Today’s blog comes from Candace Weir, Central Library staff:

I love looking at images: paintings, photographs or sculptures.

One of the library’s newest acquisitions, In Wonderland: The Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists in Mexico and the United States has lots to look at; its pages are filled with weird and wonderful imagery.

The book presents the work of well-known artists such as Frida Kahlo, Lois Alvarez Bravo and Louise Bourgeois. One painting, the Creation of the birds, I would love to have hanging on a wall in my house. It was created by the Mexican surrealist, Remedios Varo. I have a particular fondness for the work of Remedios Varo and Leonora Carrington. These women were close friends, meeting over coffee in each other’s kitchens. (You can learn more about their lives and work in another great book from our collection: Surreal Friends: Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo and Kati Horna.)

Included, as well, is the work of lesser-known artists. It introduced me to a number of great images and artists, such as the exquisitely sensitive photography of Francesca Woodman. She captured haunting images often using her own body in decaying interiors.

Publishers are rediscovering some very fine artists who have had little published about them. What a joy for us to share in this discovery!

- Candace