Van Gogh's Van Goghs


Richard Kendall - 1998
    The collection is based on works acquired directly from the artist by his brother. Among the treasures reproduced here are Potato Eaters, The Bedroom Self Portrait as an Artist, Wheatfield with Crows, and Harvest.

Handcrafted Modern: At Home with Mid-century Designers


Leslie Williamson - 2010
    Among significant mid-century interiors, none are more celebrated yet underpublished as the homes created by architects and interior designers for themselves. This collection of newly commissioned photographs presents the most compelling homes by influential mid-century designers, such as Russel Wright, George Nakashima, Harry Bertoia, Charles and Ray Eames, and Eva Zeisel, among others. Intimate as well as revelatory, Williamson’s photographs show these creative homes as they were lived in by their designers: Walter Gropius’s historic Bauhaus home in Massachusetts; Albert Frey’s floating modernist aerie on a Palm Springs rock outcropping; Wharton Esherick’s completely handmade Pennsylvania house, from the organic handcarved staircase to the iconic furniture. Personal and breathtaking by turn—these homes are exemplary studies of domestic modernism at its warmest and most creative.

Hatch Show Print: The History of a Great American Poster Shop


Paul Kingsbury - 2001
    Country musicians and magicians, professional wrestlers and rock stars, all have turned to Nashville's historic Hatch Show Print to create showstopping posters. Established in 1879, Hatch preserves the art of traditional printing that has earned a loyal following to this day (including the likes of Beck, Emmylou Harris, and the Beastie Boys). Hatch Show Print: The History of a Great American Poster Shop is the first fully illustrated tour of this iconic print shop and also chronicles the long life and large cast of employees, entertainers, and American legends whose histories are intertwined with it. Complete with 190 illustrations--as well as a special book jacket that unfolds to reveal an original Hatch poster on the reverse--Hatch Show Print is a dazzling document of this legendary institution.

The Golden Bees: The Story of the Bonapartes


Theo Aronson - 1964
     This book is a domestic chronicle of the incredible Bonaparte family, a greedy, amorous, quarrelsome and hot-blooded Corsican clan who provided nineteenth-century Europe — and America — not only with two French emperors, but also with a dazzling assortment of pretenders and parvenus, statesmen and eccentrics, great ladies and adventuresses. Plumped on to the thrones of Europe by the career of Napoleon I, who probably took better care of his family than any conqueror in history, the Bonapartes survived the wreck of the two empires they ruled, buzzing around the honeypots of the continent with all the persistence of the imperial bees of Napoleon's crest. This is a personal history, not a political one. It is the family, with its eccentricities, vulgarities and fascinations manifesting themselves in generation after generation, which holds the centre of the stage. The great political, economic and military events of the time are heard dimly as 'noises off'. Napoleon I himself appears as son, brother, husband, father and above all as founder of a dynasty, rather than as a great public figure. But about the family, its feuds, its treacheries, its love affairs, its moments of greatness and of human tragedy, Mr Aronson seems to have missed not one good story, from the squabbles of Napoleon's rebellious sisters over the carrying of Josephine's train, to Hitler's remarkable deal with Petain for the return of the body of the Duke of Reichstadt to his father's tomb in the Invalides. Mr Aronson paints his family portrait with a wealth of detail based on many years of research with historical documents and original records, letters, memoirs and family diaries — for, in the end, no one seems to have been able to tell quite such a lurid tale about a Bonaparte as another Bonaparte.

How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They're Built


Stewart Brand - 1994
    How Buildings Learn is a masterful new synthesis that proposes that buildings adapt best when constantly refined and reshaped by their occupants, and that architects can mature from being artists of space to becoming artists of time. From the connected farmhouses of New England to I.M. Pei's Media Lab, from "satisficing" to "form follows funding," from the evolution of bungalows to the invention of Santa Fe Style, from Low Road military surplus buildings to a High Road English classic like Chatsworth—this is a far-ranging survey of unexplored essential territory.More than any other human artifacts, buildings improve with time—if they're allowed to. How Buildings Learn shows how to work with time rather than against it.

Gaudi: The Life of a Visionary


J. Castellar-Gassol - 1999
    

A Short Book About Art


Dana Arnold - 2015
    Introducing art in its international context, this accessible book explores core issues about how art is made, interpreted, and displayed, without any of the unnecessary terminology. Divided into themes, A Short Book About Art presents new ways of thinking about the relationship between artists and their work, as well as fresh comparisons between works of art from different periods and places. Thought-provoking and stimulating, it is the ideal companion for anyone who wants to learn about art without a dictionary in their hands.

