American Realism

by Edward Lucie-Smith

Despite the acclaim given since 1945 to American abstract painting and sculpture, realism has continued to play a uniquely important role in American art. This lavishly illustrated book explores the tremendous scope, richness, toughness, sensibility, and liveliness of the American realist tradition. Sixteen sections discuss and display the finest and most important work of different artists, groups, schools, and periods—including American Impressionism, the Ashcan School, Precisionism, American Scene Painting, Edward Hopper, Urban realism, Photorealism, and Postmodern realism today—and provide convincing proof that the American realist legacy occupies an unparalleled position in the world art of the past one hundred years. Edward Lucie-Smith discusses the work of pioneering masters of American realism such as Thomas Eakins, Mary Cassatt, Charles Sheeler, Thomas Hart Benton, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Andrew Wyeth. He then examines the work of contemporary realist painters, from Wayne Thiebaud, Leon Golub, Isabel Bishop, Alice Neel, and Fairfield Porter to younger artists, such as Eric Fischl and Jeff Koons, who have achieved star status as practitioners of this innovative tradition. The book thus carries the story of American realism up to the present, showing how it continues to flourish in the United States today as strongly as it has in the past. A magnificent volume, with over one hundred color plates, American Realism both celebrates and reveals the strengths of a great American legacy. 250 illustrations, 115 in color.

Genres: Art

240 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1994

About the author

John Edward McKenzie Lucie-Smith, known as Edward Lucie-Smith, was an English writer, poet, art critic, curator and broadcaster.

Lucie-Smith was born in Kingston, Jamaica, moving to the United Kingdom in 1946. He was educated at The King's School, Canterbury, and, after a little time in Paris, he read History at Merton College, Oxford from 1951 to 1954.

After serving in the Royal Air Force as an Education Officer and working as a copywriter, he became a full-time writer (as well as anthologist and photographer). He succeeded Philip Hobsbaum in organising The Group, a London-centred poets' group.

At the beginning of the 1980s he conducted several series of interviews, Conversations with Artists, for BBC Radio 3. He is also a regular contributor to The London Magazine, in which he writes art reviews. A prolific writer, he has written more than one hundred books in total on a variety of subjects, chiefly art history as well as biographies and poetry.

In addition he has curated a number of art exhibitions, including three Peter Moores projects at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool; the New British Painting (1988–90) and two retrospectives at the New Orleans Museum of Art. He was a curator of the Bermondsey Project Space.

Edward Lucie-Smith died in July 2026, at the age of 93.

Information about Lucie-Smith's death from Wikipedia

Reviews

[Shruthika · Rating 4 out of 5]

good