- Hardcover: 168 pages
- Publisher: Lund Humphries Publishers Ltd (15 Sep 1999)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0853317690
- ISBN-13: 978-0853317692
- Product Dimensions: 29.9 x 24.9 x 1.9 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 703,968 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Critics have often struggled to categorize Cyril Mann, as he has displayed expressionist and surrealist qualities. This monograph brings together some of the finest examples of his work.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In the opening chapter The Making of an Artist Taylor traces Mann's family origins and schooling and his early scholarship to art school, his time in Canada and contact with the Group of Seven, his return to England and his war service. The chapter Living with Art continues with the theme with his art education and the Royal Academy and the people prominent in his life. The chapter Living for Art picks up following the break up of his first marriage and the subsequent necessity to find paying employment, meeting of his second wife, and finally the problems of his later life.
The chapter entitled The Art considers Mann's work with much emphasis on the artists who influenced him prominent among whom were Turner and Van Gogh, but included many others. However what comes through most strongly in all these chapters is a picture of Mann himself, a forceful and overbearing personality. A man obsessed with his own views and ideas and ready to impose them on anyone willing enough to be his audience, often so engrossed in his own thoughts that he would be unaware of those of his listener, or of what was going on around him. Perhaps it is only fitting that this quality should dominate the writing here in the same way as Mann himself would dominate by his own presence; it is certainly clear that he was a man one would find either fascinating or insufferable.
The section of plates runs from page 49 to 160; the dominant themes of Mann's output being still life, the nude and townscapes, with an overriding interest in the effects of light and shadow. The book concludes with a chronology and A Portrait of My Husband and a Memoir of My Father, the latter two both self-explanatory.
This is a lavishly illustrated book, in addition to the section of around 150 full colour plates, the text is illustrated throughout with black and white contemporary photographs. The plates include several large scale detail images, but sadly one or two of the paintings are reproduced unnecessarily small on the page, why do the designers of such books insist on offering a minuscule image adrift in acres of white space? However that aside it is a intriguing book about a fascinating artists, an artist one would have loved to have met, if only the once! Perhaps having been taught throughout my own art education by those of the same generation as Mann, and who displayed similar traits, I found it particularly interesting; but whatever one thinks of Cyril Mann, one cannot deny the beauty and power, the richness of colour and sense of light, of his painting.
The chapter entitled The Art considers Mann's work with much emphasis on the artists who influenced him prominent among whom were Turner and Van Gogh, but included many others. However what comes through most strongly in all these chapters is a picture of Mann himself, a forceful and overbearing personality. A man obsessed with his own views and ideas and ready to impose them on anyone willing enough to be his audience, often so engrossed in his own thoughts that he would be unaware of those of his listener, or of what was going on around him. Perhaps it is only fitting that this quality should dominate the writing here in the same way as Mann himself would dominate by his own presence; it is certainly clear that he was a man one would find either fascinating or insufferable.
The section of plates runs from page 49 to 160; the dominant themes of Mann's output being still life, the nude and townscapes, with an overriding interest in the effects of light and shadow. The book concludes with a chronology and A Portrait of My Husband and a Memoir of My Father, the latter two both self-explanatory.
This is a lavishly illustrated book, in addition to the section of around 150 full colour plates, the text is illustrated throughout with black and white contemporary photographs. The plates include several large scale detail images, but sadly one or two of the paintings are reproduced unnecessarily small on the page, why do the designers of such books insist on offering a minuscule image adrift in acres of white space? However that aside it is a intriguing book about a fascinating artists, an artist one would have loved to have met, if only the once! Perhaps having been taught throughout my own art education by those of the same generation as Mann, and who displayed similar traits, I found it particularly interesting; but whatever one thinks of Cyril Mann, one cannot deny the beauty and power, the richness of colour and sense of light, of his painting.
Format:Hardcover
This book is about my grandfather, a man about whom I know much.
Cyril Mann was a man who lived for art. His passion comes through strongly in his work, where he constantly sought to represent the power of the sun, and the varied effects of light on whatever it touched. Some of his paintings have an almost apocalyptic feel with the representation of the burning orb of the sun set squarely within the painting. He would often paint facing directly into the sun, in a way that indicated his obsession with this life-giving object. A quote of his illustrates this well: "I do not paint the object, but the way the light falls upon it". His career spanned several styles, each building on the one before, showing an amazing breadth of artistic genres but each one clearly following the central theme to his artistic life. This book shows this progression - from early works showing his burgeoning talent such as "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man", then his series of sunlit and shadowy London paintings that evoke the postwar city so strongly, going on to his still lives where light and shadow are depicted like heavy veils dropped over everyday objects, to his final pieces such as "Ecce Homo", a brutally honest, triumphant yet despairing look into the artistic mirror as old age and mental illness started to take hold of him.
Cyril Mann's single-minded dedication to Art with a capital A is also well depicted in the book. A fierce, intense man, he was never less than passionate in anything, and his quarrelsome nature and refusal to compromise his beliefs or strongly-held opinions (or art) for anyone contributed to his relative lack of success during his lifetime despite his obvious talent. Yet financial hardship or difficult circumstances never swerved him from his dedication to his vocation. My mother described him doggedly going out into the devastated bombsites of postwar East London to set up in the street and paint what he saw, occasionally irritably chasing off the street urchins who would gather to peer over his shoulder.
Cyril Mann was an artistic genius that the 20th Century never recognised - in part due to his own personality, that same intense, fierce personality that created the passion that made his art so powerful. This book tries to put Mann into the artistic canon where he belongs.
