Antoni Gaudí by Michael Eaude | Book Review | Critical Lives | Reaktion Books

[Review originally published on Bookmunch: View Post]

I knew nothing about the life of Antoni Gaudí as I dove into this book. I did, however, remember visiting the Sagrada Família when I was young, and being blown away by architecture for the first time in my life. It is a magnificent building, truly unlike anything – with mythical figures and melons and coffee beans, decorated with glass and pottery shards, piled on top of spires like 99 Flakes, bursting with colour. It’s enough to take a quick glance at the Güell Pavillions Dragon Gate, or the Casa Batlló, to see what I mean.

I know even less about architecture, but it does strike me as unique that Gaudí was a ‘total architect’: he didn’t just design the brick-and-mortar structures, but also the interiors and, in some cases, even the furniture. Every nook and cranny, painted bird, cast-iron leaf or coloured glass shard came from him. His influences, presented in the book in good detail, are fascinating in their global scale: William Morris and John Ruskin, the Arts and Crafts movement, Persian and Orientalist flourishes, mudéjar (the work of Muslim craftsmen under Christian rule, a style still very prominent throughout Spain) and Gothic styles – despite travelling very little himself and learning mostly from the books he found in his university library.

The man behind all this dreamy colour, however, was not at all what I expected.‘There were three main strands to Gaudí’s thought: he was extremely right-wing, a fervent Catalanist and a militant Catholic.’

The depths of his fanaticism emerge in detail, including a fasting period during his midlife crisis that felt more like a hunger strike in its seriousness, and religious extremism in every aspect of his life.

He was brusque, often rude, haughty and rebellious but, inarguably, outrageously talented. He had no time for leisure: ‘In his pockets he usually carried bags of biscuits … stamped with a cross, which he nibbled frequently and distributed to whomever he was talking to. Formal meals used up too much valuable time, he thought.’

The book provides good historical context for some basic understanding of Gaudí’s motives and historical setting, and will be of interest to anyone who has seen, or is planning (or hoping) to see, some of his work. Notably, Eaude writes very accessibly: as and when he uses jargon, he is quick to explain in layman terms before one could even start panicking. Everything gets sufficient context, which is surprising for such a slim volume. Adorned with 57 illustrations and/or snaps, though black and white, it feels a complete picture of the man and the myth (though for a fuller experience, it is worth seeing the designs in colour).

The format of the book is doing it no favours, though. On first appearance, I was baffled by my own wish to read this – the small type, the glossy pages, the elongated paperback format all screamed academia. Luckily, I actually started reading it, and quickly realised looks could be deceiving. It turned out to be a very enjoyable and interesting read. (Admittedly, upon further research, the TLS said the series contained ‘very short critical biographies whose main target audience is likely to be undergraduates, but that will also do nicely for a general audience.’ So clearly I'm just a nerd.)

The book finishes on the question of what Gaudí would have made of his stellar success today. He is personally responsible for driving mass tourism to Barcelona, attracting more visitors annually than the Prado Museum in Madrid or the Alhambra in Granada. Eaude proposes he would have ‘taken reverence and admiration of his talent as his due … And would have fulminated against the irreligious, money-making mass consumption of tourism’.

A classic case of biting the hand that feeds, reminiscent of Thomas Bernhard’s literary prizes. It’s a complicated legacy, but the value of Gaudí’s revolutionary buildings and unique architecture is rock solid.

Really Good, Actually | Monica Heisey | Book review

Bearing in mind that this book could well be about me, the claim that it is depressingly relatable may not be universally true. Nevertheless, with a female protagonist of 29-30 who fills over 300 pages with mostly self doubt, for me, Really Good, Actually by Monica Heisey was unputdownable. 

I've read too many books with female protagonists whose support group is more than believably supportive, living in London yet somehow managing to be at said protagonist's house in a crisis within 20 minutes. Honey, if you live in Woolwich and she in Wandsworth, that ain't happening. Not even if you're loaded, which these clichéd, adoring friends somehow normally are. The forceful cheeriness of fictional WhatsApp groups who love each other oh so much are so done in my opinion.

Fortunately, that's not the case here - in fact, I felt it was a bonus that this book is set in Toronto, giving enough colour to make it feel more warm and true but removed from the metropolis that I'm familiar with. The support group is present, but no friend gets more, or less, characteristics pinned on them than is needed, and in fact they manage to act like normal people most of the time. (Okay, fine, one character's message does read 'Be there in 20' as if people have nothing to do all day but respond to friend emergencies, but as we learn in the book Toronto is small, and I can overlook it this one time anyway.)

