#001148
Andrew Wyeth: The Helga Pictures
John Wilmerding
The book that made a private obsession public. Published by Abrams in 1987 with an essay by John Wilmerding, it presents Andrew Wyeth's Helga suite — more than two hundred works made in secret between about 1971 and 1985, depicting a single model in interiors and landscapes — and recounts the media storm that erupted when their existence was disclosed. Look past the tabloid framing to the pictures themselves: a sustained, almost obsessive study of one body and one light across many years, and, as a document of Wyeth's working method, unusually revealing. Whatever one makes of the scandal, the suite is a remarkable act of attention. Pair it with monographs on Christina's World and the Maine work for the fuller arc of a much-argued career.
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The artist
Andrew Wyeth (1917-2009) was among the most popular and most debated American painters of the twentieth century, working in a precise realist style rooted in rural Pennsylvania and coastal Maine. Admired by the public and often dismissed by the avant-garde, he painted a small, intensely observed world.
The book
Published by Abrams in 1987 with an essay by John Wilmerding, the book presents the Helga suite - over two hundred works made in secret between roughly 1971 and 1985 - depicting the same model in interiors and landscapes, and recounts the media storm that followed their disclosure.
How to read it
Look past the tabloid framing to the pictures: a sustained, almost obsessive study of one body and one light over many years. As a document of Wyeth's method, it is unusually revealing.
For more context
Pair it with monographs on Wyeth's Christina's World and his Maine work for the fuller arc of his career.
Sources
- Type
- Book
- Author / Maker
- John Wilmerding
- ISBN
- None
- Shelf
- Art
- Location
- Colorado