Handy size, concise monogram.

    Even his contemporaries found the Dutch painter’s work difficult to decipher—and it still presents riddles to contemporary art historians. Part of the problem in analyzing his shocking and richly allegorical paintings is that virtually nothing is known of the artist himself, apart from his birthplace. There is no record of his life or training, no personal letters, diaries or notebooks, and no contemporary insights into his personality or his thoughts on the meaning of his art. Even his date of birth can only be guessed at, and that based on a drawing assumed to be a self-portrait, made shortly before his death in 1516, which supposedly shows the artist in his late sixties. Bosch remains as mysterious as the worlds he painted. Although rooted in the Old Dutch tradition, Bosch developed a highly subjective, richly suggestive formal language. With a mixture of religious humility and satanic wit, he illustrated both the joys of heaven and the cruelly imaginative tortures of hell. In his pictorial world teeming with surrealistic nightmares, the medieval imagination catches fire in a moment of final brilliance before succumbing to humanism and modern rationalism. Though the man himself remains a mystery, this book pulls together the elusive threads of Bosch’s work into a cohesive and comprehensive analysis of his work and methods.

    The worldwide admiration he commanded remains unparalleled by any artist of the 20th century. Chagall's paintings, steeped in mythology and mysticism, portray colourful dreams and tales that are deeply rooted in his Russian Jewish origins. The memories and yearning they evoke recall his native Vitebsk, and the great events that mark the life of ordinary people: birth, love, marriage and death. They tell of a world full of everyday miracles - in the room of lovers, on the streets of Vitebsk, beneath the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Heaven and earth seem to meet in a topsy-turvy world in which whimsical figures of people and animals float through the air with gravity-defying serenity. This art album presents Chagall's work.

    This concise edition captures the ageless and absorbing quality of Georgia O'Keefe's highly distinctive paintings of flowers, each of which draws the viewer into the most minute of details and, in turn, into another world.

    Freud—once dubbed "the Ingres of existentialism"—has almost single-handedly redefined the figurative painting of our time. No other living artist possesses his ability to paint the texture and thinness of skin over flesh, and his distinctive portraits have a haunting quality that makes them impossible to forget. This volume, with over one hundred superb reproductions of his greatest paintings, pays tribute to one of the most original and accomplished artists of the twentieth century.

    Seventy-five of Frida Kahlo's paintings, reproduced here in lavish color, accompany numerous historical photographs and the author's descriptive text, chronicling the significant episodes in Kahlo's life, from childhood to her untimely death: the consequences and aftermath of a tragic bus accident in her adolescence; her tempestuous marriage to the great Mexican muralist Diego Rivera; her travels to the United States and abroad; her political convictions and her relationships with the great leaders and artistic personalities of her time. Kahlo's flamboyant and highly individual personal style, so eloquently reflected in her many self-portraits, has gained her an enthusiastic following worldwide. For Kahlo's many admirers, as well as for those new to her work this authoritative and richly illustrated volume will be both an excellent reference and a compelling look at her passionate and often disturbing art.

    Approximately 120 color and 20 black-and-white illustrations.

    Its homes were well-furnished and fanatically clean; its citizens feasted on 100-course banquets and speculated fortunes on new varieties of tulip. Yet, in the midst of plenty, the Dutch were ill at ease. In this brilliantly innovative book--which launched his reputation as one of our most perspicacious and stylish historians--Simon Schama explores the mysterious contradictions of a nation that invented itself from the ground up, attained an unprecedented level of affluence, and lived in dread of being corrupted by its happiness.Drawing on a vast array of period documents and sumptuously reproduced art, Schama re-creates, in precise and loving detail, a nation's mental furniture. He tells of bloody uprisings and beached whales, of the cult of hygiene and the plague of tobacco, of thrifty housewives and profligate tulip-speculators. He tells us how the Dutch celebrated themselves and how they were slandered by their enemies. The Embarrassment of Riches is a book that set a standard for its discipline; it throbs with life on every page.

    This comprehensive collection is now in a paperback identical to the original clothbound edition. 130 color, 54 black-and-white illustrations.

