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Bookshop Genres Autobiography of Hyperrealist Sculptor John DeAndrea by John DeAndrea
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Book details
  • Genre:BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY
  • SubGenre:Artists, Architects, Photographers
  • Language:English
  • Pages:190
  • eBook ISBN:9781736213001

Autobiography of Hyperrealist Sculptor John DeAndrea

by John DeAndrea and Elaine Eldridge

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Overview
John DeAndrea, an internationally recognized sculptor famous for his eerily lifelike nudes, developed his art while coping with the effects of sexual abuse by a female housekeeper that began at age 6, years of violent physical abuse by an alcoholic father, and a left arm made useless by childhood polio. "Autobiography" explains an artist and his art. But the mission closer to DeAndrea's heart is helping men who suffered boyhood trauma but haven't managed to talk about it. DeAndrea never blames others. He doesn't complain. He doesn't preach, but he urges readers not to dwell on the negative. This is the story of a boy and the man he became who kept putting one foot in front of the other to achieve both success and love.
Description
John DeAndrea, an internationally recognized sculptor famous for his eerily lifelike nudes, developed his art while coping with the effects of sexual abuse by a female housekeeper that began at age 6, years of physical abuse by an alcoholic father, and a left arm made useless by childhood polio. "Autobiography" explains an artist and his art. But the mission closer to DeAndrea's heart is helping men who suffered boyhood trauma but haven't managed to talk about it. DeAndrea tells how he moved from his violent, colorful boyhood on the wrong side of the tracks in Little Italy in Denver, Colorado, to solo exhibitions in New York, Paris, Brussels, and Munich and over 100 group exhibitions worldwide. As a boy, he struggled with Catholic Church–induced guilt for being sexually coerced by the housekeeper. Her warning not to tell began a lifelong habit of secrecy that kept DeAndrea separate from the people around him. As a young man, he suffered debilitating panic attacks that forced him to stay in familiar surroundings, and he missed his first opening in New York. DeAndrea never blames others. He doesn't complain. He doesn't preach, but he urges readers not to dwell on the negative. "Autobiography" is the story of a boy and the man he became who kept putting one foot in front of the other to achieve both success and love.
About the author

John DeAndrea roared out of the gate at exactly the right time to become the premier hyperrealist sculptor of astonishingly lifelike nudes. Ignoring abstractionism, which had dominated American and European art for decades, DeAndrea was the first artist to perfect casting sculptures from live models. His life cast statues have natural-looking hair, eyelashes, and fingernails, and they are painted to eerie perfection with accurate skin tones and the model's pores, veins, and small imperfections. After his first solo exhibit (1970) at the OK Harris Gallery in New York—at which all the pieces sold the first night, a rare accomplishment—DeAndrea quickly added to his reputation by appearing in the Whitney Annual of Contemporary American Sculpture in New York in 1970 and, in 1972, the Biennale in Paris; the Kunstmarkt in Cologne, Germany; and documenta 5 in Kassel, Germany. From OK Harris to a planned 2021 solo exhibition at the Galerie Vallois, Paris, DeAndrea has maintained his reputation in the art world for half a century. DeAndrea's work is in the permanent collections of American and foreign museums and has been seen in over 30 solo shows and 100 group art exhibits, from Hyperrealistes Americains (Paris, 1972), Images of Man (Tokyo, 1992), and Convincing Illusions (New York, 2004) to the Biennale di Venezia (Venice, 2013) and the multi-country Hyperrealistic Sculpture Review (2016–2021). His sculptures continue to be in demand by collectors in Europe, the United States, and the Far East. DeAndrea is represented by the Galerie Vallois, Paris, and the Louis K. Meisel Gallery, New York. "A premiere sculptor of the American photorealist artist group in the 1970s, John DeAndrea established a new level of literal realism within the ongoing tradition of figurative sculpture." ("The Color of Life: Polychromy in Sculpture from Antiquity to the Present," Ed. Roberta Panzanelli, J. Paul Getty Museum Publications and the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, California, 2008, p. 173)