One Hundred Portraits

Barry Moser is generally and justly regarded as the most important book artist of the past quarter-century, a tradition begun in this country by N.C. Wyeth, extended by Rockwell Kent, and furthered by artists as diverse as Jim Dine, Maurice Sendak, and Leonard Baskin. Moser's watercolors, woodcuts, and wood engravings have informed and adorned more than two hundred books, many of them central to the English-speaking canon, by writers such as Melville, Shelley, Welty, and Twain. In all his efforts, it is his preoccupation with the character of the creator that is manifest and dominant. Here, in a selection of one hundred portraits, many of them created especially for this book, we see the full range of his genius in portrayals of writers (Chaucer, Dickens, O'Connor, Willard, Oates), musicians and composers (Chopin, Handel, Wagner), artists (whistler, Rembrandt, Shahn), and even politicians (Douglass, Grant, King). Ann Patchett, the recipient of the Pen/Faulkner Award and Great Britain's prestigious Orange Prize, contributes a splendid essay about Moser's portraits and the subject of portraiture in general. Moser has also penned a note about his work, and especially the challenge of portraiture, that appears as an afterword.

Barry Moser is a native of Tennessee who makes his home in western Massachusetts. He studied at Auburn University, the University of Chattanooga, and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is a member of the National Academy of Design and has served on the faculty of Rhode Island School of Design. Currently on the Smith College faculty, in the art department, he also serves as Printer to the College. His work is in collections and libraries around the world, including the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the British Museum; the Victoria & Albert Museum; the Vatican Library; and the Israel Museum, Jerusalem. Moser's edition of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland won the American Book Award for design and illustration in 1983. His 1999 edition of the king James Bible has received international attention and acclaim. He has won numerous citations and awards of merit from Communication Arts magazine, Book-builders West, The American Association of University Presses, The American Institute of Graphic Arts, and the prestigious Umhoefer Prize for Achievement in the Humanities from the Arts and Humanities Foundation in 2006.