Mary Gabriel is the author of Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award, as well as of Notorious Victoria: The Life of Victoria Woodhull, Uncensored, and The Art of Acquiring: A Portrait of Etta and Claribel Cone. She worked in Washington and London as a Reuters editor for nearly two decades and lives in Ireland.
"Ninth Street Women is a must read...Gabriel seamlessly weaves the
intimate and the public, the lives and the art, making us feel we
were there...It is a story that is a part of the American story,
told here in vivid, meaningful detail, an absolutely pivotal
text."--Margaret Randall, Women's Review of Books
"Ninth Street Women is like a great, sprawling Russian novel,
filled with memorable characters and sharply etched scenes. It's no
mean feat to breathe life into five very different and very brave
women, none of whom gave a whit about conventional mores. But Ms.
Gabriel fleshes out her portraits with intimate details, astute
analyses of the art and good old-fashioned storytelling."--Ann
Landi, Wall Street Journal
"A colorful narrative as compelling as a novel. Gabriel brilliantly
shows how the women of Abstract Expressionism carved out paths for
themselves in an often hostile community, fashioning careers and
producing exciting work fully as important as that of their male
peers--men whom they befriended, married, bedded, or
disdained."--Mary V. Dearborn, author of Ernest Hemingway: A
Biography
"A fascinating, meticulously researched account of five painters
who broke through the gender barriers in the art world of the
1950s. Gabriel is deft at teasing out the behind-the-scenes drama
in these women's lives and careers. Essential reading for any
student of the period, and of the New York School
generally."--David Salle, author of How to See: Looking, Talking,
and Thinking About Art
"A gorgeous and unsettling narrative...Ninth Street Women is
supremely gratifying, generous, and lush but also tough and precise
-- in other words, as complicated and capacious as the lives it
depicts...It's as if once Gabriel got started, the canvas before
her opened up new vistas. We should be grateful she yielded to its
possibilities."--Jennifer Szalai, New York Times
"A sweeping panorama of American art history in the decades around
World War II--specifically Abstract Expressionism and the rise of
U.S. art world dominance internationally. A major contribution to
the literature of twentieth-century cultural and social
history."--Julia Van Haaften, author of Berenice Abbott: A Life in
Photography
"Biographer Gabriel corrects long-standing misperceptions about New
York's abstract-expressionism movement by telling the dramatic,
often traumatic stories of the five gifted and courageous women
painters at the center of that radical flowering...avidly
researched, deeply analyzed, gorgeously written, and endlessly
involving five-track mix of biography and history... Gabriel not
only provides vibrantly detailed accounts of these five exceptional
avant-garde artists' friendships and rivalries, affairs and
marriages, doubt and despair, conviction and resilience; she also
establishes a richly dimensional context for their struggles and
innovations...Gabriel has created an incandescent, engrossing, and
paradigm-altering art epic."--Booklist (starred review)
"Gabriel delivers an immersive group biography of eclectic,
free-spirited painters who shocked the art world in the 1940s and
'50s with abstract expressionism...Through the lens of these
women's lives, Gabriel delivers a sweeping history of abstract
expressionism and the postwar New York School, and an affectionate
tribute to the underappreciated women of America's
avant-garde."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Gabriel has created an ambitious, comprehensive, and impressively
detailed history of abstract expressionism focused on the lives and
works of Elaine de Kooning, Lee Krasner, Grace Hartigan, Joan
Mitchell, and Helen Frankenthaler...A sympathetic, authoritative
collective biography."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Gabriel's fascinating group portrait shimmers with vivid personal
detail...She traces their interwoven paths from studio to Cedar Bar
to the Eight Street loft known as the Club...Over time, Willem de
Kooning outshone Elaine; Jackson Pollock eclipsed Krasner. Key
contributions were erased...Gabriel makes sure these major artists
who have been written out of history are not forgotten."--Jane
Ciabattari, BBC.com
"Gripping and enthralling, Mary Gabriel made me share every
turbulent moment of these remarkable women's lives. A magisterial
reference, this book will be the definitive text for years to come.
It is also the most devastatingly accurate portrayal of five women
who had the temerity to call themselves artists in the
male-dominated twentieth century."--Deirdre Bair, author of Al
Capone: His Life, Legacy, and Legend
"I loved every page of this necessary book. At last we see such
once-sidelined artists as Joan Mitchell and Elaine de Kooning in
depth, and both the telling gossip of their lives and the brave
authenticity of their work are thrilling. Mary Gabriel restores the
humanist ambition at the core of all the New York painters of this
era, whether male or female--the boldness of their risky lives and
the seriousness of their noble enterprise."--Brad Gooch, author of
Rumi's Secret: The Life of the Sufi Poet of Love
"Masterful. Mixing critical insight with juicy storytelling, Mary
Gabriel brings five brilliant female painters to the fore of the
art revolution that cut a wide swath in postwar America."--Patricia
Albers, author of Joan Mitchell: Lady Painter
"More than a compilation of biographical tales, Gabriel's book is a
reminder of the importance of women to an artistic genre long
associated with masculinity. But it is also is a vivid portrait of
the very nature of the artist. The stars of the era suffered and
sinned as mortals, but their works -- and their creative appetites
-- were otherworldly. Ninth Street Women gets us a just a little
bit closer to their galaxy."--Karen Sandstrom, Washington Post
"Sheer delight. A richly detailed epic starring not only five
heroic female painters, but a supporting cast that defines the
entire existential and Beat era, from Frank O'Hara to Billie
Holiday to Samuel Beckett. Gabriel's vision of Lee Krasner jazz
dancing with Piet Mondrian alone is worth the price of the book.
With palpable empathy for the flawed brilliance of her five stars,
their jealous foes, and their long-suffering enablers, Gabriel
conjures the high-risk paths they chose, what making great art cost
their lives, and what they lost and won in the end."--Michael
Findlay, director of Acquavella Galleries and author of Seeing
Slowly: Looking at Modern Art
"These individuals are brought to life by Pulitzer Prize finalist
Gabriel, who shows how each defied social convention and
professional boundaries to create new creative forms and attain
equality with their male counterparts. . . . A must for modern art
historians and enthusiasts."--Library Journal (starred review)
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