Kiki Smith

A beautifully presented sample of the work of this important contemporary artist. The English text is a little on the small side, but the value added of the book is in the pictures.

Pour une jeune femme artiste

I stopped buying real books (the kind made with paper) in 2014. Then I moved and offloaded a ton of their kind. I now only have a couple bookcases of my favorites (up until 2014 the year I got a Kindle). Everything was going fine until I decided I should start doing art again and realized I only had 10 books on art or artists and 3 of them were drawing instruction. While Kindle is absolutely fine for reading novels or whatever, there’s nothing like a real book with photos for looking at art. Anyway this is a gorgeous book. It may seem expensive but it’s a hardcover with photos and text printed on very nice paper with deckled edges, even. This book provides a comprehensive overview of Kiki Smith’s work up until 2019, I think. It is dual language, French and English. The photographs are very good and for the sculpture sometimes 2 views are provided. The text is straightforward: the title of the piece, the media used and a short explanation of the motivation or thought process of the artist for the work. There is a chronology at the end. It’s a very good book for anyone interested in Kiki Smith’s work.

If you are a Kiki Smith admirer, this is a must-have book. It is simply beautiful, inspiring, full of color plates of her work. I could not be more pleased.

The English text is so small that I can't read it. I'm 29. It's so tiny.