Sunday 28 April 2019

Voyaging Out



I suppose it is about time I came clean and announced that my book about women artists will finally be out at the beginning of September; it has taken up an awful lot of valuable art-working time but I hope people will think it has been worth it, I certainly learned a lot from doing it and met lots of very lovely helpful people, and saw lots of amazing artworks by women that I would have never seen otherwise. Alexandra Harris has kindly given me a cheering endorsement - it was reading her book The Romantic Moderns that made me think of writing mine so there is a lovely circularity in it, and relief that she has really captured the spirit of what I was trying to do:

It's a wonderfully rich panorama of creative lives, written with conviction and integrity; and cumulatively powerful in questioning the terms of our appreciation. the sheer number and range of artists included here is thrilling: every chapter introduced me to new figures and re-awoke me to old admirations. Trant valuably turns our attention beyond the galleries to think about design, teaching, friendship and collaboration. By turns elegiac and celebratory, her book is truthful, practical, open-minded, and points us in new directions.


Tate Britain has just turned its modern galleries over to a hang of all women artists from their permanent collection, but only from 1960 onwards, leading on from my period 1910-60, but still its a start... and so many of the women in my book had concerns and interests outside gallery-land.



I am just off to Taunton to speak on a panel discussing the artist Doris Hatt at The Museum of Somerset - thursday 2nd May 7.30- 9pm - 

" Discover what it was like for a female artist studying and practising in the early 20th century. Join Carolyn Trant author of the forthcoming Thames and Hudson publication Voyaging Out; Women Artists in Britain from the suffragettes to the Sixties and exhibition co-curators Dr Stephen Lisney and Dr Denys Wilcox."
book online or ring 01823 255 088

And talking about websites, I have just been introduced to a lovely website documenting everything you might like to know about Schubert's song cycle Die Winterreise - with lots of visuals. I am delighted to have had my Artists Book of 2007 included in the art section among other very interesting contemporary images. 


https://diewinterreise.net