Self Portrait (McGraw-Hill Paperbacks) - Hardcover

Ray, Man

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0070512485 ISBN 13: 9780070512481

Publisher: McGraw-Hill, 1979

Synopsis

This autobiography of Man Ray, photographer, painter and maker of objects and films, follows his life from his birth in Philadelphia in 1890 to his death in Paris in 1976. He knew the world of Greenwich Village in the avant-garde era following the 1913 Armory Show; Paris in the 1920s and 1930s, where he played a key role in the Dada and Surrealist movements; Hollywood in the 1940s, when compelled by war to flee Europe, and Paris where he lived from 1951 until his death. The book is illustrated with many previously unpublished works of art, photographs and negatives made available by Man Ray's wife, Juliet, who writes the afterword to the book. Man Ray describes his friendships with, among others, Marcel Duchamp, Picasso and Dali and the women in his life, including Kiki de Montparnasse and Lee Miller and his wife.

About this title

About the Author

Born Emmanuel Radnitzky (1890-1976), Man Ray grew up in America but spent the greater part of his life as an emigre in Paris. Man Ray's art ranges from painting, sculpture, collage, constructed objects and photography. Beginning in 1921, he received hundreds of commissions for portraits and commercial work which were featured in publications such as Vogue, Vu, Harper's Bazaar and Vanity Fair. He was an American, but worked in Paris from 1921 to 1940, when Duchamp, Stieglitz, Picasso and Dali were among his colleagues. A member of the Dada art movement and the only American member of the Paris Surrealist movement, Man Ray considered himself an artist and thought of photography as a medium of artistic expression when used for more than reproduction. In describing his work, Man Ray once said, 'I paint what can not be photographed. I photograph what I do not wish to paint.'

From Publishers Weekly

Born in Philadelphia, raised in Brooklyn, wiry, kinetic Man Ray (1890-1976) set Paris, New York and Hollywood spinning as he shifted between mediums (painting, photography, film, surreal objects) and fused them. This jaunty, chatty autobiographyfirst published in 1963 and now decked out with 240 illustrationsoffers arresting glimpses of Dada and Surrealism in their heydays. Man Ray always keeps a sense of humor about himself and the avant-garde happenings swirling around him. His photographs of Dali, Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Hemingway and Joyce are vintage. Of even greater interest is the endless profusion of Man Ray images: dream compositions, typographical poems, airbrush nudes, moving sculpture, Cubist landscapes, a cymbals-and-drum machine, mannequins, experimental photographs. Pictures and text attest to this artist's rare gift for rendering ideas in multiple formats.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: McGraw-Hill
• Publication date: 1979
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0070512485
• ISBN 13: 9780070512481
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Illus. With Photos
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 398