The Silver Line

"Culture," declares art historian Kenneth Silver, "is as much about the most exalted philosophical positions as about how people button their sports jackets." With his generous tastes and voracious curiosity, it's no wonder that this New York University professor ^urls talents in so many directions. Neither snooty connoisseur nor mumbojumbo theoretician, Silver is sought after as a lecturer but is also in demand as a curator, production designer (for both tony independent films and funky performance pieces), and art-party escort.

Above all, though, he considers himself a writer. Silver's Esprit de Corps: The Art of the Parisian Avant-Garde and the First World War, 1914-1925 (Princeton), a scholarly tour de force and page turner, chronicles how this cataclysm stood the art world on its head. If you think today's scene is demented, consider Silver's tales of Braque's fistfight in an auction salesroom, the once bohemian Picasso sucking up to countesses, or Poiret's rivals' charging the couturier with treason. Now penning a Warhol tome "all about sex and class," Silver regrets only that he doesn't have more time for collecting art and breeding brindled boxers.

AMY FINE COLLINS