Niki de Saint Phalle
The Sketchbooks
A richly illustrated collection of previously unpublished drawings by the famed modern artist
The French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle is best known for her Nanas – joyful and brightly coloured monumental sculptures of goddess-like female figures. But her work, which was grounded in her visionary beliefs about social experiments and personal freedom, ranged much more widely – from painting, film, architecture, and books to theatre sets, clothing, and jewellery. Niki de Saint Phalle: The Sketchbooks presents a beautiful collection of previously unpublished drawings, notes, and other preparatory work from Saint Phalle’s private sketchbooks. Culled from a vast archive of never-before-seen materials, these drawings shed new light on Saint Phalle’s fascinating artistic evolution, style, and interior life.
Niki de Saint Phalle (1930–2002) was a French-American artist and prominent member of the Nouveau Réalisme movement. In addition to her extensive global installations of public artwork, her work has been featured in many solo exhibitions and museum collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Tate Modern, and Centre Pompidou.
Larry Warsh has been active in the art world for more than thirty years as a publisher and artist-collaborator, and was a founding member of the Basquiat Authentication Committee. He is the editor of the ISMs series, including Holzer-isms and Abramović-isms, as well as Basquiat’s The Notebooks and James Rosenquist: Collages, Drawings, and Paintings in Process (all Princeton), among many other books.
Kyla McDonald is an art historian and curator.
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