Judy Chicago: An American Vision

One of the most controversial artists of our time, Judy Chicago is most famous for her groundbreaking installations The Dinner Party, Birth Project, and Holocaust Project. While these works have been analyzed extensively from artistic and historical perspectives, this book’s in-depth discussion also embraces many of the artist’s lesser-known pieces. Using a great variety of techniques, from drawing, painting, and printmaking to needlework and sculpture, her search for a personal means of expression is examined through lavish illustrations and edifying text.

A prodigious body of work that has transformed perceptions of women’s art and collaborative venture is fully scrutinized in the first book to cover the entire scope of an astonishing and influential career.

One of the most controversial artists of our time, Judy Chicago is most famous for her groundbreaking installations The Dinner Party, Birth Project, and Holocaust Project. While these works have been analyzed extensively from artistic and historical perspectives, this book’s in-depth discussion also embraces many of the artist’s lesser-known pieces. Using a great variety of techniques, from drawing, painting, and printmaking to needlework and sculpture, her search for a personal means of expression is examined through lavish illustrations and edifying text.

Library Journal

Judy Chicago (1939-) is something of a celebrity--she was voted 1973's "Woman of the Year" by Mademoiselle--and she has written two popular autobiographies documenting her artistic consciousness-raising. Many still remember her California installation piece, the accompanying performance Womanhouse (1972), and especially the notorious The Dinner Party (1979). She has been working industriously for these many years, producing several large-scale multimedia pieces that have not garnered such broad attention. Most of her artworks are "projects," calling on her organizational skills to persuade many people with no fine arts background to carry out her vision. The prolific Lucie-Smith, who has lately coauthored a book with Chicago (Women and Art: Contested Territory, LJ 9/1/99), presents many of these lesser-known pieces as well as the blockbusters and does a good job of offering a contemporary view of the artist. This handsome monograph, containing 275 illustrations, 240 in color, is recommended as an interesting, fact-filled tome for most serious collections and large public collections.--Mary Hamel-Schwulst, Towson Univ., MD Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\

Edward Lucie-Smith, an eminent art historian, critic, curator, lecturer, and author whose previous books include Women and Art, Zoo: Animals in Art, and Visual Arts in the 20th Century, lives in London.