Spring 2012 - University of California Press

General Interest
Nancy Boas
David Park
A Painter’s Life
Nancy Boas is the author of The Society of Six:
California Colorists (UC Press) and co-curated
the exhibition of the same name at the Fine Arts
Museums of San Francisco.
David Park (1911–1960), transplanted Bostonian turned groundbreaking
West Coast painter, led the way in creating what became
known as Bay Area Figurative Art—a daring move during the post-
World War II years when abstract expressionism held sway. In this
beautifully illustrated biography, compiled from comprehensive and
sweeping interviews, Nancy Boas traces Park’s resolute search for a
new kind of figuration, one that would penetrate abstract expressionism’s
thickly layered surfaces and infuse them with human presence.
Boas changes our understanding of Park as a painter, highlighting
his strong influence on Richard Diebenkorn, Elmer Bischoff, and
other artists at the California School of Fine Arts and the University
of California, Berkeley. She plunges us into the lively 1940s and
1950s Bay Area art scene, pointing to Park’s work as a bold alternative
to the abstractions of Clyfford Still. As the book deepens our admiration
for Park’s figurative paintings, it affirms his stature as a major
figure in American art, one who spurred the figurative impulse
across the United States and abroad.
A Simpson Book in the Humanities
A Chairman’s Circle Book
FEBRUARY
392 pages, 7 x 10”, 41 color illustrations,
75 b/w photographs
American Art
World
cloth 978-0-520-26841-8 $49.95/£34.95
14 | University of California Press