    M. W. Turner is one of the most famous—and most mysterious—of artists. His paintings are among the masterpieces of Western art, and the range of his work and the originality of his technique make him a giant. He kept his private life a secret, and his contradictory personality, his love of mystification, and his revolutionary manner of painting all fascinated his contemporaries and still arouse our curiosity today.Andrew Wilton's knowledge and enthusiasm uniquely qualify him to introduce us to the artist's life, and he concentrates here on original sources: Turner's writings, in the form of letters, notes, and verse; impressions recorded by his contemporaries; and reviews of his exhibited works. A comprehensive illustrated chronology covers Turner's travels, exhibitions, and projects, and includes portraits of his friends and patrons, views of places with which he was associated, and works by other artists who played a crucial role in forming his style and thought.• Revised and updated edition • Now with color illustrations throughout (200 illustrations total, 150 in color)• Forty-four works are new to the book• Includes a recently discovered watercolor•

    In a new chapter, Oleg Grabar develops alternate models for the formation of Islamic art, tightens its chronology, and discusses its implications for the contemporary art of the Muslim world. Reviews of the first edition: “Grabar examines the possible ramifications of sociological, economic, historical, psychological, ecological, and archaeological influences upon the art of Islam. . . [He] explains that Islamic art is woven from the threads of an Eastern, Oriental tradition and the hardy, surviving strands of Classical style, and [he] illustrates this web by means of a variety of convincing and well-chosen examples.”—Art Bulletin “A book of absorbing interest and immense erudition. . . All Islamic archaeologists and scholars will thank Professor Grabar for a profound and original study of an immense and complex field, which may provoke controversy but must impress by its mastery and charm by its modesty.”—Times Literary Supplement “Oleg Grabar, in this book of exceptional subtlety and taste, surveys and extends his own important contributions to the study of early Islamic art history and works out an original and imaginative approach to the elusive and complex problems of understanding Islamic art.”—American Historical Review

    Wollheim had three great passions--philosophy, psychology, art--and his work attempted to unify them into a theory of the experience of art. He believed that unlocking the meaning of a painting involved retrieving, almost reenacting, the creative activity that produced it.In order to fully appreciate a work of art, Wollheim argued, critics must bring to the understanding of a work of art a much richer conception of human psychology than they have in the past: Many [critics] . . . make do with a psychology that, if they tried to live their lives by it, would leave them at the end of an ordinary day without lovers, friends, or any insight into how this came about. Many reviewers have remarked on the insightfulness of the book's final chapter, in which Wollheim contended that certain paintings by Titian, Bellini, de Kooning, and others represent the painters' attempts to project fantasies about the human body onto the canvas.Reviewing the book in the Los Angeles Times, Daniel A. Herwitz asserted that Wollheim had done no less than recover for psychology its obvious and irresistible place in the explanation of what is most profound and subtle about paintings.

    Since publication, the museum has expanded its collection, with major acquisitions of pieces from Europe and Asia. The new edition includes a complete revision of the section on Europe after 1700, plus revisions to the sections on Celtic Europe, Roman Britain, cameos and finger rings.The book explores the varied styles, techniques and materials used to make jewelry in many civilizations throughout the world and across the millennia. Egyptian necklaces, Celtic torcs, South American gold masks, Renaissance pendants and Art Nouveau buckles are examples of the range of the masterpieces described and illustrated with 400 superb photographs.7000 Years of Jewelry takes readers on an impressive tour that includes, among other times and places:The Middle East: 5000-2000 BC Egypt: 1500-900 BC Phoenician, Greek, Etruscan and Persian Lands: 850-325 BC China, Celtic Europe, Mexico and Peru: 600 BC-AD 600 The Mediterranean, India, Egypt, Roman Britain and Byzantium: 325 BC-AD 600 Europe, China, Korea and Japan: AD 300-1000 Mayan Central America: AD 600-1000 Central and South America: AD 500-1500 Europe, Islam, China, Korea and Java: AD 1000-1500 China, India, Tibet and Mongolia: AD 1500-1850 West Africa: AD 1500-1800 Europe: AD 1500-1950. More comprehensive than before, this reference remains the finest and most beautifully illustrated history of jewelry ever published.

