The Art of Dahlov Ipcar

"The real world may come to seem oppressively dull and barren unless transformed and revitalized by imagination."---Dahlov Ipcar

Representing more than seventy years of work, this volume is the first retrospective publication of Dahlov Ipcar's art. Best known for her vibrant collage-style paintings of animals, Ipcar's talents have earned her wide recognition. Her work is included in the permanent collections of many museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Her numerous solo shows include a one-woman show at the Museum of Modern Art in 1939, when she was 21. She has received the Maine State Award from the Maine Arts Commission, the Deborah Morton Award from Westbrook College, honorary doctorates from the University of Maine and Colby College, a Women of Achievement Award from Westbrook College, and a Living Legacy Award from the Central Maine Area Agency on Aging.

In addition to being a successful painter, Ipcar has illustrated more than thirty children's books, many of which she also wrote, and she has written four novels. Now in her nineties, she still paints every day at her home in Georgetown, Maine.

Carl Little is the author of several art books, including The Art of Monhegan Island, Lawrence Goldsmith: A Life in Watercolor, Paintings of New England, The Watercolors of John Singer Sargent, and Edward Hopper's New England. He edited and wrote a preface for Discovery: Fifty Years of Craft Experience at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts. He is a regular contributor to Art in America, Art New England, Maine Boats, Homes, & Harbors, and Ornament; and he has written catalog essays for exhibitions by a number of artists, including Dozier Bell, Bernard Langlais, Alan Magee, and William Keinbusch. Formerly the director of the Blum Gallery at the College of the Atlantic, in 2000 he was awarded the Acadia Arts Achievement Award for his contributions to the arts on Mount Desert Island. Little now serves as director of communications and marketing for the Maine Community Foundation. He lives with his family in Somesville.