Arshile Gorky His Life and Work

Nominated for the Pulizter Prize, "the definitive biography of Arshile Gorky--lucid, persuasive, intimate and refreshingly clear-eyed" (Andrew Solomon,The New York Times Book Review) Born in Turkey around 1900, Vosdanik Adoian escaped the massacres of Armenians in 1915 only to watch his mother die of starvation and his family scatter in their flight from the Turks. Arriving in America in 1920, Adoian invented the pseudonym Arshile Gorky-and obliterated his past. Claiming to be a distant cousin of the novelist Maxim Gorky, he found work as an art teacher and undertook a program of rigorous study, schooling himself in the modern painters he most admired, especially Ceacute;zanne and Picasso. By the early forties, Gorky had entered his most fruitful period and developed the style that is seen as the link between European modernism and American abstract expressionism. His masterpieces influenced the great generation of American painters in the late forties, even as Gorky faced a series of personal catastrophes: a studio fire, cancer, and a car accident that temporarily paralyzed his painting arm. Further demoralized by the dissolution of his seven-year marriage, Gorky hanged himself in 1948. A sympathetic, sensitive account of artistic and personal triumph as well as tragedy, Hayden Herrera's biography is the first to interpret Gorky's work in depth. The result of more than three decades of scholarship-and a lifelong engagement with Gorky's paintings-Arshile Gorkytraces the progress from apprentice to master of the man Andreacute; Breton called "the most important painter in American history." Hayden Herrerais also the author ofMatisse: A Portrait,Mary Frank, andFrida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo. She lives in New York City. Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize Born in Turkey around 1900, Vosdanik Adoian escaped the massacres of Armenians in 1915 only to watch his mother die of starvation and his family scatter in their flight from the Turks. Arriving in America in 1920, Adoian invented the pseudonym Arshile Gorkyand obliterated his past. By the 1940s, Gorky had developed a style that is seen as the link between European modernism and American abstract expressionism. His masterpieces influenced the great generation of American painters who came of age after World War II, even as Gorky faced a series of personal catastrophes: a studio fire that destroyed dozens of his paintings, a wasting battle with cancer, and a car accident that temporarily paralyzed his painting arm. Further demoralized by the dissolution of his seven-year marriage, Gorky hanged himself in 1948. A sympathetic, sensitive account of artistic and personal triumph as well as tragedy, Hayden Herrera's biography is the first to interpret Gorky's work in depth. The result of more than three decades of scholarshipand a lifelong engagement with Gorky's paintingsArshile Gorkytraces the progress from apprentice to master of the man Andreacute; Breton called "the most important painter in American history." "The fascinating story of how Gorky overcame his influences and became an artist of singular originality and beauty . . . It is hard to imagine that Herrera's study will soon be superseded."Arthur C. Danto,Los Angeles Times "A page-turning narrative . . . Skillfully [investigates] how lived experience is transmuted into meaningful works of art."Sue Taylor,Art in America "The definitive biography of Ashile Gorkylucid, persuasive, meticulous, intimate, and refreshingly clear-eyed."Andrew Solomon,The New York Times Book Review "The fascinating story of how Gorky overcame his influences and became an artist of singular originality and beauty . . . It is hard to imagine that Herrera's study

Hayden Herrera is the author of Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo, Mary Frank, and Matisse: A Portrait. She lives in New York City.