Barbara Chase Riboud: Sculptor

Celebrating the unique stylings of sculptor Barbara Chase-Riboud, one hundred illustrations from the acclaimed artist's repertoire reveal how she has successfully blended African-American history, archaeology, spiritualism, and the Baroque tradition in her work.

While Chase-Riboud--an African American poet, novelist, sculptor, and draftsperson--has been an artist for 30 years, much of it was created in Europe and remains little known in the United States. This volume, with essays by world-renowned critics and 100 mostly full-page illustrations, including 55 in color, makes an immediate impact and should help to raise her stature. Chase-Riboud's sculture melds bronze with sensuous cords made from gleaming silk that is knotted as it falls. Her drawings are exquisite, architectonic, and complex yet nearly minimalist. Themes include Cleopatra, Malcolm X, Pushkin, Queen Isabella, Egyptian gods and goddesses, holy sites, and "The Middle Passage Memorial" for the diaspora of those who crossed the Atlantic on slave ships, and her most important "Africa Rising." All of her work is sumptuously beautiful and well served by this fine catalog; highly recommended.
-Mary Hamel-Schwulst, Towson Univ., Millersville, MD.
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