SCHMECKEBIER, Laurence E.

Modern Mexican Art

Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1939. First Edition. Quarto (26cm). Terra-cotta cloth over boards, stamped in blue; 190pp text; 78 leaves of plates. Inscribed on half-title: "To Ben Shahn with kindest regards, Laurence Schmeckebier," dated 1951. A lightly worn copy, lacking the dustwrapper; Very Good.

Schmeckebier's book was the first full-scale study of the Mexican muralists in English, and is still one of the best. Schmeckebier (b. 1906) was a sculptor and art administrator who was active in the Art Section of the WPA, though his association with Shahn might have predated this somewhat, as one of Shahn's first major public art commissions was as an assistant on Diego Rivera's RCA mural at Rockefeller Center - a project which is discussed at considerable length in the present work (though without any direct mention of Shahn).

Price: $150.00

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