Yve-Alain Bois, Professor Emeritus in the School of Historical Studies, has published An Oblique Autobiography, a collection of essays and reminiscences, with no place press. Bois, who has been Institute Faculty since 2005, is a specialist in twentieth-century art, writing extensively on Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian, Barnett Newman, and more.
The new collection highlights Bois’s intellectual formation, from the beginning of his career at Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris in 1977 to his latest work. Known for his conceptual and methodological innovation, the volume traces Bois’s deeply personal itinerary through an important era of art history. It details his early relationships with figures such as Roland Barthes, Hubert Damisch, Lygia Clark, and Jacques Derrida, as well as his extended engagements with Rosalind Krauss, Ellsworth Kelly, and Martin Barré.
Featuring texts that range from academic journal articles to obituaries, written from 1976 to 2021, An Oblique Autobiography “reveals the range of Bois's authorial voice and offers a remarkable self-portrait of one of art history's primary protagonists.”
