Compiled and edited by art historian and expert James Timothy Voorhies, My Dear Stieglitz: Letters Of Marsden Hartley And Alfred Stieglitz 1912-1915 is an informative and intrinsically interesting collection of previously unpublished correspondence between America artist Marsden Hartley and avant-garde impresario, editor, and photographer Alfred Stieglitz chronicling Hartley's three year European sojourn before and just at the inception of World War I. The letters begin with Hartley's 1912 arrival in Paris and provides invaluable commentary on Gertrude Stein's salons, the paintings of Picasso, Cezanne, and Matisse, and his encounters with many of the leading lights of the European world of artists, art dealers, and gallery owners. Hartley continues in 1913 to write an informative correspondence about the Expressionist artists and art trends that he encountered in Germany. This amazing body of correspondence concludes with Hartley's late 1915 return to an America seasoned by the influx of pre-war modern art. My Dear Stieglitz is a welcome and invaluable contribution to 20th Century Art History reference collections and supplemental reading lists.

I loved this collection of letters because the correspondence is so succint, complete, and filled with emotion and drama. The letters really gave me a sense of what the artist was going through at this time in his life.

Also, the editor did a great job with the appendices and the footnotes - they are as entertaining and informative as the letters themselves.

This book will blow your mind with the beautiful paintings from all different time periods. Don't miss out on how Hartely brings together all his passions into this one exquisite book.

I was a little disappointed with the author's hamfisted attempts at interpretation here. The book is full of self-congratulatory attempts at radical crtique, and not many of them hit the mark. He raises some interesting points in his discussion of Hartley: is it radical to be a homosexual artist? Does the canon welcome alternatives? Regarding the canon of great art,is it fair to be always on the top or on the bottom? The author's discussion of the ethics of the reacharound are quite provocative. It would have been more gratifying if he had addressed such topics to the lay person and not the ivory tower specialist. -schwiner

"Painting Berlin Stories" is more of an extended essay for scholars than a thorough art history book for the general public. It does a fine job of explaining how both Marsden Hartley and Oscar Bluemner ended up in Germany instead of France (where most early twentieth century American artists went) for their art educations abroad. Also, it very clearly describes Kandinsky's influence and Stieglitz' support of both artists. German expressionist art resonated with both Hartley and Bluemner, but both of them dismissed purely non-objective painting, instead believing that a work of art needed to ultimately be based on reality, even if it was abstracted away from pure representation. Both were influenced by the transcendentalism of Americans Emerson, Whitman, and James, as well as by the idealism of Kant, Goethe, and Neitzche. The book does a nice job of describing all of the German influences on American culture in the pre-WWI timeframe.

However, there are serious problems with this book as it stands. First, it is a major disservice to publish a book mostly about Hartley and Bluemner that is completely in black and white -- there are NO color photos in this book. Both artists are excellent colorists and much is lost because all twenty of the book's illustrations are B&W. Although the book's description lists 208 pages, there are actually 190 numbered pages and of those, over 50 (!) are full of footnotes (most of which are just source references, not additional reading material) and bibliographic information. Further, the book contains no index, limiting its usefulness as a reference work. Biographical information is very limited for all artists, focusing almost exclusively on the years around their time spent in Germany. Finally, one chapter very briefly discusses other German-influenced American artists -- Bloch, Feininger, and Demuth -- but does not include any pictures of their paintings and does not add much to the discussion. Thus, [the price] is an awful lot of money for a small (6"x9"), short, black-and-white art book. If you need a very focused essay on the German influence of early twentieth century American modernist painters, especially a detailed bibliography, then you might find this book helpful. Otherwise, while interesting, it is very expensive for what it delivers.

This is a reworking of the autobiography of Marsden Hartley by Susan Elizabeth Ryan (Assistant Professor of Art, Louisiana State University) I have not read the previous versions but I am interested in Maine art and I found this autobiography and the pictures it contains interesting and informative about Hartley and his travels and interactions with other prominent artistic and literary figures of his time. There are 5 appendices that include some of his letters to Gertrude Stein and his niece Norma Berger. There are 45 illustrations (all in black and white) of photos of Hartley and of some of his paintings. There is a chronology of Hartley's life and travels which I have found helpful on occasion while researching some of his paintings.

This book probably would not be of interest to you unless you had an interest in Hartley, but if you want to understand him and his paintings this book would be a good place to start.