Thunderclap: A Memoir of Art and Life and Sudden Death

"This is a genre-defying book, as many of them are. It examines the life and work of Carel Fabritius, the 17th-century Dutch artist – who painted ‘The Goldfinch’, among other things. He actually only left just over a dozen paintings, and has been under-recognised in assessments of the Golden Age of Art. He’s always referred to as a ‘missing link’ between Vermeer and Rembrandt, as if he doesn’t stand for anything himself. “Mary Ann Sieghart called it ‘the authority gap’: women are still expected not to be able to talk with expertise in the same way that men are” But it’s also an examination of Cumming’s own father’s work – James Cumming , an artist in his own right. The two disparate stories are drawn together, I suppose, by what one might call memoir. There’s a connection, which is Laura herself. It’s a work of admiration of both people, and it has this incredible structure which unfurls and pulls in all manner of things along the way. Laura Cumming has an incredible facility with words. She can describe a painting in a way that means you see more in it than when you look at it with your own eyes. She brings a lyrical quality, and it’s very, very moving. I mentioned the structure—it is so carefully managed that there’s a revelation on the very last paragraph of the last page that leaves you with you mouth hanging open. Breathtaking. How did she do that? On Chapel Sands , yes. Also a wonderful book."