Flowers and Floral Patterns: 60 Full Page Line Drawings Ready For Coloring (Adult Coloring Books Book 2)


Sue Taylor-Cox - 2015
    Your colorful pictures of flowers will produce a stunning flower art book that you can be proud of.In recent years coloring for grown-ups has become a widespread and growing hobby. There are of course many reasons for this, but here are just some... Coloring Lowers Stress And Anxiety Psychiatrists have long known that coloring relaxes the fear center of the brain and allows your mind to get some rest. In fact the founder of analytical psychology, Carl Jung, is known to have given his patients mandalas to color more than one hundred years ago. In today's hectic world the stress reducing properties of coloring are possibly more valuable than ever. Coloring Trains Your Brain To Focus Remaining inside the lines as you color needs focus and, while you are concentrating on this stress-free and relaxing activity, you can forget about your worries. Coloring is a mind exercise which allows you to put aside everything else for the time you spend coloring, and this is very important in our increasingly demanding world. Coloring Helps In The Development Of Fine Motor Skills And Vision Coloring forces the two hemispheres of the brain to work together and involves both the use of logic (necessary for coloring forms) and creativity (as we mix and match colors). In turn, this brings those areas of the brain responsible for fine motor skills and vision into play, and helps in keeping these active and in developing them further. It is this aspect of coloring which is being seen more and more as especially valuable for older individuals, as many in the medical profession believe that it can delay, or even prevent, the onset of dementia. Coloring Provides The Chance To Be Social Although you might feel that coloring should be a solo occupation, its rising popularity is quickly turning it into a social one. Friends, families, work colleagues and others are getting together to eat, drink and enjoy the chance to socialize, through their shared interest in coloring books. Without doubt, this is a perfect excuse for getting together, as coloring needs only a minimum of concentration and can easily be done in a group setting. Coloring Lets You Be Yourself There are no rules when it comes to coloring and your coloring book is your coloring book. If you mistakenly make the cat's back leg green because you mistook it for part of the grass, who cares? If you feel like making the sky yellow, what does it matter? You can be as creative as you wish because this is your coloring book, and yours alone."You may already be a convert to adult coloring, in which case you will already know and appreciate its value. This may however be a new project for you and one which you are considering for any one of several different reasons. If this is something new for you then I urge you to give it a try. There is a reason why so many people are fired up about the world of adult coloring, so join in and start enjoying the benefits for yourself today. IMPORTANT Please note that the illustrations in this Kindle book are deliberately of a relatively low quality in order to keep the download size of the book small.

St. John Feet, Fins and Four Wheel Drive


Pam Gaffin - 1994
    John, Virgin Islands. It tells you exactly where to go, how to get there, and what to do and see when you arrive. It contains everything you need to know about the St. John's beaches and hiking trails, as well as its confusing system, of roads, foot-paths and goat-trails. Recommended by Caribbean Travel and Life and by many St. Johnians since locals are NOT on vacation and can't always take time off from work to be a tour guide for their guests. Best Selling St John Guidebook since 1994. Updated in 2009.

