American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America by Robert Hughes

American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America Reviews

• 
  Stewart Tame

  This book is a companion volume to a PBS series that aired during the late 90's. Since Hughes' book, The Shock of the New, had been one of the principal texts responsible for my love of 20th century art ("Modern Art" sounds weird to me since some of it was created over 100 years ago, and 21st century art didn't exist at the time), I of course had to watch it. And then I bought the book when it became available, and have reread it a few times since then.
  
  Anyway, a recent visit to the Detroit Institute of Arts prompted me to dig this out and read it again. As the cover promises, this is a history of Art in the USA from the colonial era right up until the early 90's. Obviously the subject is broad and your favorite artist might be given short shrift, but Hughes gives a good overview of the major trends and figures. As with any art text, there are numerous works mentioned that don't appear in any of the photos. If you've read enough art books and/or visited enough museums, you may have seen some of them. But the illustrations that did make it into the book are well-chosen and plentiful.
  
  Hughes is one of the better writers of Art books out there. He's not above using jargon and theory, but he tries to keep it useful rather than as a means of dazzling the reader. If you're interested in the history of American Art, this book is an excellent place to start.
  
• 
  Candi

  Read the whole book in college, and watched the movies. They're actually quite good. I find myself still thinking about them 10 years later.
• 
  Ray Dunsmore

  A staunchly-opinionated, frank, fascinating account of the development of art in my home country. Hughes' no-holds-barred criticism is honestly refreshing to hear from an academic art writer. If he sees problems in an artist's work or doesn't see much worth in it at all, he is entirely unafraid to say so. He lays down his biases in plain text and you know enough to skew around them and take what he's saying with a degree of uncertainty. That's important, honestly. The subterfuge of feigning objectivity to claim to have the one unimpeachable truth is not something I favor in my historical texts, quite frankly. You can't be sure of getting the whole truth from any historical text and the more the author realizes that fact, the more I feel I'm getting my information from secure hands - and if not, I can at least see what biases to attempt to pry behind. Fascinating stuff with great insight into the thought and minds that went into the major pieces of American art since the country's founding.
• 
  Will Allen

  I'll refrain from saying much since my students are currently writing reviews on one of the video episodes. I will gladly say this: Of all the books I have used over the years to teach the history of American art, this (and the videos) succeed beyond any other. My students like it. They like the man. Even when he disappoints a reader who reads or sees a favorite artist "put down" by Hughes, they honestly respect his opinion. He is one of those critics who never seems cynical even when he dismisses an artist. He comes across as honest and most students respect his opinion. I end the semester having students watch videos outside of those included in American Visions. "The Business of Art. Damien Hirst is all hype (interviews with the Mugrabis--wonderful) Finally I have them watch some of the tributes to Hughes.
• 
  Janet

  illustrations were excellent. I learned a lot especially about 18th and 19th century american painting. The book dragged a bit at the end when the late 20th century was covered in too much detail and Hughes sarcastically quoted the unintelligible explanations with which the artists explained their art again and again. Hughes thinks Pollock and Hopper were the most creative 20th century American painters and he convinced me.
• 
  Becca

  This book is an incredible addition to a humanities library. With a sweeping look at the arts in America, the thing that sets this book apart from the rest is the author's ability to give *context* to it all. You get this great feel for what was going on in America and the world at the time that made this painting or that statue so valued or memorable, even if we might think it's the ugliest thing we've ever seen. I also love that Robert Hughes isn't afraid to express his opinion about various works, whether I agree with it or not. This is one textbook that I didn't sell back and continue to read and refer to years later.
• 
  Suzy

  Definitive historical guide to American art. Enthralling.
• 
  Henry Begler

  (4.5 honestly, but....) watched alongside the tv series. the best book on art i’ve read alongside ways of seeing and hughes’ other book the shock of the new. he’s one of my favorite critics now: witty, democratically minded, hates pretense, really good at articulating how to look. extremely opinionated but mostly right (and 20 years on definitely vindicated in how much he hates the art market. thank god him and berger didn’t live to find out about NFTs.) plus when you disagree with the text you get to feel like a smart independent thinker who goes their own way. i found myself slowing down and doubling back to really take in some of these illustrations based on his analysis, which my idiot brain almost never does. visual art can be such a forbidding and opaque subject but it doesn't have to be. looking and thinking is available to everyone. you don't have to apologize for beauty or pleasure. he makes it tangible, comprehensible, and exciting for nearly 700 pages as well as using it to advance a greater thesis on the country as a whole, which only an outsider could do. terrific book.
• 
  Scott

  Fantastic overview of American art. Someone from somewhere else (Australia) had to write it, even though Hughes was the art critic for "Time" magazine. No high faluting theory here, well written witty prose sets a context and provides understanding of those blotches on the wall that are "modern art". Hughes has the right attitude, not quite sneering at manifestos issued to an -ism adherents, but informative and conversational. A huge gorgeous doorstop of a book, enjoyed over many nights.
• 
  Claire

