Leonora Carrington: Surrealism, Alchemy and Art
- Artist: Leonora Carrington
- Published: May 2010
- Publisher: Lund Humphries, London
- Edition: First
- Format: Paperback
- Height: 29cm
- Pages: 160
- Illustrations: Includes 95 colour and 25 b&w illustrations
£20.00
Add to basketLeonora Carrington: Surrealism, Alchemy and Art
Now available for the first time in paperback, this book remains the definitive survey of the life and work of Surrealist artist Leonora Carrington (born 1917).
Carrington burst onto the Surrealist scene in 1936, when, as a precocious nineteen-year-old débutante, she escaped the stultifying demands of her wealthy English family by running away to Paris with her lover Max Ernst. She was immediately championed by André Breton, who responded enthusiastically to her fantastical, dark and satirical writing style and her interest in fairy tales and the occult. Her stories were included in Surrealist publications, and her paintings in the Surrealists' exhibitions.
After the dramas and tragic separations of the Second World War, Carrington ended up in the 1940s as part of the circle of Surrealist European émigrés living in Mexico City. Close friends with Luis Bunuel, Benjamin Péret, Octavio Paz and a host of both expatriate Surrealists and Mexican modernists, Carrington was at the centre of Mexican cultural life, while still maintaining her European connections.
Leonora Carrington: Surrealism, Alchemy and Art provides a fascinating overview of this intriguing artist's rich body of work. The author considers Carrington's preoccupation with alchemy and the occult, and explores the influence of indigenous Mexican culture and beliefs on her production.
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Artists Biography
Leonora Carrington began painting in the Surrealist style in the 1930’s before moving to Mexico in 1942. There she met and shared a studio with Remedios Varo, a fellow female artist who dealt with the same mystical and occult themes that Carrington was interested in. She also created early feminist paintings that interpreted woman as the center of creativity and nature. Carrington’s work contains religious and mythological symbols, as well as other extraneous elements that compose her unique Surrealist approach.
