Reported Sightings

"Ashbery's art reviews for the Paris Herald Tribune, ARTNews, New York and Newsweek go beyond journalism. Generous, astute, never dull and possessed of catholic taste, this poet-critic shows us what is special about a Bonnard or a Grandma Moses. He especially admires artists who have undertaken individualistic, spiritual pilgrimages, like Marsden Hartley, Odilon Redon ("a kind of Cezanne of the unconscious"), Belgian fantasist Leon Spilliaert and undervalued American still-life painter John F. Peto. Nearly 100 reviews and essays are gathered here, amplified by 35 color and black-and-white…