The Beauty of Light
An Interview
Laure Adler author Etel Adnan author Ethan Mitchell translator
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Nightboat Books
Published:2nd May '24
Should be back in stock very soon
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A lively and spontaneous interview with Etel Adnan about her absolute belief in the beauty of the world and the beauty of art.
In these interviews with journalist and editor Laure Adler, conducted in the months before her death in November 2021, Etel Adnan traces with depth and emotion the founding experiences of her artistic approach, between poetry and painting. From her youth in Lebanon, her American years in New York and California, to her late recognition at Documenta in 2012 and her life in France, the conversation covers philosophy, painting, poetry and aesthetics, as well Adnan's views on history and politics in Europe, the Middle East, and the United States. These transcripts usher the experiences and observations of Adnan's long and rich life into an intimate and spontaneous conversation with a dear friend—a window on the “universe” of her imagination.
“In perception, redemption,” Adnan declares in this assemblage of mystical, metaphysical ideas and aphorisms, often in conversation with the dead. 'We have to say yes to that fate,' she writes of mortality, 'and it’s hard, the hardest.'” ―Matt Flegenheimer, The New York Times
"This intimate, extended conversation, conducted with journalist and producer Laure Adler, opens up Adnan’s personal views on various topics: war, history, philosophy, painting, poetry, and feminism. " —Christina Chatzitheodorou, Asymptote
"Rather than pin down or bemoan our lack of perceptual surety, Adnan builds a nebula for readers to drift about. Her pages are a place for us to submerge, to question ourselves and each other even as we want to reach out and affirm that yes, we saw some nice fish down there—the colors really set off the light." ―K.B. Thors, Lambda Literary
"Given the uncanny breadth of her art, Adnan is a modern-day inheritor of 20th-century avant-garde movements like Dada and surrealism in which people moved fluidly between writing and art making in one recklessly inventive swoop." ―Negar Azimi, The Wall Street Journal
ISBN: 9781643622118
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
120 pages