Zelda Fitzgerald: The Biography


University Press Biographies - 2017
    The chafing restrictions of a typical upbringing in upper-class, small town Alabama simply did not apply to Zelda, who was described as an unusual child and permitted to roam the streets with little supervision. Zelda refused to blossom into a typical 'Southern belle' on anyone's terms but her own and while still in high school enjoyed the status of a local celebrity for her shocking behavior. Everybody in town knew the name Zelda Sayre. Queen of the Montgomery social scene, Zelda had a different beau ready and willing to show her a good time for every day of the week. Before meeting F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda's life was a constant pursuit of pleasure. With little thought for the future and no responsibilities to speak of, Zelda committed herself fully to the mantra that accompanied her photo in her high school graduation book: "Why should all life be work, when we all can borrow. Let's think only of today, and not worry about tomorrow." But for now Zelda was still in rehearsal for her real life to begin, a life she was sure would be absolutely extraordinary. Zelda Sayre married F. Scott Fitzgerald on the 3rd of April 1920 and left sleepy Montgomery behind in order to dive headfirst into the shimmering, glamourous life of a New York socialite. With the publication of Scott's first novel, This Side of Paradise, Zelda found herself thrust into the limelight as the very epitome of the Flapper lifestyle. Concerned chiefly with fashion, wild parties and flouting social expectations, Zelda and Scott became icons of the Jazz Age, the personification of beauty and success. What Zelda and Scott shared was a romantic sense of self-importance that assured them that their life of carefree leisure and excess was the only life really worth living. Deeply in love, the Fitzgeralds were like to sides of the same coin, each reflecting the very best and worst of each other. While the world fell in love with the image of the Fitzgeralds they saw on the cover of magazines, behind the scenes the Fitzgerald's marriage could not withstand the tension of their creative arrangement. Zelda was Scott's muse and he mercilessly mined the events of their life for material for his books. Scott claimed Zelda's memories, things she said, experiences she had and even passages from her diary as his possessions and used them to form the basis of his fictional works. Zelda had a child but the domestic sphere offered no comfort or purpose for her. The Flapper lifestyle was not simply a phase she lived through, it formed the very basis of her character and once the parties grew dull, the Fitzgeralds' drinking became destructive and Zelda's beauty began to fade, the world held little allure for her. Zelda sought reprieve in work and tried to build a career as a ballet dancer. When that didn't work out she turned to writing but was forbidden by Scott from using her own life as material. Convinced that she would never leave her mark on the world as deeply or expressively as Scott had, Zelda retreated into herself and withdrew from the people she knew in happier times. The later years of Zelda's life were marred by her detachment from reality as, diagnosed with schizophrenia, Zelda spent the last eighteen years of her life living in and out of psychiatric hospitals. As Scott's life unraveled due to alcohol abuse, Zelda looked back on the years they had spent together, young and wild and beautiful, as the best of her life. She may have been right but she was wrong about one thing, Zelda did leave her mark on the world and it was a deep and expressive mark that no one could have left but her. Zelda Fitzgerald: The Biography

The House Party: A Short History of Leisure, Pleasure and the Country House Weekend


Adrian Tinniswood - 2019
    Parlour games. Cocktails. Welcome to a glorious journey through the golden age of the country house party - and you are invited. Our host, celebrated historian Adrian Tinniswood, traces the evolution of this quintessentially British pastime from debauched royal tours to the flamboyant excess of the Bright Young Things. With cameos by the Jazz Age industrialist, the bibulous earl and the off-duty politician - whether in moated manor houses or ornate Palladian villas - Tinniswood gives a vivid insight into weekending etiquette and reveals the hidden lives of celebrity guests, from Nancy Astor to Winston Churchill, in all their drinking, feasting, gambling and fornicating. The result is a deliciously entertaining, star-studded, yet surprisingly moving portrait of a time when social conventions were being radically overhauled through the escapism of a generation haunted by war - and a uniquely fast-living period of English history. Praise for The Long Weekend:'Delicious, occasionally fantastical, revealing in ways that Downton Abbey never was. It is as if Tinniswood is at the biggest, wildest, most luxuriantly decadent party ever thrown, and he knows everyone.' Observer 'A deliciously jaunty and wonderfully knowledgeable book. Tinniswood displays a terrific insider's grasp of gossip . A meticulous, irresistible story.' Spectator 'Elegant, encyclopedic and entertaining . A confident and skilled historian who understands the mores of his era and wears his learning lightly . Deserves to be on every costume drama producer's bookshelf.' Times

100 Lost Rock Albums From The 1970s


Matthew Ingram - 2012
    From The Wire: "Matthew Ingram, aka Woebot, has published a book titled 100 Lost Rock Albums From The 1970s. The book takes in strands of metal, glam rock, French artists, punk and pub rock, and is released digitally as a self-published eBook via Amazon. Ingram says: 'Last year I started writing an article on the 100 Lost Rock Albums From The 1970s but it ballooned out of all proportions and I decided to turn it into an eBook.''Over time we have lost touch with the original character of the 70s. Using 'lost' records I've attempted to re-examinine the decade and redress what I see as imbalance. Beyond small reviews of a meticulously-selected 100 albums there's quite a lot of contemporary history, much theorising and lots of gags.'"

God Needs To Go: Why Christian Beliefs Fail


J.D. Brucker - 2012
    It brings comfort, purpose, and sense of pride. These feelings mean so much to the Christian. But are these feelings justified? Do Christians have good reason to trust the truth of their beliefs? Author J. D. Brucker brings forth a short collection of arguments against Christian beliefs, exposing the falsehoods of the faith so many all around the world cherish.

The New Small House


Katie Hutchison - 2015
    The book presents fundamental small-house design strategies, complete with whole-house case studies for homeowners eager to simplify. Creating a great small house is illustrated in the opening chapter with 10 approaches, including: borrowed view and daylight multipurpose spaces privacy pockets using quality materials Twenty-five stunning small houses are profiled in the second part of the book, organized by the nature of their locations.

Becoming Human: Our Past, Present and Future


Scientific American - 2013