About the Author

Burt Chernow taught at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and created the Housatonic Museum of Art in Connecticut. Wolfgang Volz has collaborated with Christo and Jeanne-Claude and extensively photographed their projects.

Reviews

"Christo and Jeanne-Claude are as much adventurers and gamblers as artists. They love the action. There is something of the mischievous child in them, devising then accepting their own near-impossible dares. They are guerrillas dedicated to subversion, their schemes greeted with disbelief. Perhaps they find perverse delight in watching jaws drop as people hear of their plans to build a fabric-covered processional through their hometown park, surround islands with flaming pink fabric, construct a gargantum structure in the desert, or wrap a bridge, monument, or government building. Taking on greater odds, their ideas appear simultaneously familiar and wildly alien, evident yet enormously complicated, obvious but rich in ironic subtexts."--Burt Chernow
"What induces an artist to undertake such complicated, dangerous, and ephemeral projects as covering a rocky Australian coastline in synthetic fabric, hanging a colossal curtain across a Colorado valley, or wrapping the Reichstag? Christo, the Bulgarian-born mastermind behind numerous unprecedented, large-scale, politically volatile, and, after the dust settles, sublime and unforgettable creations, has courageously challenged assumptions about art for more than four decades. A man of phenomenal energy, vision, and passion, he's remained an enigma in spite of his renown, as has his collaborator and wife, Jeanne-Claude. This unusual couple, who share the same 1935 birthday and who fell in love under scandalous circumstances in 1959, didn't declare their 'artistic interdependence' until 1994. Chernow, who knew the resilient and intense pair well, recounts their dramatic life stories and chronicles the arduous technical, financial, legal, and public relations efforts involved in their monumental projects, establishing beyond doubt the true symbiotic nature of their partnership. Sadly, Chernow died before completing this captivating work, but it will stand as the keystone biography of a truly revolutionary artist and