A website is being developed to showcase Cyril Mann's life and work and can be found on: www.cyrilmann.co.uk
Cyril Mann was a man who lived for art. His passion comes through strongly in his work, where he constantly sought to represent the power of the sun, and the varied effects of light on whatever it touched. Some of his paintings have an almost apocalyptic feel with the representation of the burning orb of the sun set squarely within the painting. He would often paint facing directly into the sun, in a way that indicated his obsession with this life-giving object. A quote of his illustrates this well: "I do not paint the object, but the way the light falls upon it". His career spanned several styles, each building on the one before, showing an amazing breadth of artistic genres but each one clearly following the central theme to his artistic life. This book shows this progression - from early works showing his burgeoning talent such as "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man", then his series of sunlit and shadowy London paintings that evoke the postwar city so strongly, going on to his still lives where light and shadow are depicted like heavy veils dropped over everyday objects, to his final pieces such as "Ecce Homo", a brutally honest, triumphant yet despairing look into the artistic mirror as old age and mental illness started to take hold of him.
Cyril Mann's single-minded dedication to Art with a capital A is also well depicted in the book. A fierce, intense man, he was never less than passionate in anything, and his quarrelsome nature and refusal to compromise his beliefs or strongly-held opinions (or art) for anyone contributed to his relative lack of success during his lifetime despite his obvious talent. Yet financial hardship or difficult circumstances never swerved him from his dedication to his vocation. My mother described him doggedly going out into the devastated bombsites of postwar East London to set up in the street and paint what he saw, occasionally irritably chasing off the street urchins who would gather to peer over his shoulder.
Cyril Mann was an artistic genius that the 20th Century never recognised - in part due to his own personality, that same intense, fierce personality that created the passion that made his art so powerful. This book tries to put Mann into the artistic canon where he belongs.
A website is being developed to showcase Cyril Mann's life and work and can be found on: www.cyrilmann.co.uk
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
Lavishly illustrated with the artist's powerful paintings
23 Dec 2008
Format:Hardcover
In the opening chapter The Making of an Artist Taylor traces Mann's family origins and schooling and his early scholarship to art school, his time in Canada and contact with the Group of Seven, his return to England and his war service. The chapter Living with Art continues with the theme with his art education and the Royal Academy and the people prominent in his life. The chapter Living for Art picks up following the break up of his first marriage and the subsequent necessity to find paying employment, meeting of his second wife, and finally the problems of his later life.
The chapter entitled The Art considers Mann's work with much emphasis on the artists who influenced him prominent among whom were Turner and Van Gogh, but included many others. However what comes through most strongly in all these chapters is a picture of Mann himself, a forceful and overbearing personality. A man obsessed with his own views and ideas and ready to impose them on anyone willing enough to be his audience, often so engrossed in his own thoughts that he would be unaware of those of his listener, or of what was going on around him. Perhaps it is only fitting that this quality should dominate the writing here in the same way as Mann himself would dominate by his own presence; it is certainly clear that he was a man one would find either fascinating or insufferable.
The section of plates runs from page 49 to 160; the dominant themes of Mann's output being still life, the nude and townscapes, with an overriding interest in the effects of light and shadow. The book concludes with a chronology and A Portrait of My Husband and a Memoir of My Father, the latter two both self-explanatory.
This is a lavishly illustrated book, in addition to the section of around 150 full colour plates, the text is illustrated throughout with black and white contemporary photographs. The plates include several large scale detail images, but sadly one or two of the paintings are reproduced unnecessarily small on the page, why do the designers of such books insist on offering a minuscule image adrift in acres of white space? However that aside it is a intriguing book about a fascinating artists, an artist one would have loved to have met, if only the once! Perhaps having been taught throughout my own art education by those of the same generation as Mann, and who displayed similar traits, I found it particularly interesting; but whatever one thinks of Cyril Mann, one cannot deny the beauty and power, the richness of colour and sense of light, of his painting.
The chapter entitled The Art considers Mann's work with much emphasis on the artists who influenced him prominent among whom were Turner and Van Gogh, but included many others. However what comes through most strongly in all these chapters is a picture of Mann himself, a forceful and overbearing personality. A man obsessed with his own views and ideas and ready to impose them on anyone willing enough to be his audience, often so engrossed in his own thoughts that he would be unaware of those of his listener, or of what was going on around him. Perhaps it is only fitting that this quality should dominate the writing here in the same way as Mann himself would dominate by his own presence; it is certainly clear that he was a man one would find either fascinating or insufferable.
The section of plates runs from page 49 to 160; the dominant themes of Mann's output being still life, the nude and townscapes, with an overriding interest in the effects of light and shadow. The book concludes with a chronology and A Portrait of My Husband and a Memoir of My Father, the latter two both self-explanatory.
This is a lavishly illustrated book, in addition to the section of around 150 full colour plates, the text is illustrated throughout with black and white contemporary photographs. The plates include several large scale detail images, but sadly one or two of the paintings are reproduced unnecessarily small on the page, why do the designers of such books insist on offering a minuscule image adrift in acres of white space? However that aside it is a intriguing book about a fascinating artists, an artist one would have loved to have met, if only the once! Perhaps having been taught throughout my own art education by those of the same generation as Mann, and who displayed similar traits, I found it particularly interesting; but whatever one thinks of Cyril Mann, one cannot deny the beauty and power, the richness of colour and sense of light, of his painting.
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