Lion and Leopard

Fiction. Art History. In Nathaniel Popkin's novel LION AND LEOPARD, the tragic demise of John Lewis Krimmel marks a flashpoint point between the young artist's European-influenced Romanticism and the Philadelphia art establishment long dominated by the formidable portraitist Charles Willson Peale. Peale's single-minded crusade to define American art through a dogma of reason and moral clarity clashes with the self-taught Krimmel's subversive notion that art must seduce the viewer not lecture her and it must touch the realm of the unknown. But how far will Krimmel go to spread his heresy? Spurned by Peale and his son Rembrandt, Krimmel aligns himself with the black sheep of the Peale family, Raphaelle, a master of deception. When Krimmel finishes a painting so intriguing that it is acquired by the art collector Joseph Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon, Krimmel is accused by his powerful enemies of being a fraud. This sets off a maelstrom of events leading to a tragic fire, accusations of plagiarism, and a fateful confrontation with Peale that will have unthinkable consequences. Throughout these clashes between fathers and sons, peers and rivals, lovers and mentors, Popkin uses a vibrant framework of collected fictional narratives to illuminate for the reader a pivotal period when American art and culture were in their infancy."

About the Author :
Nathaniel Popkin is an author, editor, film writer, architecture and literary critic, journalist, and historian. Since the 2002 publication of his first book, Song of the City: An Intimate History of the American Urban Landscape, (Four Walls, Eight Windows-Basic Books), and continuing into his role as co-editor of the Hidden City Daily and writer of the film series "Philadelphia: The Great Experiment," he has been a distinctive voice in the conversation about cities: past, present and future. LION AND LEOPARD (The Head and The Hand Press, 2013) is his third book and first novel.

Review :
"Any history of visual art in America should include a review of Nathaniel Popkin's Lion and Leopard, a fictionalized account of early-American painters that illuminates brilliantly how building a culture is so much more than building a country." -Foreword Review "For love of sketchbook, observation, and pictorial inspiration, as if the whole of history and time depended on it, Nathaniel Popkin's Lion and Leopard entangles classical and romantic ideologies in a struggle to commence a truly American artistic vision." -Michelle Grabner, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. "In Lion and Leopard, three young friends travel to Philadelphia on a quest to interview the best artists in America for a book. Along the way, they find themselves caught in a tangle of alliances and rivalries, witnesses to the tensions between the American art establishment and a new way of making art." -Penn Gazette "Lion and Leopard is historical literary fiction at its most engaging, a stirring love song to early Philadelphia. More than that, Nathaniel Popkin's novel rings with arguments about the purpose of artistic endeavor that provoke us to this day. This is an important, auspicious debut."-Ken Kalfus, author of A Disorder Peculiar to the Country, National Book Award nominee "Nathaniel Popkin has pulled off one of the rarest of literary feats in LION AND LEOPARD: he has brought his story to vivid, compassionate life." -Jay Kirk, author of Kingdom of Glass "Nathaniel Popkin's new book, Lion and Leopard merges history and fiction in a novel that reads like a 19th Century road trip." -The Art Blog "Popkin weaves a multileveled tale that is as much a treatise on art at a historical crossroads as it is a story of young artists making their way in the world." -Library Journal "The book might sound rather heady, and it is. But for those interested in Philadelphia history, it's also a lot of fun." -Philadelphia Magazine "Nathaniel Popkin was born, it seems, with a preternatural talent for turning back the hands of time. Here, in this teeming novel about idealists, romanticists, schemers, and raconteurs, Popkin takes readers through the fields and down the streets of a roiling Philadelphia. The snow falls and drifts. The skies bruise. The vendors tattle. The artists sulk. Many opine, but who will listen? Radical in its form, glorious in its details, LION AND LEOPARD is Philadelphia-then." -Beth Kephart, author of FLOW: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River, and Handling the Truth: On the Writing of Memoir