Joan Didion : what she means / Hilton Als.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Als, Hilton, author, curator.

Contributor:

Didion, Joan, artist, author.

Philbin, Ann, writer of foreword.

Butler, Cornelia H., curator.

Hammer Museum, host institution, issuing body.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Didion, Joan--Exhibitions.

Didion, Joan.

Biography as a literary form--Exhibitions.

Biography as a literary form.

Women authors, American--20th century--Biography--Exhibitions.

Women authors, American.

Women authors, American--21st century--Biography--Exhibitions.

Screenwriters--United States--Biography--Exhibitions.

Screenwriters.

Didion, Joan--Interviews.

Novelists, American--20th century--Interviews.

Genre:

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

127 pages : illustrations (some color), facsimiles, maps (some color), portraits ; 33 cm

Other Title:

What she means

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : DelMonico Books ; Los Angeles, CA : Hammer Museum, 2022

Summary:

In 'Joan Didion: What She Means', the writer and curator Hilton Als creates a mosaic that explores Didion's life and work and the feeling each generates in her admirers, detractors and critics. Arranged chronologically, the book highlights Didion's fascination with the two coasts that made her. As a Westerner transplanted to New York, Didion was able to look at her native land, its mores and fixed rules of behavior, with the loving and critical eyes of a daughter who got out and went back. (Didion and her late husband moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1964, where they worked as highly successful screenwriters, producing scripts for 1971's The Panic in Needle Park and 1976's A Star Is Born, among other works, before returning to New York 20 years later.) And from her New York perch, Didion was able to observe the political scene more closely, writing trenchant pieces about Clinton, El Salvador and most searingly the Central Park Five. The book includes 50 artists ranging from Brice Marden and Ed Ruscha to Betye Saar, Vija Clemins and many others, with works in all mediums including painting, ephemera, photography, sculpture, video and film. Also included are three previously uncollected texts by Didion: "In Praise of Unhung Wreaths and Love" (1969); a much-excerpted 1975 commencement address at UC Riverside; and "The Year of Hoping for Stage Magic" (2007).

Contents:

Director's foreword / Ann Philbin

Acknowledgments / Connie Butler and Hilton Als

Would it have been better to turn away? Joan Didion and the art of observation / Hilton Als

Holy water : Sacramento-Berkeley, 1934-56 ; Plates

Goodbye to all that : New York, 1956-63 ; Plates

In praise of unhung wreaths and love / Joan Didion

The white album : California, 1964-88 ; Plates

Planting a tree is not a way of life / Joan Didion

Sentimental journeys : New York-Miami-Honolulu-San Salvador, 1988-2021 ; Plates

The year of hoping for stage magic / Joan Didion.

Notes:

Published on the occasion of an exhibition at the Hammer Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, October 9, 2022-January 8, 2023.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

9781636810577

1636810578

OCLC:

1344292758