Maxfield Parrish by Laurence S. Cutler, Judy Goffman And The American Illustrators Gallery (book review).
Who would have thought that I could pull a very large book such as ‘Maxfield Parrish’ by Laurence S. Cutler, Judy Goffman And The American Illustrators Gallery in such good condition and 20 years after the ‘Maxwell Parrish’ by Coy Ludiwick book I reviewed last month. Even so, this book was released in 1993. If you need something to pass the time, try looking old books at a reasonable price.
Apart from size, this book is in full colour throughout and covers pretty much the same territory when looking at Maxfield Parrish’s work across the board as well as his history. This time there is no taster to his colour schemes but it does confirm that he worked to the type of printing that was available at the time. Unusually, his foregrounds are a lot darker and uses the background as the means to highlight them than the other way around. Not that he couldn’t do it the other way around but they do dominate a lot of the choices in the selection of his art here.
The two things to be aware of with this book is you need a big height on your bookcase to put it upright of you’ll need to lay it flat or across other books within the shelf but at least it is reasonably thin.
If you’ve fallen in love with his art after looking it up on-line or got the previous book, then this is a decent follow-up.
GF Willmetts
September 2020
(pub: Bison Group, 1993. 112 page illustrated very large hardback. Price: I pulled my copy for about £ 8.00 (UK). ISBN: 0-86124-996-8)