In the long shadows cast by the twentieth century's greatest artists, one often finds the figure of The Muse. Whether spouses or lovers, protectors or tormentors, models, patrons, or artists themselves, they are always a main source of inspiration. Every art, from painting to writing to filmmaking to music, has a rich history of these fateful partnerships. What does the artist see in his muse? Why is artistic inspiration so often incarnated by the female form? Does a woman render it more human, more palpable?" "This exploration of the muses of twentieth-century art - from the well-known to the unjustly forgotten - addresses these questions and more while providing a wealth of archival photography, sketches, handwritten letters, paintings, and other highly personal ephemera. Authors Annette and Luc Vezin examine some twenty-four couples whose pairings have left an indelible mark on twentieth-century art. Scrupulously researched and authoritatively written, the book argues that these muses were not marginal figures to a scene or simply hangers-on but were in most cases talented, willful, and complementary characters in their own right." "Exploring traces left by these charismatic characters, who sometimes served as a muse to more than one artist in their lifetimes, The 20th-Century Muse sheds new light on figures once consigned to the background, finding that in each of these couples, artistic passion and intimacy proved to be the germ of creation.