Look Away: Reality and Sentiment in Southern Art - Hardcover

Pennington, Estill Curtis

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0934601925 ISBN 13: 9780934601924

Publisher: Saraland Press / Peachtree Publishers, 1989

Synopsis

Draws together prevailing ideas on southern art, lifestyle, and literature to capture the spirit of a place.

About this title

About the Author

Estill Curtis Pennington is an independent scholar and author of many books, including "Lessons in Likeness: Portrait Painters in Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, 1802-1920".

Review

The humming and the strumming, the scent of magnolias and the swish of ball gowns, the view of a kinder, gentler life are very much the image of the South, an image perpetuated by myth and nostalgia. It is a tribute to the immutable nature of this myth that the transformations of the past two decades have done little to alter these images. With skill and grace, the author presents his vision of the forces that have shaped southern perceptions and southern art. The yearning for an idealized past creates a tension between romance and reality. The strength of repression. of turmoil hidden beneath a veneer of social manners and propriety had a strong impact upon the arts tradition of the South. Interestingly, the artists discussed are not all native-born southerners; also included are those from other areas and countries influenced by the South's mystique. Pennington likens the South's vision of itself to that of the English in their attitude toward revered ancestors, the preservation of small details of local life, and a strongly sentimental approach to depicting human relationships. The essays deal with a variety of themes and ideas: portraiture as the most specific of visual art forms; landscape and genre painting as combining the perceived and the imagined; and the detailing in contemporary and current works of the devastion caused by the only war ever fought on United States soil. All these images and more-some of which have never been published-are illustrated by excellent color reproductions, and all are well annotated. Writing with the perception of an art historian and the passion of a Southerner, the knowledgeable author bares the "warm and beating heart of a vapid nation, a fanciful vision in color, played out to a black-and-white world." -- From Independent Publisher

About this edition

• Publisher: Saraland Press / Peachtree Publishers
• Publication date: 1989
• ISBN 10: 0934601925
• ISBN 13: 9780934601924
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 200