cover image John Sloan's New York

John Sloan's New York

Joyce K. Schiller, Heather Campbell Coyle. Delaware Museum of Art, $50 (208pp) ISBN 978-0-300-12619-8

Looking at New York through the eyes of the Ashcan School painter John Sloan, this book takes a reliable tack, contextualizing his work, describing the city's issues, problems and events through Sloan's moody, vibrantly colored lens. Though the wordy foreword is less than revelatory (""Defined by their many inhabitants and visitors, urban settings shape the way city dwellers make sense of the world around them""), the book finds more solid footing when considering the work itself-the painting ""Spring Rain"" features ""the red of her stockings and the acid-green of trees""-revealing a passion and understanding for the artist that takes in the artist's full range of interests, from the philosophical influence of Robert Henri to his commercial work for newspapers and journals. Illustrations include sharply reproduced paintings, engravings and sketches, each with personality to spare, that ably cover the Ashcan canon: the urban working-class day-to-day, the dynamism of the city street and the foibles of the upper class. Unfortunately, the text looks all the more flabby next to Sloan's concise, highly evocative art; still, those looking for the full picture of Sloan will definitely find it here.