Among his many captivating exploits, the French artist Yves Klein (1928-1962) invented his own brand of color: the inimitable International Klein Blue. Denounced as a charlatan and feted as a mystic, Klein scandalized the art world with his enthusiastic embrace of the highs and lows of postwar mass culture and his exploitation of controversial publicity tactics. Today it is clear that Klein was not only one of the most radical artists of the postwar period but was also an iconic role model for contemporary practices: he reinvented abstract painting, conceived new horizons for performance art, and was a trailblazer in the interdisciplinary realm of land, body, and conceptual art.
Nuit Banai examines the relationship between Klein's brief but incandescent life and his wide repertoire of artistic practices. The book establishes that Klein's brilliance was above all performative, as he created and inhabited a cast of public identities: Bourgeois, Judo expert, Painter, Avant-garde Artist, Charlatan, Collaborator, Politician, Middle-Class Mystic, Fascist, and Showman. With each persona, Klein invented new ways to communicate his paradoxical message of spiritual enlightenment and dada iconoclasm to an unsuspecting, bemused, and entranced audience.