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Thunderclap
- A memoir of art and life & sudden death
- Narrated by: Laura Cumming
- Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins
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Publisher's Summary
Brought to you by Penguin.
'We see with everything that we are'
On the morning of 12 October 1654, in the Dutch city of Delft, a sudden explosion was followed by a thunderclap that could be heard more than seventy miles away. Carel Fabritius - now known across the world for his exquisite painting, The Goldfinch - had been at work in his studio. He, along with many others, would not survive the day.
In Thunderclap, Laura Cumming reveals her passion for the art of the Dutch Golden Age and her determination to lift up the reputation of Fabritius. She reveals the Netherlands, where - wandering the narrow streets of Amsterdam, driving across the flatlands, or pausing at a quiet waterfront - she encounters the rich reality behind the shining beauty of Vermeer and Rembrandt, Hals and de Hooch. She shares too her relationship with her father, the Scottish artist James Cumming, who had his own deep connection to Dutch painting, and who taught her about colour, light and the rewards of looking deeply.
This is a book about what a picture may come to mean: how it can enter your life and change your thinking in a thunderclap, a sudden clarity of sight. This is also a book about the precariousness of human life - the way it may be snatched from us in an instant. What can art do to sustain us? The work that survives tells its own compelling story in these pages.
From the Sunday Times-bestselling author of On Chapel Sands, shortlisted for the Costa Prize for Biography.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
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Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- linda wilkins
- 20-09-2023
A tour de force
Beautifully read by the author, this extraordinary evocation of C17th Delft, weaves the life and work of the painter Fabritius and his Flemish contemporaries - including Vermeer, de Hooch and Rembrandt- with that of her artist father who nurtured her love of Dutch still life painting. Cumming concludes her paean to the genre with findings from conservation science that link the title of the book to Fabritius’ most famous surviving painting “The Goldfinch”.
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- Earnest
- 10-08-2023
Informative and a pleasant amble alongside an enthusiast.
An author has every right to choose to supplant an experienced voice actor to read their own book. Sometimes it’s an excellent decision. In this case I felt completely overwhelmed by the overly melodramatic and amateur reading style. No matter how interesting the proffered insight, the more intrusive the untrained voice became. I often felt embarrassed when a personal and familial description was shared.
Nonetheless, I have now bought the hardback version as well so that the pictures so lovingly described could be viewed ‘on site’ instead of interrupting the listen with a visit to the internet. I’m still in two minds as to whether paintings should be wholly dependent on a word description. Even a photograph, however better to have rather than nothing at all, still is disappointing compared to an original. Words are very powerful but not enough, for me, to encapsulate a painting.
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- Ruth Bourchier
- 01-01-2024
Engaging
A skilful melding of art historical and personal memoir highlighting Fabritius and his short tragic life as well as his unparalleled talent.
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