Peggy Guggenheim: the Shock of the Modern

Interesting book talk at Charleston Farmhouse as part of their literature festival by Francine Stock about her biography of Peggy Guggenheim.

I knew virtually nothing about Peggy Guggenheim except the obvious that she collected art and that her home in Venice is now a gallery. This talk was therefore fascinating from the fact that her father had died on the Titanic, her numerous marriages and affairs and her later life in Venice.

I was most interested in the section on her relationship with the art world discussing how she bought and saved Degenerate Art before the war and helped get some of the artists to the USA. I want to know more about her Art of the Century gallery in New York where she showed installations and work by many of the great 20th artists.

It was a nice touch to have the event chaired by Dinah Casson, an exhibition and gallery designer which put the emphasis on the art rather than the life.

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