Bouguereau
Fronia Wissman's Bouguereau offers astute and illuminating insights into his art, career, and family life of the French artist Adolphe-William Bouguereau (1825-1905) whose evocative visions of a better, purer time and place earned him a passionate following during his lifetime down through the present. 60 full color reproductions and 15 black & white illustrations perfectly exemplify Bouguereau's prodigious talent in creating works of sensual, emotional, and intellectual appeal. By the time of his death in 1905, Bouguereau was scorned by progressive painters and critics who saw in his works all that was wrong with the official French world of art, but he was also a favorite of collectors, who found in his paintings of bathers, nymphs, and shepherdesses a realm of eternal beauty far from contemporary life. Bouguereau displayed his talent for drawing at a very early age, became educated at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, was a highly successful portraitist, was exhibited at the Salon to an enthusiastic public, and had his work recognized and awarded at various European expositions during his life. Bouguereau is a beautiful tribute to an artist and would grace any art school, community, or personal art library!  --Midwest Book Review