Between Lives: An Artist and Her World

Rating:
Summary: It Should Have Been So Much More
Review: Indifferent writing, a surprising lack of insight into the incredible milieu in which she moved, and gratuitously catty remarks towards the great Leonora Carrington (an earlier Ernst protege who Tanning apparently feels threatened by 50 years after the fact) mar what should have been a very interesting memoir of a remarkable life. Tanning, Max Ernst's companion of 30 years and a compelling painter in her own right, was at the heart of one of the great artistic movements of the 20th Century, but this work reads like a flat travel log of places gone to and roll call of persons met. The paucity of detail,personal anectdotes, and characterization of any of the luminaries mentioned mark Tanning's bio as a great disappointment.
--A two star book with one star added because any information on this artistic epoch provided by an active participant has to be considered an important contribution.