MASTERS IN PIECES II
A New Book by Russell Connor

Opening Masters in Pieces is a bit like wandering into a museum late at night where the subjects of the paintings have all slipped out of their frames to go visiting in the tableaux next door. Van Gogh meets Gauguin, the survivors on the Raft of the Medusa have a heavenly hallucination in the form of Cabanel's Venus; Picasso's Girl Before a Mirror sees herself reflected as Sargent's Madame X. It is not a dream; it is the work of Russell Connor, a master of the absurd, yet lyrical, juxtaposition.

This is the latest collection of Connor's works – paintings that have appeared in galleries around the world and in The New Yorker, Time and The New York Times Book Review. In these lively pieces, Connor draws on his own experience working in museums and hosting TV art programs to breathe some fresh air into the sometimes stuffy world of art history. “What if Monet, concerned that Toulouse-Lautrec's fragile health was endangered by all those nights in the smoky cabarets and dance halls of Montmartre, had invited him to paint in the fresh air of his pre-Giverny garden at Vètheuil?” Such unlikely but intriguing scenarios are the basis of Connor's paintings in which he pays homage to Rembrandt, El Greco, Manet, and Van Gogh, to name a few. More than tongue-in-cheek deconstructions of the great master paintings, Connor's revisitations lovingly bring the masters back to life, often putting them in the center of their own works in new relationships and new narratives. His compositions reveal the structure of the original canvases and cast a fresh light on the nature of tradition, creativity, and originality. Each work is an art lesson, a history lesson, and a keen observation on human nature.

Witty, irreverent, and revelatory, Masters in Pieces II is a delightful tour of the half-remembered masterpieces we all carry in our heads – masterpieces that may never look the same again.

“I find Connor's witty, well-made art delightfully refreshing in contrast to the often sophomoric ironies of post- modernist fine art “critique. ” – Robert Storr

“... a marvelous painter and a tremendous visual mimic....Connor is a meta-master whose sly wit and painterly hand are the joy of his many admirers.” – Arthur C. Danto

“Russell Connor takes works of art I know and love and marries them to others I know and love, and the offspring of these marriages populate my mind with wit and insight. His art makes me see what I never saw before. I love it.” – Alan Alda

“Connor's approach to art history is that of a magician on canvas. Instead of rabbits out of a hat, he gives us masterpieces out of sync, sleight of art instead of sleight of hand. Wry, witty, thoughtful, and disarming.” – Jules Feiffer

“The brilliance of Russell Connor's work cannot be overstated. He brings the past to the present and present to past as worlds collide splendidly.” – Carman Moore

“Russell Connor first brought dignity to Art on TV, then to TV as Art, and now to Art about Art.” – Nam June Paik