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Citizen Keane
- Narrator
- Bronson Pinchot
- Publisher
- Blackstone Publishing
- Publish Date
- 17 March 2015
- Run Time
- 3 hours 33 minutes
- Format
- Audiobook
What to expect
Teary, big-eyed orphans and a multitude of trashy knockoffs epitomized American kitsch art as they clogged thrift stores for decades.
When Adam Parfrey tracked down Walter Keane—the credited artist of the weepy waifs—for a San Diego Reader cover story in 1992, he discovered some shocking facts. Decades of lawsuits and countersuits revealed the reality that Keane was more of a con man than an artist, and that he forced his wife Margaret to sign his name to her own paintings. As a result, those weepy waifs may not have been as capricious an invention as they seemed.
Parfrey's story was reprinted in Juxtapoz magazine and inspired a Margaret Keane exhibition at the Laguna Art Museum. Director Tim Burton made a movie about the Keanes called Big Eyes, which came out in 2014.
Citizen Keane is a book-length expansion of Parfrey's original article, providing fascinating biographical and sociological details.
Critics Review
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“This stunning investigative report pulls back the curtain of maudlin decorative kitsch to reveal the hedonistic and depraved stylings of a true American mountebank.”
Frank Kozik, renowned graphic artist
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“Here’s the story of ‘Big-Eyed Art’…I’ve been waiting for this book for twenty-five years.”
Long Gone John
User Reviews
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Details
- Author
- Adam Parfrey, Cletus Nelson
- Narrator
- Bronson Pinchot
- Duration
- 3 hours 33 minutes
- Release Date
- 17 March 2015
- ISBN
- 9781504608145
- Format
- Audiobook
- Publisher
- Blackstone Publishing
- Genre
- Biography: general, Individual artists, art monographs, Individual architects and architectural firms, Individual photographers, History of art, Popular culture, True crime, Popular beliefs and controversial knowledge
Synopsis
Teary, big-eyed orphans and a multitude of trashy knockoffs epitomized American kitsch art as they clogged thrift stores for decades.When Adam Parfrey tracked down Walter Keane—the credited artist of the weepy waifs—for a San Diego Reader cover story in 1992, he discovered some shocking facts. Decades of lawsuits and countersuits revealed the reality that Keane was more of a con man than an artist, and that he forced his wife Margaret to sign his name to her own paintings. As a result, those weepy waifs may not have been as capricious an invention as they seemed.Parfrey's story was reprinted in Juxtapoz magazine and inspired a Margaret Keane exhibition at the Laguna Art Museum. Director Tim Burton made a movie about the Keanes called Big Eyes, which came out in 2014.Citizen Keane is a book-length expansion of Parfrey's original article, providing fascinating biographical and sociological details.
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