Product Description

This volume provides a rare glimpse into the most intimate works of the internationally acclaimed artist Brice Marden. Twenty years ago, Marden produced a series of small and virtually unknown paintings on the Greek island of Hydra, which the artist first visited in 1971. Inspired by the island's ancient marble quarries, Marden created these private paintings in oil on marble fragments as tokens for friends and family. Between 1981 and 1987, the artist made a total of 32 paintings on marble, gathered together here for the first time in a single volume. The period coincided with changes in his publicly exhibited paintings. In 1987, the date of his last painting on marble, Marden presented the first public exhibition of his calligraphic paintings, as opposed to his earlier monochrome work. An essay by Lisa Liebmann here helps to contextualize that shift: According to the artist, the diagonal in the marble fragments helped serve as a stepping stone from rectilinear to more organic form.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1226895 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-15
• Released on: 2005-09-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 88 pages

Customer Reviews

Intimate Fragments
The recent release of "Brice Marden: Paintings on Marble" reveals subtle and luminous balancing acts of this American master. Marden paints on marble fragments discarded from the construction of a bench on the Greek island of Hydra. Every stroke, angle, and delicate application of color demonstrates a commanding decision within classical bounds. Three of these fragments were shown in Marden's recent MoMA show, and can be thought of as a kind of sculptural sketchbook. The paintings are beautifully reproduced, capturing some of the delicacy and translucence of the actual work. This is an important book for the Brice Marden lover, but not the best general volume on his work, which is Gary Garrel's "Plane Image," the catalogue of the Museum of Modern Art retrospective.

Small masterpieces
This is both informative and enlightening. Small in format, but large in concept. These small works are certainkly a percussor to Marden's latest work. I do highly recommend this book to any who are student of Marden's output, as they do show that constant search for new ways of looking and working out one's ideas. Marden's has produce both very large works and small ones - this book stands by and supports the saying 'that small is beautiful', and that works do not have to be large to be good.
For me this small monograph has been a 'real thumbs up!"
Peter Whitting

more emporers new clothes
brice marden is another example of the emporers new clothes--- as an artist which some call him--hes a sham--- and if not a sham -his work reveals such paltry talent such a limited imagination-- i can only say its a sign of the times that someone of such limited ability is respected and collected and shown-- his scribbly lines of late bear witness to the stolid lack of imagination in his work--when cy twombly scribbles-- we are witnessing something ! imagination !!! that this guy can keep painting the same similar nonsense just shows his lack of talent and non protean resources as an artist--this book equally reveals the crippled pretensiousness of this over rated pretender ----looking at sidewwalks in nyc is more exciting than looking at his work !!!!