The story can be summed up simply: Maggie, 29, is a very normal main character. She is an adjunct professor, teaching and working on her PhD. ('Jon had joked about me stepping forward on an airplane: 'Are there any doctors on board?' 'Yes! What part of Coriolanus is he struggling with?') Crucially though, she is going through a divorce. And losing custody of her cat. When you open the cover of this book, you grab your suitcases and march on into her head, where you'll be making a home until the end, including hilarious lists of Google searches and hypothetical scenarios which end each chapter, adding that touch of lightness. 

Maggie's internal monologues are self-deprecating, biased against herself: negativity piles about her body, her actions, her entire being as a person (bad daughter, bad friend, bad everything). And although yes, she has flaws - as we all do - it is weirdly uplifting to read such a negative view of another's self and be able to think, 'don't be so hard on yourself'. Perhaps this is what is so loveable about this book: by cultivating compassion for someone who is just like us, we as readers can stop and imagine being this compassionate towards our own selves as well. Just imagine!

Importantly, Maggie is not kooky, or depressed in a cute way, and her friends only tolerate her meltdowns up to a point. She is sometimes rude, sometimes insensitive, and this is what makes her believeable and a pleasure to spend time with.

Although the novel follows the simple story arc where things go from good to bad to really bad to hopefully better, it is full of bittersweet surprises and human decisions, interactions and occurrences. It is a story of a divorce that somehow manages to avoid melodrama, even when things don't go as originally planned - the amicable, reasonable breakup we'd all want but none of us can make happen in the end. In fact, refreshingly, the ex-husband barely features in person, and is more hinted at through memories and second degree interactions. 

The only slight crime, if we need to poke holes, is the overuse of the word 'bashfulness', but if that's all, believe you me we're in good hands.

Ultimately, this is easy reading that still manages to make you feel like your heart is broken (I kept reaching over and grabbing my husband's hand for reassurance). I loved Maggie and I will miss her honest rambles, and her 3am burger deliveries, and her therapeutic online shopping, and her too many hashbrowns for breakfast. In fact, I'm slightly annoyed I can't get a McDonald's breakfast delivery right now.

Strangers by Rebecca Tamàs | Essays on the Human and Nonhuman | Book review

Strangers by Rebecca Tamàs first grabbed my attention when I saw it exhibited as part of The Nature Library at one of their locations in Glasgow. Our shared Hungarian background immediately obvious from her name, I was pleased to recognise a writer who, despite coming from my much-despised and begrudgingly admitted to birth country, creates and thinks in English. What's more, it was clear from a variety of aspects - the design of the book, the first few pages, the location where I was encountering it - that she wrote deeply, interestingly, informed. 

Strangers is a collection of essays, pleasingly formatted and designed throughout this short book, with a focus on the connection between human and nonhuman entites, the climate crisis, nature and existence. In a nutshell. (Naturally, from the very beginning of the book wakes a lurking feeling of guilt for having given up my vegetarianism.) But it is also a book that reaches further than its covers, inspiring thought without piling you with information. 

The first three essays in the book - On Watermelon, On Hospitality and On Pansychism - are very strong. They set the mind buzzing immediately.

On Hospitality, for example, discusses a novel, The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector, regarding an encounter between a human and a cockroach. 'What G.H. reaches in her experience with the cockroach is an understanding that human ideas of reason and progress are only casings around the unspeakable purposelessness of existence. ... Purposeless, but not pointless. Into this ambient purposelessness comes an understanding of our radical interdependence and intimacy with nonhuman forces; viscerally and urgently alive in a space of constant becoming.'

What is interesting about this recurring idea of the interdependence of human and nonhuman beings is that only one side is consciously aware of it, and this same side is consciously trying to suppress the other's existence. Is the bargain then equal? Or rather than trying to simply accept our interdependence with all living ('living' the key word) beings, should we also be aiming to become guardians, leaders for a positive coexistence? Or is that too 'blue sky'?

'Can anyone really deny that thought and thinking comes from the outside as well as the inside? That when the outside is terribly damaged, the inside will be also?'

Simple idea, yet reading On Pansychism, I feel the metal bands of my mind popping as they expand. The image of a lake driven insane, or the simple fact, presented plain and simple, that the world isn't just a bakcdrop to our lives: it is part of them, influences them, drives them. And yet, nonhuman beings exist on the outside of our infinite feedback loop. This idea reminds me of Robert Macfarlane's thoughts about the indifference of mountains to our struggle to climb them, similar to the river is quoted in this book, not as a metaphor to the author's feelings, but as an indifferent, cool entity - and it is that detachment that ultimately helps soothe the author's soul.

Then follow two essays which are more deeply art criticisms or analysis, introducing the artworks of Ana Mendieta and a poetry collection by Ariana Reines. The latter feels slightly weaker in that it gives less insight, I felt, into the work, but Mendieta's work, upon Googling, is hauntingly beautiful. An essay on climate grief versus climate despair quietly meditates on the difference. And the final essay, On Mystery, remains just that - it feels like reading a stream of consciousness, surprisingly well crafted nevertheless.

