Ilene Susan Fort, Tere Arcq, Terri Geis (Editors)
In Wonderland: The Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists in Mexico and the United States.
Del Monico Books/Prestel, 2012. First edition. 9783791351414 254 pages.
Large-format volume, measuring approximately 10.5" x 12.25", is bound in red cloth, with stamped black lettering to spine. Book and illustrated dust jacket are new. Jacket is preserved in mylar cover.
Issued in connection with an exhibition held Jan. 29-May 6, 2012, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California.
Contents:
"In the Land of Reinvention: The United States" by Ilene Susan Fort;
In the Land of Convulsive Beauty : Mexico" by Tere Arcq;
"The Ancestral and the Living" by Rita Eder and Terri Geis;
"Down the Rabbit Hole: An Art of Shamanic Initiations and Mythic Rebirth" by Gloria Feman Orenstein;
"One Hundred Percent Photographic" by Dawn Ades;
"Guided by the Invisible: The Psyche of Women Surrealists" by Salomon Grimberg;
"Eros and Thanatos : Surrealism's Legacy in Contemporary Feminist Art" by Maria Elena Buszek"
Artists' biographies by Terri Geis.
"Filled with a wide array of illustrations, this book offers a fresh perspective on surrealism as it spotlights the important role that North American women artists played in the movement. The surrealist movement in art is most often identified with male artists, many of whom objectified women in their paintings, casting them as sexual or symbolic ideals. Conversely, the female artists of the movement delved primarily into their own subconscious and dreams. This volume features the work of
48 Mexican and U.S.-based women artists whose contributions to the surrealist movement span more than four decades and whose work was both influential and radical in its own right. Thematically arranged, it includes more than 250 full-color images along with several essays exploring the effects of
geography and gender on the movement. This unique book illustrates surrealism as a gateway to self-discovery, especially in North America, where women artists were freed from oppressive European traditions and the vagaries of war. From 1931, the year of Lee Miller’s first surreal photograph, to 1968,
when Yayoi Kusama presented her landmark happening “Alice in Wonderland” in New York’s Central Park, the artists and works depicted here are both significant and extraordinary in their explorations of personal and universal truths."