    In his introduction, Flusser proposes that writing does not, in fact, have a future because everything that is now conveyed in writing—and much that cannot be—can be recorded and transmitted by other means.Confirming Flusser’s status as a theorist of new media in the same rank as Marshall McLuhan, Jean Baudrillard, Paul Virilio, and Friedrich Kittler, the balance of this book teases out the nuances of these developments. To find a common denominator among texts and practices that span millennia, Flusser looks back to the earliest forms of writing and forward to the digitization of texts now under way. For Flusser, writing—despite its limitations when compared to digital media—underpins historical consciousness, the concept of progress, and the nature of critical inquiry. While the text as a cultural form may ultimately become superfluous, he argues, the art of writing will not so much disappear but rather evolve into new kinds of thought and expression.

    It examines whether perspective evolved as an approximation to normal perception or whether it was a symbolic form, one wary of discoursing about space.

    As in past editions, all the artists' works are represented in large-format color reproductions, and the artists' careers are examined in concise critical biographies.

    Shows horses and menagerie animals carved out of wood for American and European carousels, traces the history of carousel rides, and looks at some prominent manufacturers.

    The threat of a second world war sent Tamara packing to America, where she reveled among the famous in Hollywood and the wealthy of New York, In the 1970s she was rediscovered when a gallery owner in Paris mounted a retrospective of her work, and today paintings that were unsellable for three decades fetch many hundreds of thousands of dollars.Much of the story of de Lempicka's amazing life is told in moving detail by her daughter, whose recollections are amplified by anecdotes from others who knew the artist. The is illustrated by dozens of photographs from Tamara's personal album and by 50 full-color reproductions of her evocative paintings.

    An extensive collection of articles, as well as broadsheets printed in facsimile, illustrate the history and diversity of arguably the most important intervention in modern art. Essays by, amongst others, Laura Mulvey, Sarah Kent, Rosalind Coward, mary Kelly, and Sally Potter combine with press releases from the Women's Workshop, articles from The times and Spare Rib, and a host of other documents.

    The author looks at several aspects of Turner's life - his training and working methods, extensive travels, relationship to ancient and modern art, patrons, writing, and intellectual interests - which he relates to specific examples of his work.

    

    painting is like speaking or walking', Dubuffet looked to non-traditional sources - art by prisoners, psychics, and the insane - and to unusual materials - tar, sand, butterfly wings - to liberate his own creativity. The extraordinarily imaginative and varied results are viewed in this survey of his career. Insatiably curious about new ideas, fiercely skeptical about conventional ones, Dubuffet probed unexplored territory through his prose as well as his art - many appearing here for the first time. Dubuffet made several false starts as an artist before committing himself to painting full time in 1943. This book proceeds from the heavily impastoed portraits of the forties, through the well-known Hourloupe Cycle of the sixties, and onto the last works of Dubuffet the Non-lieux (No-ground). Dubuffet also experimented with lithographs, gouaches, assemblages and large scale public sculpture. As artist, writer, collector of more than 5000 examples of Art Brut, Dubuffet had a formidable impact on international postwar art. Refusing to conform to any one style, he dazzled with an inexhaustible inventiveness that continued nearly to his death at age eighty-three. This book captures the unique spirit of this remarkable artist.

    

    

    The works range from his early impressions of peasant life to drawings that served as studies for the great canvases he painted at the close of his life, including Landscape with Cypresses and Starry Night.Van Gogh's quest to be "alone with nature" and with those whose lives were close to the land took him first to the desolate reaches of northern Holland and ultimately to the sunlit fields and villages of southern France. The drawings presented in this book record the life, the land, and the people he encountered; familiar images to us through his paintings, yet startlingly fresh in these lesser-known works in another medium. Themes include peasants in their fields and cottages, village gardens, fishing boats, the postman Roulin, a drawbridge, fields of grain, a self-portrait, the house he lived in, the room he slept in, and the courtyard of the hospital in Arles.Van Gogh Drawings offers a beautiful and stirring collection of work, one that clearly displays the artist's powerful affinity for the drawing medium. During the last six years of his life, his most productive period, van Gogh produced approximately 700 drawings and 800 paintings. Virtually unknown at his death, he had sold only one of this astonishing number of works. Now, a century later, they number among the most universally admired and prized of man’s creative achievements. The drawings presented here, chosen from museums and private collections around the world, dramatically record the brief journey of his life and the unfolding of his genius. The captions, which draw heavily upon information provided by Jan Hulsker in The Complete Van Gogh, list subject, date, medium, dimensions (in centimeters, height before width), and the institutions in which they are located. 44 black-and-white illustrations.

