Joseph E. Yoakum - What I Saw

Joseph E. Yoakum: What I Saw, edited by Mark Pascale, Esther Adler, and Édouard Kopp / ISBN 9780300257489 / 252-page hardcover, about 9.3 x 12.3 inches, published by the Art Institute of Chicago / light bump to corners *** The extraordinary life of a captivating American artist, beautifully illustrated with his dreamlike drawings Much of Joseph Elmer Yoakum’s story comes from the artist himself—and is almost too fantastic to believe. At a young age, Yoakum (1891–1972) traveled the globe with numerous circuses; he later served in a segregated noncombat regiment during World War I before settling in Chicago. There, inspired by a dream, he began his artistic career at age seventy-one, producing some two thousand drawings over a decade. How did Yoakum gain representation in major museum collections in Chicago and New York? What fueled his process, which he described as a “spiritual unfoldment”? This volume delves into the friendships Yoakum forged with the Chicago Imagists that secured his