Look again / Gideon Rubin ; [text by Jennifer Higgie, Matthew Holman, Varda Caivano, Park Joon] ; edited by Rosie Robertson and Matt Price.

Artist
Rubin, Gideon [Browse]
Uniform title
Format
Book
Language
English
Published/​Created
London : Anomie Publishing, 2023.
Description
225 pages : color illustrations ; 26 cm

Details

Subject(s)
Author
Interviewer
Editor
Summary note
"Gideon Rubin (b. 1973, Israel) is an artist who lives and works in London. Exploring identity, history, and the inheritance of trauma in his enigmatic paintings, Rubin’s subject matter draws on myriad references such as film, popular culture, art history, and literature, creating and investigating mythologies from the recent past. Haunting and subtly theatrical, the paintings often feature faceless yet familiar figures. Underlying each work is Rubin’s expressive mark-making, muted palette and understated use of negative space and raw canvas. Look Again is Gideon Rubin’s second major trade monograph and showcases his substantial body of work since 2015, including studies of people in nature and scenes of solitude and intimacy. Author and art critic Jennifer Higgie discusses the evolution of his artistic style and his many influences – Balthus, De Kooning, Guston, and Diebenkorn to name a few. Matthew Holman’s expansive essay touches on Rubin’s cinematic characters, source material, his use of artistic conventions and engagement with sexuality. Holman investigates the meaning of redaction in Rubin’s work, both in his faceless portraits and in Black Book – a work in which Rubin used black paint to erase the contents of a 1938 English translation of Mein Kampf. Exhibited at the Freud Museum in London in 2018, Black Book is an exploration of what is left out of history, as much as what is remembered. Painting is essential to Rubin, as both a creative and therapeutic act; 'a log keeping him afloat in the middle of the sea,' as he puts it. In conversation with fellow artist Varda Caivano, Rubin analyses his motivations, processes, and doubts, and explains his surprising route to painting. Despite coming from a lineage of painters on his father’s side, it was largely his mother’s academic love of art that galvanized his artistic career, as well as a transformational experience in South America that opened him up to painting. An emotive poem by South Korean author Park Joon sheds further light on Rubin’s imagination"-- Provided by publisher.
Bibliographic references
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Language note
Includes English translation of Superstition by Joon Park ; translated from the Korean by Youngseo Lee..
Contents
  • Look again: the paintings of Gideon Rubin / Jennifer Higgie
  • Superstition / Park Joon ; [translated from the Korean by Youngseo Lee]
  • The wilderness is gathering all its children back again / Matthew Holman
  • Where are the paintings happening? / Gideon Rubin in conversation with Varda Caivano.
ISBN
  • 191022152X (hardcover)
  • 9781910221525 (hardcover)
OCLC
1401052242
Statement on responsible collection description
Princeton University Library aims to describe library materials in a manner that is respectful to the individuals and communities who create, use, and are represented in the collections we manage. Read more...
Other views
Staff view