What are we talking about when we talk about biography? What does it mean to write about an artist’s life? Is it possible to find words, or in any way grasp, or communicate, the transmutation from life into art? What is the place of biography in the writing and teaching of art?

Michael Brenson is an art critic, art historian, and teacher. He received an MA in Creative Writing and a Ph.D in art history from Johns Hopkins University and wrote about art for The New York Times from 1982 to 1991. He is a Getty Scholar and a Guggenheim Fellow. He has been a curator and editor and a consultant for Harry N. Abrams Publishers and the Rockefeller Foundation. He teaches in MFA programs at Bard College, the University of Pennsylvania, and the School of Visual Arts. His biography of David Smith will be published by Farrar Straus and Giroux.

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