H. Mallock's A Human Document, and began cutting and pasting the extant text to create something new. The artist writes, 'I plundered, mined and undermined its text to make it yield the ghosts of other possible stories, scenes, poems, erotic incidents and surrealist catastrophes which seemed to lurk within its wall of words. As I worked on it, I replaced the text I'd stripped away with visual images of all kinds. I began to tell and depict, among other memories, dreams and reflections, the sad story of Bill Toge, one of love's casualties.' After its first publication in book form in 1980, A Humument rapidly became a cult classic. This new fourth edition follows its predecessors by incorporating revisions and re-workings -- over half the pages in the 1980 edition are replaced by new versions -- and celebrates an artistic enterprise that is nearly forty years old and still actively a work in progress.

    Moreover, it is the only modern book that provides clearly described, brilliantly photographed, and accurately reproduced examples of both major and minor hands along with explicit directions for writing them.The author — a professional calligrapher of medieval styles, as well as illuminator, writer, and teacher — presents a spirited historical account of thirteen important writing styles developed from about the fourth century to the end of the fifteenth. These include Roman Rustic, Uncial, Carolingian Minuscule, Early Gothic, Luxeuil Minuscule, Gothic Littera Bastarda , and seven other distinctive hands. The text explains how and why different styles evolved, why certain devices, codes, and abbreviations were used, and how form and function interacted.In addition to fascinating facts about the origin and development of medieval scripts, Medieval Calligraphy also shows you how to duplicate medieval techniques with modern writing tools. Thorough instructions and sharply detailed, full-page photographs of the original alphabets explain pen angles and stroke sequences for each letter and capital. By carefully studying and practicing the techniques described, calligraphers will be able to master some of history's most interesting and influential scripts. Mr. Drogin has rounded out the book with helpful lists of suppliers of tools and materials, American and European sources for facsimiles and books, calligraphic societies, a bibliography, index, and more.

    Illustrated with more than 300 full-color photographs, each species account includes information on physical characteristics, size, similar species, breeding, tracks and other signs, habitat, and range, as well as commentary on feeding, nesting, and other behaviors. Easy-to-read range maps, detailed anatomical illustrations of different mammals, track illustrations, and a state-by-state location guide make this the decisive authority on North American mammals.

    Describes the secret activities of the Caretakers of Wonder, who perform such magical tasks as putting up new stars, keeping the night buttoned up against the cold, and mending old clouds, all while we sleep.

    While gazing at Rauschenberg's painting Double Feature, Tomkins felt compelled to make some kind of literal connection to the work, and it is in that sprit that "for the last forty years it's been [his] ambition to write about contemporary art not as a critic or a judge, but as a participant." Tomkins has spent many of those years writing about Robert Rauschenberg, whom he rapidly came to see as "one of the most inventive and influential artists of his generation." So it seemed natural to make Rauschenberg the focus of Off the Wall, which deals with the radical changes that have made advanced visual art such a powerful force in the world.Off the Wall chronicles the astonishingly creative period of the 1950s and 1960s, a high point in American art. In his in his collaborations with Merce Cunningham and John Cage, and as a pivotal figure linking abstract expressionism and pop art, Rauschenberg was part of a revolution during which artists moved art off the walls of museums and galleries and into the center of the social scene. Rauschenberg's vitally important and productive career spans this revolution, reaching beyond it to the present day. Featuring the artists and the art world surrounding Rauschenberg--from Jackson Pollock, and Willem de Kooning to Jasper Johns, Frank Stella, and Andy Warhol, together with dealers Betty Parsons, and Leo Castelli, and the patron Peggy Guggenheim--Tomkins's stylish and witty portrait of one of America's most original and inspiring artists is fascinating, enlightening, and very entertaining.

    --alibris.comEssays originally published on the occasion of the exhibition Joseph Cornell, November 17, 1980 - January 20, 1981, The Museum of Modern Art, New York.

    This book includes more than 80 color reproductions of his stamps, which are passionately collected throughout the world, plus his "Map of the World" and a typewritten "Census of the World".