Ruth Artmonsky - Even though she grew up in the vulgarity of bright lights and candy floss of Blackpool, Ruth Artmonsky and her identical twin sister threw themselves into culture. They played piano duets together and went to concerts. Their best friend married a pianist. They read the classics and grew to love contemporary novels by Aldous Huxley. Their older half sister impressed them with her reading of socialism and Bernard Shaw.

When she was setting up home with her first husband, she visited The Festival of Britain and chose 6 Ernest Race 'antelope' chairs to place around the dining table. In their living room stood a Race 'heron' armchair in back wool upholstery (way ahead of that curve) and a boxy sofa with wooden elbow rests and webbing that continued to be troublesome until the noughties when her ex-husband's new wife finally called time on it. Their tableware was Ulla Procope for Arabia with Gense focus cutlery. Their clothes hung in a Heal's teak wardrobe and their living room was graced with a smoked glass chrome legged coffee table from Habitat. The living room curtains were an oversized modern Sanderson 'dreamflower'print on satin cotton. The best choice they made for a weekend retreat was buying a second home on Emsworth Yacht Harbour designed by Gore, Gibberd & Saunders in 1965.

She took their children with them to cultural places in France and Spain for their holidays. Her eldest took her first steps in the Raphael Cartoon rooms at the V&A. Her youngest wasn't allowed in the swimming pool on holiday until she had been trapsed around the Uffizi. They filled their spare time with art. When Ruth remarried she holidayed in Italy, Germany and the Netherlands too and most Sundays included a museum visit. They bought art and visited antique fairs. In short, art & decorative art were a priority.

She bought properties in Dieppe and then their love of France led them to Paris and the South, acquiring apartments in Rue des Ecoles and then Rue Recamier on the fashionable rive gauche, while holidaying in Nice. The flower market being Ruth's favourite saturday morning stroll.

In London, Ruth moved to Percy Street in Fitzrovia, a listed Georgian house which she lovingly restored with its stone flagged floors, sweeping staircase and dumb waiter. She ate at Etoile on Charlotte Street and revelled in the history of the area.

When Ruth divorced her second husband she began selling vintage art & design books and then had her own art & ceramics gallery for several years in St John's Wood. Selling art was difficult but Ruth wanted to highlight artists she liked. Writing about them instead came next.

In her first career as an occupational psychologist she had written books and articles so she had form. Every Artmonsky Arts book made her a world expert on that subject or person and when they were finished she moved onto the next. It was her post divorce therapy and her walls in her new Covent Garden loft apartment became covered with the posters and pictures from each subject on which she wrote.

Ruth had a particular type of pen with which she wrote longhand and to inspire her creativity she always had to sit in her beloved LeCorbusier LC3 chair. Every morning (usually before most of us were awake) just sitting in the chair automated a Pavlovian response from her and she would begin. No one else was allowed to sit in that chair.
As the long line of books were published her fan base grew and grew. Her books became indispensable to experts and a whole new generation alike, who wanted to acknowledge and celebrate the artists and designers who shaped the 20th century

Artmonsky Arts are distributed exclusively by ACC Publishing Group.
Contact them by phone on 44 (0) 1394389950
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Ruth Artmonsky's background is in statistical and occupational psychology. After taking a degree in economics and social work, Artmonsky began her career assisting a psychologist in Wandsworth Prison. She took a second degree in psychology while working at the National Institute of Industrial Psychology and then set up a careers and testing service for further education colleges in London for the G.L.C. In 1977 she helped to found Saville and Holdsworth Limited, a consultancy that developed psychometric tests for business. They started in a spare room and a garage, became a roaring success and went on to open offices around the world. 'It's really helped being a psychologist,' she says, 'because although I wasn't a lunatic fringe psychologist or a therapist, I'm interested in the human angle of advertising.'

To date she has written 38 books, edited 9 books of quotations and 4 books on careers.