The Medium of Leonora Carrington

A critical survey of Leonora Carrington’s legacies in contemporary creative practice. The medium of Leonora Carrington explores why creative people, especially women, are preoccupied with making work in her legacy today.

Many creative people have spoken of their pilgrimage to meet the English-Mexican artist and writer Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) as a profound encounter. Even before her death at the age of ninety-four, Carrington had garnered a cult following.

Thinking across contemporary art media, Catriona McAra demonstrates how Carrington has posthumously become a medium in her own right, critically haunting the creative intellectuals who met or knew her. The book curates the conceptual art of Lucy Skaer alongside a Tilda Swinton performance installation and links the eco-farming of Double Edge Theatre with the animal rights interests of novelists Chloe Aridjis and Heidi Sopinka and the embodied storytelling of Samantha Sweeting and Lynn Lu.

This long-awaited study provides essential reading for both new and established members of the burgeoning Carrington fan club.

Before her death, the artist and writer Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) had already garnered a cult following, with numerous creative people making the pilgrimage to meet her at her home in Mexico City. Since then, her fame has only increased.

Thinking across contemporary art media, this book demonstrates how Carrington has posthumously become a medium in her own right, critically haunting the creative intellectuals who met or knew her. It explores the work of a remarkable variety of individuals and organisations, including the artists Lucy Skaer, Samantha Sweeting and Lynn Lu, the actress Tilda Swinton, the novelists Chloe Aridjis and Heidi Sopinka and the ensemble Double Edge Theatre.

This long-awaited study provides essential reading for both new and established members of the burgeoning Carrington fan club.