After receiving his masters degree in critical theory from CalArts in 2009, my young colleague Spark Boon took a fateful trip to Paris. It was there through a chance meeting with Tuvia Van Oles, grand nephew to the great American expatriate artist Faun Roberts that he began his obsessive search for the forgotten women artists of early Modernism.
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| Spark Boon at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, 2011 |
Through Van Oles, the young scholar Boon was granted access to the entire Faun Roberts estate. For months he pored over her papers, her correspondences, her diaries and even her tax returns. But the truly great boon to Boon was the ready availability of Faun Roberts' infamous works on paper.
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| Dreams of Phaon the Ferryman, oil on rough rag paper, Faun Roberts 1923 |
It's been said that Picasso's erotic works from the 50's and 60's would not have been possible without his intimate knowledge of Faun Roberts and her work.
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| Pablo Picasso |
Spark Boon has made a major contribution to our understanding of the critical role women played in the history of 20th century art. I look forward to the publication of his dissertation.
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