{"product_id":"red-brick-black-mountain-white-clay-reflections-on-art-family-and-survival-9781594203268","title":"Red Brick  Black Mountain  White Clay: Reflections on Art  Family  and Survival","description":"\u003cp\u003eNew York Times 100 Notable Books of 2012  \"Beautiful  haunted  evocative and so open to where memory takes you. I kept thinking that this is the book that I have waited for: where objects  and poetry intertwine. Just wonderful and completely sui generis.\" (Edmund de Waal  author of The Hare with Amber Eyes)  An unforgettable voyage across the reaches of America and the depths of memory  Red Brick  Black Mountain  White Clay follows one incredible family to discover a unique craft tradition grounded in Americas vast natural landscape. Looking back through the generations  renowned critic Christopher Benfey unearths an ancestry--and an aesthetic--that is quintessentially American. His mother descends from colonial explorers and Quaker craftsmen  who carved new arts from the trackless wilds of the frontier. Benfeys father escaped from Nazi Europe--along with his aunt and uncle  the famed Bauhaus artists Josef and Anni Albers--by fleeing across the Atlantic and finding an eventual haven in the American South.  Bricks form the backbone of life in North Carolinas rural Piedmont  where Benfeys mother was raised among centuries-old folk potteries  tobacco farms  and clay pits. Her father  like his father before him  believed in the deep honesty of brick  that men might build good lives with the bricks they laid. Nurtured in this red-clay world of ancient craft and Quaker radicalism  Benfeys mother was poised to set out from home when a tragic romance cracked her young life in two. Salvaging the broken shards of his mothers past and exploring the revitalized folk arts resisting industrialization  Benfey discovers a world brimming with possibility and creativity.  Benfeys father had no such foundation in his young life  nor did his aunt and uncle. Exiled artists from Berlins Bauhaus school  Josef and Anni Albers were offered sanctuary not far from the Piedmont at Black Mountain College. A radical experiment in unifying education and art  Black Mountain made a monumental impact on American culture under Josefs leadership  counting Robert Rauschenberg  John Cage  and Buckminster Fuller among its influential students and teachers. Focusing on the natural world  innovative craftsmanship  and the physical reality of materials  Black Mountain became a home and symbol for an emerging vision of American art.  Threading these stories together into a radiant and mesmerizing harmony  Red Brick  Black Mountain  White Clay is an extraordinary quest to the heart of America and the origins of its art.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45960373633077,"sku":"ByrdShop_1594203261","price":25.67,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9781594203268.jpg?v=1788285388","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/red-brick-black-mountain-white-clay-reflections-on-art-family-and-survival-9781594203268","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}