CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 9/21/2025

In Elizabeth Catlett, art for liberation and for life

Danys y Liethis (2005) is from Elizabeth Catlett, one of the most stunning catalogs on our entire list. Oversized with a soft canvas cover, the book features ingenious canvas section dividers precisely matched to the rich red, blue, green, purple and orange colors of the installation walls of Catlett’s recent exhibition at Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt, Germany—which blend, in this book, perfectly into the background colors of the pages of the plate sections of the book itself. “I have always wanted my art to service my people,” Catlett is quoted. “To reflect us, to relate to us, to stimulate us, to make us aware of our potential […] We have to create an art for liberation and for life.”