About the Book:

For Marc Chagall (1887–1985), painting was an intricate tapestry of dreams, tales, and traditions. His instantly recognizable visual language carved out a unique early 20th-century niche, often identified as one of the earliest expressions of psychic experience. Chagall’s canvases are characterized by loose brushwork, deep colors, a particular fondness for blue, and a repertoire of recurring tropes including musicians, roosters, rooftops, flowers, and floating lovers.

For all their ethereal charms, his compositions were often rich and complex in their references. They wove together not only colors and forms, but also his Jewish roots with his present encounters in Paris, markers of faith with gestures of love and symbols of hope with testimonies of trauma. Across scenes of birth, love, marriage, and death, this dependable artist introduction explores the many versions of Chagall’s rich vocabulary.

About the Author:

Ingo F. Walther was born in Berlin in 1940 and studied medieval studies, literature, and art history in Frankfurt am Main and Munich. He has published numerous books on the art of the Middle Ages and of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Rainer Metzger is a writer and cultural historian, and professor of art history at the Academy of Karlsruhe, Germany.