Overview
For their sheer scale and breathtaking audacity, their works have made them among the most celebrated and controversial artists in the world. Valley Curtain stretched 1,250 feet across a valley in Rifle, Colorado; Wrapped Coast covered a mile and a half of Australian coastline with a million square feet of fabric; The Umbrellas deployed 3,100 umbrellas set in Japan and California, each nearly twenty feet tall; Surrounded Islands encircled eleven islands in Biscayne Bay, Florida with six and a half million square feet of bright pink fabric; and Wrapped Reichstag enveloped the entire German parliament in shimmering silver fabric.
For more than forty years, these and many other works by Christo and Jeanne-Claude have reconceived the art of the possible, turned natural and human monuments-streets, bridges, hills, trees, buildings, parks, and islands-into sculptures and paintings, and created dazzling new landscapes and startling new vistas. Often requiring years, even decades, of preparation and planning, these works-not merely feats of aesthetic daring but engineering and organizational marvels-exist for only a few weeks or less. Yet what makes these transient creations linger forever in the mind is their overwhelming and magisterial beauty. They are, in every sense, transformative, and, for the millions who have experienced them in person, unforgettable.
Christo and Jeanne-Claude have been the frequent subjects of films, videos, catalogues, cartoons, monographs, exhibitions, and editorials. Until this biography by Burt Chernow, however, written with the full cooperation of the artists, nothing has connected the intimate details of their lives and the spectacular dimensions of their projects. Christo, the penniless Bulgarian refugee who made his way to Paris during the 1950s, and Jeanne-Claude, the socialite daughter of a prominent French general, seemed an unlikely couple, yet together they forged one of the most enduring partnerships in contemporary art. When they arrived in New York in 1964, Christo was already becoming well known in avant-garde circles for his wrappings of everyday objects; Jeanne-Claude acted as manager, dealer, and accountant. Over time, as Chernow reveals, the fusion of their prodigious gifts-his drawings and her ability to draw things together-produced the works for which today they are known the world over.
Chernow recounts their rise from relative obscurity to international renown, revealing both the sources of their art and the heights to which it has quite literally aspired. An epilogue by Wolfgang Volz, a longtime and close collaborator of the artists, as well as their exclusive photographer, provides a fascinating insider's view of what it is like to work, and dream, with them. Christo and Jeanne-Claude is an indelible portrait of the artists and their work, and a moving account of an extraordinary couple.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewTogether, Christo and Jeanne-Claude have created masterworks -- such as the "wrapped" series of pieces, "Iron Curtain," "Wrapped Coast," "Running Fence," and "Umbrellas" -- that have caused controversy, challenged convention, and quite simply redefined contemporary art. In this first authorized biography of the artists, Burt Chernow traces the personal history and artistic journey of two of the most enigmatic figures of our time. Meticulously researched and amply detailed, the trajectory of their shared vision is revealed in this detailed account. (Unfortunately, Chernow died just prior to the completion of this biography; longtime Christo and Jeanne-Claude collaborator Wolfgang Volz wrote the final chapter.)
By some cosmic coincidence, both Christo Javacheff and Jeanne-Claude Marie de Guillebon were born on the same day in 1935, in cultural and economic circumstances that couldn't have been more different. Christo, the son of intellectual but poor Bulgarian parents, was repeatedly thwarted in his artistic education by the Communist stranglehold of censorship and propaganda. At 22 he escaped the Soviet Union in a freight car and eventually make his way to Paris, then considered the epicenter of the art world. In contrast, Jeanne-Claude was born to privilege, and though she faced considerable hardship during World War II, her teens and early 20s would be a whirlwind revolving around Parisian high society and various frivolous pursuits. However, when the two joined forces -- she was at first merely a neophyte champion of his work but eventually became a fully recognized "coauthor" -- they would together play a pivotal role in shifting the axis of 20th-century art from Paris to New York and defining a new genre of postmodern art.
The couple's formative years are recounted with fitting drama, and Chernow provides a precise academic account while illuminating the elusive emotional motivations that go into the making of an artist. The enormity of effort required to realize über-projects like the 25-mile-long "Valley Curtain" is recounted with all the histrionic zeal it deserves. Evocative and enlightening, Chernow delivers an intimate portrait of the larger-than-life artistry of Christo and Jeanne-Claude. (Ann Kashickey)