In the Meridian of the Heart (Selected Letters of Rico Lebrun)

Rico Lebrun was a maverick, an artist of deep humanity and broad sympathies. A draftsman, painter, and sculptor of great accomplishment and international recognition, he constantly sought to transform his natural virtuosity into something deeper and more elemental. These letters written between 1950 and 1964, as he moved between the United States, Mexico, and Italy, give the reader an intimate and extended glance into the impassioned crucible of his mind and soul. Lebrun belonged to a generation to which art was, and had to be, something more than abstract compositions or cerebral exercises. For him, art was a force, a profoundly moral force, that could construct and shape an edifice containing all the inconsistency, drama, and inner conflict of the human animal, from its capacity for cruelty to its sublime moments of grace.