Samantha Baskind is Distinguished Professor of Art History at Cleveland State University. She is the author of six books, including The Warsaw Ghetto in American Art and Culture and Jewish Artists and the Bible in Twentieth-Century America, both published by Penn State University Press.
Description
"Samantha Baskind has crafted a compelling and revealing portrait of the working life of the sculptor Moses Jacob Ezekiel. Ezekiel's art comes to life as Baskind explains the motifs that animated his work, the milieus in which he lived and worked, and the unlikely background of this once renowned-but now largely forgotten-artist." -Adam Mendelsohn, author of Jewish Soldiers in the Civil War: The Union Army "Amid current controversies about what constitutes history and can be taught, this study of a talented public sculptor raises concerns about what one man's career can and must tell us about our own history and identity. Moses Ezekiel compels our interest for his accomplishments but also for his commitments as a Jew, Confederate, expatriate, and patriot, which, Samantha Baskind reveals, complicate attempts at censorship and promote a sense of American history as alive and present today." -Larry Silver, author of Europe Views the World, 1500-1700