‘New Testament’ art book honored

For 10 years, Heidi Gealt and her co-author George Knox worked together to compile and correctly order Domenico Tiepolo’s New Testament cycle of 313 drawings.\nAfter that decade of scholarly perseverance, the work put in by Gealt and Knox has been rewarded with “Domenico Tiepolo: A New Testament” being selected as one of the 20 Outstanding Academic books for the year 2007 in the fine arts category by Choice magazine.\n“I was just smiling (upon learning of the honor),” Gealt said with a laugh. \nChoice, a magazine published by the American Library Association and generally used by librarians and academics, honored 646 titles divided into 54 sections this year, according to the ALA Web site. The honored titles are funneled from more than 3,000 reviewers employed by the ALA around the United States and Canada, said Joan Slauta, Choice’s publisher liaison. Throughout the year, the magazine’s editors whittle the list down from the reviewers’ recommendations, a process which eventually ends with the publication of the finalists that is seen in the magazine.\nThe motivation for this project came from an exhibition in Udine, Italy, put on by Gealt, director of the IU Art Museum, and Knox, professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia. It comprised works by Tiepolo, including segments of the New Testament cycle that would ultimately be studied in “Domenico Tiepolo: A New Testament.”\n“We decided ‘these are really worth researching,’” Gealt said. “No one had ever done anything with them.” \nAfter the show in 1996, Gealt and Knox worked together, overcoming the obstacle of distance – Knox lives in Vancouver, British Columbia – and continued to pursue the project until they completed their work in 2006. \nReassembling the works that comprise Tiepolo’s New Testament series was made difficult by the dispersal of the drawings after the artist’s death in 1804. \n“Most of these drawings actually left Venice and went into French hands,” Gealt said, citing Napoleon Bonaparte’s conquest of Venice as a main cause. \nWith each piece essentially being a snapshot of the New Testament story, the team then spent years properly sequencing the drawings. \n“My research involved taking huge sheets of cardboard and literally thumb-tacking photographs of the drawings up to try to figure out how they fit together,” Gealt said. She said the process took her two or three years. \nGealt said that what makes Tiepolo’s work so unique is his use of what she calls “drawn serial narrative.” \nHis works comprised sequences of drawings, which created ongoing stories in a manner she feels almost anticipated the style used by modern day film makers to create imagery, giving his work a “cinematic quality.”\nThe book was co-published by IU Press, which typically works with IU-affiliated academics to publish works involving the humanities, in association with the IU Art Museum. \n“We sort of expected (the book) to be honored, because it’s such an extraordinary book,” said Pat Hoefling, director of sales and marketing for IU Press. \nGealt became enamored with Tiepolo’s when she began working at the IU Art Museum in 1972. \n“I fell in love with Domenico’s work and realized that he had never gotten his just due ...,” she said. “The New Testament Cycle, which is 300-plus drawings, is his most ambitious work, and that’s why it took us so long to put it back together.”