Oh To Be A Painter!

“When he paints a portrait, I read a life” – Virginia Wolf 

This collection of Virginia Woolf’s writings on the visual arts offers a whole new perspective on the revolutionary author. This volume collects her longest essay on painting, “Walter Sickert: A conversation” (1934), alongisde shorter essays and reviews, including “Pictures and Portraits”(1920) and “Pictures” (1925). In these essays and reviews, Woolf illuminates the complex and interdependent relationship between the artist and society, and reveals her own shifting perspectives during decades of social and political change. She also provides sharp and astute commentary on specific works of art and on the relationship between art and writing. 

• Introduced and selected by Claudia Tobin.
• Part of the Ekphrasis series from David Zwirner Books. 
• Paperback published in 2021.
• Pages: 144. 
• Dimensions: 18cm x 11cm.