Jenny (Reading Envy)'s Reviews > Art for the Ladylike: An Autobiography through Other Lives (Volume 1)

There is a lot in this book to like. The focus on female photographers - Sally Mann, Imogen Cunningham, Judy Dater, Ruth Orkin, Tina Modotti, Lee Miller, Madame Yvonne, and Grete Stern - was fascinating and would make this book a great companion to a focused course on the same topic. I spent a lot, a lot, a lot of time looking up images and reading more about many of these artists.

I know this is supposed to be an autobiography through the lens of these lives, but I'm just not sure the author makes it work. I've read books with that strategy that have been impressive - My Autobiography of Carson McCullers comes to mind as a recent book that does this excellently - but in this case I felt the author's own story actually distracted from the highly fascinating stories she was telling about these women and how they had to juggle expectations and gender roles alongside their work.

I love a good quotation, and so does this author, and she throws them into the text in great abundance, without a lot of context. Another strong edit reducing these to the most relevant would have been well advised.

I had a copy of this book from the publisher through Edelweiss. It came out March 7, 2021.