An Eye on the Modern Century: Selected Letters of Henry McBride (Henry McBride Series in Modernism and Modernity) - Hardcover

McBride, Henry

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300083262 ISBN 13: 9780300083262

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2000

Synopsis

Henry McBride (1867–1962) became a towering figure in art criticism during a long career that began in 1913―the year of the famous Armory Show in New York that opened American eyes to avant-garde developments in European art―and continued until the advent of Abstract Expressionism in the late 1940s and early 1950s. A sensitive and discerning observer of the changing cultural landscape, McBride not only wrote prolifically for publication but also corresponded extensively. In this remarkable collection of selected letters, Henry McBride describes some of the most important events and figures of twentieth-century modernism. Written in a characteristically charming, gossipy, and warm-hearted style, these letters reveal McBride’s responses to revolutionary changes in the world of art and in the world at large.

Closely allied to the pivotal circles that shaped modern culture, McBride counted among his correspondents such friends as Gertrude Stein, Carl Van Vechten, the Stettheimer sisters, Alfred Stieglitz, Charles Demuth, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Marianne Moore. His letters, along with the biographical introduction, headnotes, and rich annotation provided in this volume, present a unique perspective on twentieth-century modernism by one of its most ardent supporters.

About this title

About the Author:

Steven Watson is a cultural historian and the author of Prepare for Saints. Catherine J. Morris is a writer and curator.

From Publishers Weekly:

Whether the fare was Virgil Thomson's opera Four Saints in Three Acts, Picasso's or Marcel Duchamp's paintings or Gertrude Stein's prose, critic Henry McBride (1867-1962) was noted for his friendly, upbeat acceptance of modernist art, literature and music in such avant-garde periodicals as the Dial. McBride could make it all seem cozy and friendly, in part because he enjoyed friendships with many vital creators during his long lifetime. As a youngish tourist, McBride is not brilliant: "Botticelli is not so tremendous to me as he used to be." Starting a journalistic career in 1912 at 45, he approved heartily of modern artists like Juan Gris, but saved his case making for his criticism. At times, McBride seems to have been a rotten judge of character: he found the young Nelson Rockefeller "really a nice lad." In 40 years of letters to friend Malcolm MacAdam, he camps it up genteelly, probably coming the closest to his real-life intimate talking style, joshing for example about Thornton Wilder's being the "friend intim " of boxer Gene Tunney. McBride hints elsewhere at the amusingly gossipy personality he clamped down on in public and which did not stray, even in the letters, into intimate detail. (Editor Watson refers to McBride as "openly not heterosexual.") Students and less formal fans of modernism will want to check out this informal champion's quotidian, but they will find few of the kind of revelations that make for good hype. (Jan.) Forecast: If stores with solid selections of lesser-known modernist literature stock this book along with McBride's selected criticism, The Flow of Art (also from Yale), or with the recent Magician of the Modern: Chick Austin and the Transformation of the Arts in America (Forecasts, Oct. 16) and Stravinsky's Lunch (Forecasts, Oct. 9), could attract a bigger audience than it otherwise might.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0300083262
• ISBN 13: 9780300083262
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384
• Editor: Watson Steven, Morris Catherine J.