My copy of Strangers happened to be an uncorrected proof, which meant I had to contend with typos and guesses throughout - something that added to the strangeness, perhaps. It was a pleasure to come across a book that discusses unusual questions around the climate crisis, and offers a completely fresh perspective on human and nonhuman existence on Earth. Somehow this book manages to inspire without sounding the doom alarm too much, and it left me with fresh thoughts and feelings about my own role in changing the world a tiny bit.

I certainly look forward to reading more from Rebecca Tamàs.

Wreck: Géricault's Raft and the Art of Being Lost at Sea | Book Review | Tom de Freston

 

A few months ago I visited the White Chapel Gallery in London. The exhibition I went to see - 'A Century of the Artist’s Studio: 1920-2020' - presented a variety of art forms, from painting to video installation, sculptures, audio, immersive space and more. It's the type that can be rather hit or miss, depending on how much abstraction one is willing to put up with on that specific day. Fortunately, as is normally the case at this Gallery, some pieces were exquisite - William Kentridge debating with himself on video, slightly out of sync, enough to build to a comical yet highly intriguing effect; Francis Bacon's studio recreated in detail, as organised chaos. Others, however, lost their meaning in translation for me, due especially to the lack of explanation of the artist's motives, inspiration or background. This, of course, begs the question (one of my favourites to debate): what do we expect from art? Is it an individual, laying their soul bare in front of the viewer? Is it a shared experience? Or is it a deeply personal, individualistic form of entertainment where the viewer is free to create their own experience?

Perhaps it is all and none of those things. This is one of the questions that Tom De Freston explores in Wreck: Géricault's Raft and the Art of Being Lost at Sea. I find myself itching to write a review of this book before I've even finished it. Why? Perhaps because it's so visual, filling my mind with thoughts - the first book to do so in a while. 

Tom is an artist wearing many hats. As he himself proclaims in the book, he has been known to experiment with enough art forms to draw criticism for his broad net but, like his many-pronged approach to creating art, this book benefits from its many layers. The threads he weaves add up to a varied tapestry, starting with an in-depth analysis of the painting of The Raft of the Medusa (1818–19) by Géricault, which he uses as the base structure to build the book on. He gradually layers additional storylines, like coats of paint; grappling with his own childhood trauma, as well as that of Syrian writer, translator and professor Ali Souleman, with whom he begins an artistic collaboration. Having lost his sight to a bomb blast, Ali works with Tom to learn to see together, exploring each other's lives as their friendship develops, and creating through their interwoven stories.

There is something that captures Tom's imagination in the tragedy of Ali's past. It isn't clear whether the intention is to capture, work through or heal, and throughout we get the sense that Tom reaches for a multitude of art forms, unsure which one will express that unnamed desire that will, perhaps, create a final product. We don't get the satisfaction of seeing it, but perhaps the book is all the stronger for it. Observing the creative process, I once again think about art as often a delicate balance between fine and pretentious. It's easy to gloss over, refute the abstract as performance and false intellectualism. But in this book, we stand up close, breathing down the artist's neck while he devises and performs his art, first painting, then performing as on a stage, twisting his body into contortionist shapes, then exploring further and stranger artistic avenues. It would be easy to smirk. But I chose to believe the artist, let his art in, follow him down the rabbit hole. 

Parallel to the developing collaboration and its many surprising turns, Tom also explores the story of Géricault's life, full of obsession and phantasmagorical elements. It is a fascinating overview of the painter's biography and art, and Géricault's collaboration with a survivor of the Medusa, Corréard, during his work on The Raft draws neat parallels with the present day storyline too. I very much enjoy the logical and solid structure throughout the book.

Creative references abound, and the wide-ranging research that has clearly gone into this work is like a breath of fresh air. In reading about paintings, especially ones we haven't come across before, we are invited to follow Ali's way of seeing, relying on our narrator. I constantly find myself faced with these two options: phone at the ready to Google all the art mentioned; or simply read, giving control to the author. I do a bit of both, taking in his words but looking up the art later. It's a fascinating game, seeing with someone else's eyes, thinking with someone else's brain and background, imagining with someone else's imagination. Another person may see a face where we see billowing sails, or shadow where light is overwhelming. We're exploring how different people come to view the same piece of art, circling back to the meaning of art itself.

This is, ultimately, a fascinating combination of art history and analysis, and the type of book that launches a reader on a journey: to discover Goya's Black Paintings, to seek out de Kooning's biography, to understand why [Jacques-Louis] David had such an influence on his followers. It reads as if it's happening in the present moment, a stream of consciousness reflecting on art as it is born. It's thrilling to observe the process.