Kiki Man Ray: Art, Love, and Rivalry in 1920s Paris

"In a brisk chronicle of Paris between the wars, cultural historian Braude features photographer, filmmaker, and painter Man Ray (1890-1976), born Emmanuel Radnitzky, and chanteuse, painter, and model Kiki, born Alice Ernestine Prin (1901-1953)...Both Man Ray, a Jewish New Yorker, and Kiki, who grew up poor in Burgundy, came to Paris to reinvent themselves and fulfill their dreams: Kiki's, 'of falling in love with a poet, painter, or actor'; Man Ray's, to be recognized as a painter...Braude notes, 'to describe all sorts of things: chicken giblets; someone's neck (usually strangled or hanged); a cock's crow; having a chat; having sex'...Alice eagerly adopted it...During their seven-year affair, she served as Man Ray's muse as well as caretaker; but 'her physical presence, her erotic charms, her joyfulness, and her mental quickness' made her a vibrant force in a colorful world—and the heart of Braude's history...A rich, affectionate look at bohemian Paris."

"He brings that milieu to life in all its grit and energy — but also the larger sociopolitical pressures that myopic mythmaking leaves out: the still-vivid trauma of World War I and the growing conservative backlash against everything the cosmopolitan city represented ..."

"Braude's biography suggests a third and more compelling possibility: the "Kiki Man Ray" at the heart of the book was a true collaboration ..."

"Braude tries hard to be even-handed, but Kiki is a far more engaging character than the difficult Man Ray, who begrudged her her celebrity."

"Braude leans heavily on both Kiki's and Man Ray's memoirs; his writing is occasionally slack, and his deployment of art history can be perfunctory...But that matters little when you're under Kiki's spell, and he has written a biography worthy of her, alive with anecdote and incident...You just become so glad to know her — at least, I did, after having thought of her, stupidly, as an adjunct to other artists...She was a marvel, and her triumph feels so far-fetched, the space that she opened for herself as a poor woman in a rich city: 'How in this violent, money-mad world that makes no space for its Kikis,' as Braude says, in a lovely passage, 'its Kikis have always found some way to make themselves feel at home.'"

"Braude calls Alfred Stieglitz 'Arthur'—the book is its own enchantment...With the immediacy (if not the intimacy) of Patti Smith's 'Just Kids,' he transports us back to the City of Light just after World War I, reeling from the butchery of millions of young soldiers...At the dawn of the Jazz Age, it seemed everyone wanted to kick up their heels, drink champagne and sleep around...Mr."