Observer

by Nathan Smith

Yoko: A Biography by David Sheff

After decades of public mistreatment, Ono has only recently received the recognition and acknowledgment deserving of such a forceful artist. In Yoko, David Sheff makes it his project to challenge Ono’s popular image as a “fraud … who broke up the greatest band in history.” The ensuing tome is a generous and humanizing portrait that draws on Sheff’s own extensive experience interviewing Ono and John Lennon. Ono’s art practice is given equal redemption here, as Sheff underscores the potency of her early feminist artworks and performances once caused in America.