    She was an influential member of the Impressionist group, whose exhibitions she organized with her fellow artists Monet, Renoir, Pissarro and Degas.A landmark tome in this field, this book considers Morisot's work in the context of the artistic and social milieu of the time. It explores the meaning of Baudelaire's famous dictum - to paint 'the heroism of modern life' - for a woman artist painting in the changing city of Paris: a very different city from the Paris of her male colleagues.

    Among the most successful were the great masters of the various European traditions and schools of art. The extraordinary skill, inspiration, and technique they brought to figure drawing resulted in many masterpieces.This anthology, carefully reproduced from rare portfolios, presents over forty of those works, by artists ranging from the 15th century Italian Filippino Lippi to the 19th century French classicist, J. A. D. Ingres. Included are such highlights as a Michelangelo study for a dead Christ; two drawings of seated women by Rembrandt; a study by Rubens for Daniel in the Lions' Den, and splendid nudes by Tintoretto, Titian, Andrea del Sarto, Raphael, Pontormo, and other celebrated artists. The drawings included in this volume reveal differences in attitudes toward the nude figure and in artistic technique. Some masters, such as Tintoretto, use an agitated, almost calligraphic line, while others, such as Michelangelo, create the illusion of a smooth, undulating surface. The drawings are lessons in foreshortening, and in how to handle various media — ink, chalk, pencil, and charcoal. These and many more artistic insights, embodied in drawings of striking beauty, are yours to study and enjoy in this collection, available nowhere else at this price.

    Today, historians consider Artistic Houses the best source of information and illustrations for private houses in major Eastern cities in the early 1880s. Although its authorship is not certain, the text is generally attributed to noted author and art critic George William Sheldon.This volume retains all of the photographs from the original two-volume work; the text, however, has been replaced with a version specially written for this edition. In addition to an introductory essay on the period's social and esthetic trends, extensive captions for each plate include most of the valuable information from Sheldon's descriptions plus biographical comments on the homeowners and their families, comments on paintings and sculptures, present condition of the houses, and locations.Over 200 photographs of 97 grand buildings include rare photographs of the New York homes of Hamilton Fish and Ulysses S. Grant; multiple views of the Henry Villard house, now part of the Helmsley Palace Hotel in Manhattan; rooms from William H. Vanderbilt's Fifth Avenue residence; interiors from J. Pierpont Morgan's Madison Avenue home; the Marshall Field house in Chicago, and many others. Here are richly paneled rooms that rivaled the baronial halls of European castles, miniature art galleries, magnificent tapestries, plush draperies, and brilliant chandeliers. With its thorough scholarship and wealth of detail, this impressive survey offers not only inside views of the homes of the rich and powerful families during the Gilded Age but also fascinating insights into the social history and architectural development of the United States.

    

    He demonstrates the ways in which a literary approach to Vasari's book deepens our understanding of its historical, art-historical, and imaginative character. Why Mona Lisa Smiles discusses Vasari's shrewd, witty, intimate awareness of Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio and relates the Lives to the works of Catiglione, Arentino, Cellini, and Rabelais. Barolsky reveals the unexpected fantasy of Varasi, who imagined and then invented artists and works of art, as well as totally fabricating the lives of artists about whom he knew little or nothing. Barolsky traces the myth of Pygmalion through the Lives, demonstrating that Vasari was himself a Pygmalion in words and showing that wittily played on the names of artists, revealing these poetical fantasies as part of the very iconology of Renaissance art. By aprroaching the LIves as a combination of genres---biography, history, novella, autobiography, novel and literary banquet--Barolsky connects Vasari's highly fictionalized history to the modern historical novel. The fictional character of Vasari's book should not be ignored or dismissed by art historians, Barolssky insists, since it is itself a historical document--the record of how a painter and writer of extraordinary sensibility beheld works of art at a particular moment in history. Barolsky's unique approach to the Lives makes just study a valuable contribution to the history of the reception of art. Paul Barolsky is Professor of History of Art at the University of Virginia. He is the author of Michelangelo's Nose (Penn State, 1990), Walter Pater's Renaissance (Penn State,1987), Daniele da Volterra: A Catalogue Raisonne (Garland, 1979), and Infinite Jest: Wit and Humor in Italian Renaissance Art (Missouri,1978).

    It found artists who succeeded brilliantly and this book, the only one devoted to the subject, records both the sitters and the work of the artists.