Diaghilev
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Condition: Good to fair. Jacket: good, worn/faded with tear on spine (refer to image). Page Condition: Good - possible tanning. Markings: possible previous owner inscription.
Few figures in the history of the performing arts burned as brilliantly — or as briefly — as Sergei Diaghilev, the Russian impresario whose relentless vision transformed ballet from imperial spectacle into the defining avant-garde art form of the twentieth century. Richard Buckle's magisterial biography chronicles the life of this extraordinary cultural architect, from his provincial Russian origins through his meteoric rise as the founder of the Ballets Russes, the company that introduced the world to Stravinsky, Nijinsky, Picasso, and Matisse — all marshalled under Diaghilev's singular, demanding genius. Buckle reconstructs the glittering and turbulent world of early twentieth-century European art with scrupulous research and vivid narrative authority, drawing on firsthand accounts and unpublished letters to present an intimate portrait of a man driven equally by aesthetic obsession and personal hunger. The biography stands as the definitive account of a life lived entirely in service of beauty, and asks — with haunting resonance — what it costs to remake an art form in one's own image.
Author: Richard Buckle
Format: Hardback
Published: 1979, Weidenfeld and Nicolson
Genre: Biography
Condition remarks:
Condition: Good to fair. Jacket: good, worn/faded with tear on spine (refer to image). Page Condition: Good - possible tanning. Markings: possible previous owner inscription.
Few figures in the history of the performing arts burned as brilliantly — or as briefly — as Sergei Diaghilev, the Russian impresario whose relentless vision transformed ballet from imperial spectacle into the defining avant-garde art form of the twentieth century. Richard Buckle's magisterial biography chronicles the life of this extraordinary cultural architect, from his provincial Russian origins through his meteoric rise as the founder of the Ballets Russes, the company that introduced the world to Stravinsky, Nijinsky, Picasso, and Matisse — all marshalled under Diaghilev's singular, demanding genius. Buckle reconstructs the glittering and turbulent world of early twentieth-century European art with scrupulous research and vivid narrative authority, drawing on firsthand accounts and unpublished letters to present an intimate portrait of a man driven equally by aesthetic obsession and personal hunger. The biography stands as the definitive account of a life lived entirely in service of beauty, and asks — with haunting resonance — what it costs to remake an art form in one's own image.