Tamara de Lempicka: A Life of Deco and Decadence Book

With her couture clothes and film-star good looks (she was frequently mistaken for Greta Garbo), Tamara de Lempicka seemed too glamorous to be a serious painter. Even in the years of her greatest success, 1925 to 1935, the luscious colours and highly wrought finishes of her portraits--a suspect genre in any case to high modernists--linked Lempicka more closely to the Italian Renaissance painters she revered than to her Cubist contemporaries. She was labelled an "Art Deco artist", someone whose work was more decorative than substantive. Feminist scholar Laura Claridge, a good guide despite her overuse of the phrase "gender politics" enhances the reader's appreciation of Lempicka's work without scanting her enjoyably lurid personal life. Born (around 1895) in Russia, of Polish and Jewish descent, Lempicka fled the revolution to set up shop in Paris during its avant-garde heyday. The Nazi threat sent her to America, where Hollywood proved a natural setting. Two husbands, one daughter, male and female lovers, manic-depressive illness--nothing ever really cramped her style or her dedication to art. She died in 1980, a venerable survivor still looking forward rather than back. Blending art history with psychological analysis, Claridge helps readers understand why this gifted painter, although commercially successful, has not enjoyed the critical respect she deserves. --Wendy SmithRead More