The muralist

Resource Information

The work The muralist represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Boxford Town Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

The muralist

Statement of responsibility

a novel by B. A. Shapiro

Creator

• Shapiro, Barbara A., 1951-

Author

• Shapiro, Barbara A., 1951-

Subject

• Artists -- New York (State) | New York -- 20th century -- Fiction
• Fiction
• Historical fiction
• Manners and customs
• Missing persons
• 1900 - 1999
• New York (N.Y.) -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
• New York (State) -- New York
• Missing persons -- Fiction
• Artists

Genre

• Historical fiction
• Fiction

Language

eng

Summary

When Alizée Benoit, a young American painter working for the Works Progress Administration (WPA), vanishes in New York City in 1940, no one knows what happened to her. Not her Jewish family living in German-occupied France. Not her arts patron and political compatriot, Eleanor Roosevelt. Not her close-knit group of friends and fellow WPA painters, including Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock, and Lee Krasner. And, some seventy years later, not her great-niece, Danielle Abrams, who, while working at Christie's auction house, uncovers enigmatic paintings hidden behind works by those now famous Abstract Expressionist artists. Do they hold answers to the questions surrounding her missing aunt? Entwining the lives of both historical and fictional characters, and moving between the past and the present, The Muralist plunges readers into the divisiveness of prewar politics and the largely forgotten plight of European refugees refused entrance to the United States. It captures both the inner workings of New York's art scene and the beginnings of the vibrant and quintessentially American school of Abstract Expressionism. As she did in her bestselling novel The Art Forger, B. A. Shapiro tells a gripping story while exploring provocative themes. In Alizée and Danielle she has created two unforgettable women, artists both, who compel us to ask: What happens when luminous talent collides with unstoppable historical forces? Does great art have the power to change the world?--Dust jacket

Cataloging source

DLC

Dewey number

813/.54

Index

no index present

LC call number

PS3569.H3385

LC item number

M87 2015

Literary form

fiction