  Truly wonderful writing, witty the entire way. The scope of art here is comprehensive to a point (unfortunately, only really mentioning Native American and indigenous art when it serves as context to a Spanish church built on top of a temple in the Southwest, or Bierstadt or Remington, for example), but I can forgive its faults with the realization that what art history is omitted here deserves many, many books of its own. To counter this, I'll add that Hughes is (perhaps almost) always a great reminder of the injustices, genocides, and violence committed against Native Americans, immigrants, and minorities throughout American history. He chooses art which reflects these horrors and identifies the hateful and violent streak within many artists' personal biographies and ideologies, sometimes shockingly. In many ways, this book is a brilliant treatment of its subject, one without too much gloss and one which is highly critical. My complaint, since I did read this as a textbook for my American Art History undergrad class, is that it often feels very biased, even for all its highly academic, researched, knowledgeable content. Hughes writes about art often subjectively, sometimes skewing his comments of "this painting is bad" to sound like fact ( "the technique is sloppy", "the symbolism/iconography/motifs are indecipherable", "I don't agree with this artist's politics", e.g. -- these could all be correct or astute observations of a piece or its creator, but in objective academic writing, especially in something which is read as a textbook and not a collection of personal essays, perhaps one shouldn't necessarily be "teaching" from this kind of perspective; but everybody is guilty of this, not just Hughes). My class also confusingly had content written supposedly with this book as its guide, but which ultimately contradicted its factual and analytical statements time and time again, leading several students to just stop reading it, and me to lament that this book, even with all its small annoyances, was so much more comprehensive, well-researched, honest and thought-provoking than our class material (and many other academic treatments of the same subject).
  
  My point, I guess? Please read this book if you are interested in American art history. You might skip a few pages here and there (it is roughly textbook sized), but it is well worth your time in its discussion of history through at times raucous, entertaining prose. Just please maybe don't use this as a textbook for a class, if you're just going to pretend you don't hear what it's saying.
• 
  Dru

  As the subtitle indicates, this is a history of America through art, and it's beautifully produced, with heavy paper and lovely color illustrations. (And beautifully produced to a fault--it's a heavy tome!)
  Hughes is mostly a terrific writer but sometimes, especially when discussing modern art in chapter 9, he twists himself into the art-historical jargon of the time. What comes out is the same meaningless hooey that the artists and critics themselves espoused. (And of course Hughes was a critic for Time magazine.)
  
  And much of his choices for inclusion/exclusions would just not pass muster today. A couple of his descriptions of women are really ridiculous, for example, Edward Hopper's wife (p. 428): "Jo Hopper may have been an untamed shrew." Really? How many of the men in the book, artists or not, get such treatment? And he certainly doesn't spend a lot of time on any but the standard white male artists.
• 
  Drew Plummer

  As an overall history of American art, this is one of the more comprehensive that I have read. The illustrations are helpful, if perhaps a touch sparse. The coverage of major American art schools and architectural movements up through Abstract Expressionism is thorough, often thoughtful, and generally illuminating. As Hughes gets closer and closer to contemporary art he begins to leave the role of dispassionate historian and speak with a critic’s voice, which I found somewhat distracting.
  Overall a worthwhile read, even if the last few chapters should be taken with a small grain of salt.
  I will say that Hughes’ use of misogynistic, homophobic, and racist terminology seem excessive even by 1997 standards. I did not expect to find the n-word used fairly casually in an art-history book, and I might be reluctant to read more of Hughes’ work in the future based on that alone.
• 
  Marcas

  This is a really good History of America, through her art, architecture and people. Hughes helpfully situates American in wider History and shows fine sensitivity to the various strains of influence and life that make up America; a place indeed of many visions.
• 
  Jackie G

  Hughes' narration is entertaining as well as informative. The illustrations and anecdotes bring this history alive. Just wish there had been room for even more reproductions of the works described.
• 
  Niels Frid-Nielsen

  Brillant!
• 
  Stephen Coates

  This well-illustrated book presents a history of the United States through its art from its beginnings as a collection of colonies through independence, westward expansion through various stages to where art was at the time of the book’s publication. Hughes certainly knew his art and the book was an interesting read.
• 
  David Cowhig

  Great overview, richly illustrated. Hughes is a great read -- I've also read "Barcelona", "Rome" and "The Fatal Shore". Great to dip into -- high resolution art photos on nearly every page.
• 
  Erik

  Very tendentious and judgmental which is typical for Hughes. I do disagree with him, especially on significance of Hopper, Winslow Homer and Wyeth, among others. My gods are Eakins and Sargent and Whister's etchings. I do like Hughes' courage to make judgments about good and bad in art however, and his send up of the NYC 80s art world as a relativistic PR machine for peddling junk to dealers. This seems to only have gotten worse. But the good news is New York's star has definitely fallen.
• 
  Carol

  I used this as a textbook in my classes. Actually I showed the films and the book was recommended.
  Hughes was a man of definite opinions with a sardonic sense of humor. The book is an uneven survey (not to mention biased). Better than dry textbooks for stimulating discussion and this was a discussion class. For a good balanced survey of American Art I would recommend either Mendelowitz or Craven.
• 
  Eric McLean

  This is a great book for anyone looking to understand/appreciate/learn more about American art. Robert Hughes is a talented writer and I enjoyed reading between the lines on some of non-American humor. There are some rather dry parts, but I suppose that's bound to happen in a 600 page book about art. You probably won't enjoy it all.
• 
  Margaret

  I read this book and watched the accompanying PBS series for a class in school. If you have the ambition, it is well worth the time and effort to read this book and watch (most) of the series (it's on you tube). I am sorry that Robert Hughes has since passed away - I would have been very interested in a follow up.
• 
  Andrew

  Compulsory for anyone who wants to quickly get to grips with American art, and its strange blend of conservatism and innovation for innovations sake. Chapters on 18th- 19th centuries are actually the best.
• 
  Colin Gabriel

  great overview
• 
  Sarah

  This is undoubtedly my most favourite book of all time, the beautiful flow of writing and insights into the world of art are astounding. Read this book!!!
• 
  Tuck

  at 648 pages, this is a bit much for even Robert Hughes worshipers, but its AN ESSENTIAL BOOK for any thinking humans out there.