes opened to many art forms often overlooked or dismissed. From the Cornish coast to Manhattan, Nigeria to Japan this is the history of art as it's never been told before.
Publisher: Cornerstone
ISBN: 9781529151145
Number of pages: 512
Weight: 1280 g
Dimensions: 244 x 165 x 34 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'Katy Hessel is a brilliant chronicler of the overlooked. I am so thrilled this book exists as an empowering, enlightening guide to the unforgettable vision of these brilliant artists. Essential reading' - Elizabeth Day
'Will change the history of art... thank God.' - Tracey Emin
'I was not aware how hungry I was for this book until I dropped everything and ate it from cover to cover. I was not aware how angry I was that this book did not exist until it existed. It's an urgently needed, un-put-downable, joyful, insightful, glorious, perspective-shifting revision of the Story of Art.' - Es Devlin
'A spirited, inspiring, brilliantly illustrated history of female artistic endeavour... The Story of Art Without Men should be on the reading list of every A-level and university art history course and on the front table of every museum and gallery shop.' Laura Freeman, The Times
'Passionate, enthusiastic and witty... I wish I had had this book as a teenager' - The I
'A long overdue, revisionist history of art by the brilliant Katy Hessel ... Never stuffy or supercilious, Hessel's book is a revelation and an important first step towards redressing the balance of an art world in which women have been sidelined, stepped over and trampled upon for far too long' - Refinery 29
'An extraordinary achievement that will have a disruptive cultural legacy and help deter mine the landscape for years to come.' - Harper's Bazaar
'In this astounding, generous book, Katy Hessel has given us such a gift. Her research is profound, scholarly and wide-ranging, her writing authoritative yet accessible. I found so much to surprise and delight in these pages, so many works of art pulsating with life and intelligence, beauty and power. This book is a long-overdue corrective, and Hessel has executed it to perfection, echoing the passion and skill of the very artists she writes about. An astonishing achievement.' - Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist
'Unapologetically revisionist' - The Financial Times
'Via chronological chapters focusing on periods of change, Hessel leads the reader back through this story, reinstating the countless women whose contributions were missed.' - RA Magazine
'Vital... has firmly cracked open the canon' - Chloe Ashby, The Spectator
'An inspiring, beautifully written corrective' - Bidisha Mamata, The Guardian
'An illuminating celebration of female artists and their often overlooked place in history' - Stylist
'A touchpoint for a new generation who will go on to define the future of those exhibitions, collections, and auctions' - Dazed Digital
'Katy Hessel's first book The Story of Art without Men is a necessary and urgent book. A truly empowering title, the volume celebrates the rise of women artists and recentres them within art, political and social history. Many of these artists have been presented at Serpentine and their visions are getting the visibility they deserve through the fantastic visuals and Katy's thorough research' - Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artistic Director, Serpentine
'This passionate and personal telling of what has been an invisible history will bring revelation to anyone entering the world of art and its histories.' - Iwona Blazwick, Director, The Whitechapel Gallery
'Excellent, authoritative, exuberant and elegantly written' - Simon Sebag Montefiore
'Although women have always made art, for far too long, art history has been told as the story of male achievement. Katy Hessel's The Story of Art without Men is a brilliantly readable and lively corrective. Outraged and celebratory, it's chock-full of female trail-blazers - from the Renaissance until the present day - who forged their way, despite facing the kind of hurdles that would stump most mortals -- Jennifer Higgie, author of The Mirror and the Palette Compiled with zip and wit, even the informed reader will learn something new on every page - we really cannot recommend it enough.' - The Fence
'A magnificent read and a beautiful book' - David Walliams
'When women are literally written out of history, Hessel conveys how radical, powerful and vulnerable their lives and art were - and still are. Through moments of rage and celebration, this story fundamentally centres creative freedom: the stifling of it, and the lengths endured to claim it.' - Tiarney Miekus, The Sydney Morning Herald
'The early centuries are thin simply due to the paucity of surviving work by talented women painters but her story becomes fuller and more persuasive the closer it gets to today. Hessel is clear-sighted and impartial enough not to over-claim for her subjects but show that they are full of interest and every bit as worthy of attention as their male peers.' - Michael Prodger, The New Statesmen
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