Joan Baez, “AM I PRETTY WHEN I FLY? An Album of Upside Down Drawings.”

Legendary Bay Area singer, painter and activist Joan Baez is releasing a new collection off sketch drawings as a book titled “AM I PRETTY WHEN I FLY? An Album of Upside Down Drawings” on April 4 via publisher Godine.

While Baez, a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee who stepped back from active performing in 2019, is best known in the art world for her paintings, this collection focuses on “lovingly loose and charming sketches on reoccurring themes such as politics, relationships, women, animals and family,” according to the publisher.

Each section is organized thematically, with an introduction by Baez. And as the title indicates, she began each drawing upside down, often using her non-dominant hand and not knowing at the start where she would lend up.

Two days after the release, City Lights Books in San Francisco will host the artist in conversation with long-time Marin County journalist and rock critic Paul Liberatore. It’s the first of three release events; she’ll also speak in Nashville and New York.

The book is already getting raves from other artists, including Baez admirer Lana Del Rey, whom Baez joined on stage at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley in 2019.

“’Am I Pretty When I Fly?’ shows me a side of Joan Baez I could not have imagined,” she wrote. “It is entertaining, moving, ridiculously funny, insightful, and mysterious.”