Creative Collage Techniques


Nita Leland - 1994
    This book can help you bring all of these together in one beautiful creation.Here you'll see magnificent collages by leading artists who show you--in step-by-step demonstrations--how to begin, how to design, how to apply collage techniques in exciting ways.Plus you'll get your chance to use those techniques with nearly fifty projects that challenge you to do your most creative work.

Has Modernism Failed?


Suzi Gablik - 1984
    In describing a world whose central aesthetic paradigm of modernism had lost its vitality, with an "avant-garde" that reflected the culture of consumerism, her book struck a chord in an audience that had once responded to the heroic idealism of modernism. Reprinted many times, Has Modernism Failed? became one of the most popular and influential works of contemporary art criticism. Now Gablik has revised and expanded her work to encompass developments over the last two decades. A new prologue looks at changes in the cultural context of art, especially at the radical split between artists who still proclaim the self-sufficiency of art, "in defiance of the social good," and artists who want art to have some worthy agenda outside of itself. In a new chapter, "Globalization," she looks at the ruthless cultural homogenization of a universal consumer society and how a number of artists and curators are challenging it. And in a passionate new chapter called "Transdisciplinarity" she offers a way forward for individuals to break free of the limiting ideologies of modernism and consumerism and shows how some artists are reflecting both spiritual and social concerns in their art.

Secret Knowledge: Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters


David Hockney - 2001
    Hockney’s extensive research led him to conclude that artists such as Caravaggio, Velázquez, da Vinci, and other hyperrealists actually used optics and lenses to create their masterpieces.In this passionate yet pithy book, Hockney takes readers on a journey of discovery as he builds a case that mirrors and lenses were used by the great masters to create their highly detailed and realistic paintings and drawings. Hundreds of the best-known and best-loved paintings are reproduced alongside his straightforward analysis. Hockney also includes his own photographs and drawings to illustrate techniques used to capture such accurate likenesses. Extracts from historical and modern documents and correspondence with experts from around the world further illuminate this thought-provoking book that will forever change how the world looks at art.Secret Knowledge will open your eyes to how we perceive the world and how we choose to represent it.

Making the Mummies Dance: Inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art


Thomas Hoving - 1993
    In a decade, Hoving changed almost everything people had grown accustomed to from the Met, shaking the institution out of royal repose and transforming it into the most vital cultural presence in the country. Now, the irrepressible former director delivers a fearless account of his life at the pinnacle of the art world - a modern Vanity Fair, a true story of masterpieces and money, society and scandal, intrigue and international theft. The Met is more than a dazzling art showplace. The museum is a vibrant if quietly influential community, inhabited and run by singular sorts of people: trustees and curators, connoisseurs and conservators. It is steeped in history and tradition and seems to move in a serene and elegant world of impeccable manners and the finest taste. Behind the proper social veneers and pristine marble galleries, Hoving reveals the cutthroat precincts where the real business of the Met is carried out. From seducing important patrons like Robert Lehman, Nelson Rockefeller, Walter Annenberg, and Brooke Astor to spiriting ancient treasures across international borders; from striking secret agreements with the world's most powerful dealers to sidestepping rivals; from securing blockbuster exhibitions, like "Tut" and "The Glory of Russian Costume," to seizing the most phenomenal Velazquez portrait, Hoving shares not only the nimbleness and brashness that made him so effective, but also the zeal and passion that made the Met so exciting. Making the Mummies Dance is told in the head-on, even naughty, way that is trademark Hoving. This is an important, shocking museum story and more - an unforgettable tale of power struggles and one-upmanship, fame, big money, and, of course, great art.

The Animation Book: A Complete Guide to Animated Filmmaking--From Flip-Books to Sound Cartoons to 3- D Animation


Kit Laybourne - 1979
    Now, as we enter the twenty-first century, the explosion in computer technology has created a corresponding boom in animation. Using desktop hardware and software, animators can easily produce high-quality, high-artistry animation and mix the aesthetics of traditional cel animation with dazzling 3-D effects. Kit Laybourne's digital revision to The Animation Book brings you to the cutting edge of animation technology. Richly illustrated with frame-grabs, production stills, and diagrams, this volume shares Kit's infectious enthusiasm for the limitless possibilities of today's hybrid techniques, and it provides beginning animators with all the information they need to jump in and start their own animation projects. More advanced animators will find The Animation Book to be an invaluable resource with detailed descriptions of filmmaking gear, computer hardware and software, art supplies, plus Internet and other resources.Using an innovative case-study approach, Kit deconstructs how a range of digital projects were carried out at some of today's hottest animation studios, including Wildbrain, Blue Sky, Protozoa, Fantome, Broderbund, Nicktoons, and Klasky Csupo. These step-by-step studies show how desktop animators can follow the same creative process in their own films.

How to Draw Almost Everything: An Illustrated Sourcebook


Chika Miyata - 2016
    The section on people gives simple tricks for showing emotion (angry, surprised) and action (skipping, doing a handstand). There's also a section on clothing that shows how to draw coats and jackets, shoes and boots, bell-bottoms and skinny jeans. From tricycles to tanker trucks, the book gives tips on drawing all kinds of moving vehicles.At then end of each chapter, author and artist Chika Miyata challenges you to synthesize what you've learned and create a scene. At the end of the chapter on animals, the challenge is to draw a zoo. At the end of the chapter on food, the challenge is to keep an illustrated food journal.Each entry is broken down with step-by-step illustrations, making this book perfect for beginners or experienced artists in need of a quick refresher and a great resource for those who want to express themselves through illustration or cartooning. Each book in the Almost Everything series offers readers a fun, comprehensive, and charmingly illustrated visual directory of ideas to inspire skill building in their creative endeavors.

The Drawing Projects: An Exploration of the Language of Drawing


Mick Maslen - 2011
    The artists discuss the value of drawing in their own work, and invites you to think about how we view life, view art and view the story that they tell together.Drawing Projects includes fifteen projects to inspire you to join in and work through at your own pace. These detailed tutorials provide a how to draw these images guide. The combination of artists work and easy to follow projects make this a practical guide to inspire the artist in you.

Classic Human Anatomy: The Artist's Guide to Form, Function, and Movement


Valerie L. Winslow - 2008
    This long-awaited book provides simple, insightful approaches to the complex subject of human anatomy, using drawings, diagrams, and reader-friendly text. Three major sections–the skeletal form, the muscular form and action of the muscles, and movement–break the material down into easy-to-understand pieces. More than 800 distinctive illustrations detail the movement and actions of the bones and muscles, and unique charts reveal the origins and insertions of the muscles. Packed with an extraordinary wealth of information, Classic Human Anatomy is sure to become a new classic of art instruction.

No Excuses Watercolor: Painting Techniques for Sketching and Journaling


Gina Rossi Armfield - 2015
    It's not colorful enough. It's intimidating!With the fun and easy techniques in Gina Rossi Armfield's No Excuses Watercolor, your excuses for not painting with watercolor don't stand a chance! As you try the demonstrations and exercises, you'll learn the techniques and tricks necessary to achieve amazing, colorful results in your artist's sketchbook.After getting to know your materials, you'll try your hand at thirteen exercises that will help train your hand, and help you identify and refine your artistic style. Along the way, you'll get tips and suggestions for adding journaling and writing to your art. Finally, you'll find an inspirational resource guide packed with reference photos, starter sketches, color palettes, journaling prompts and more to help you fill your watercolor journal!Grab your sketchbook and watercolors--it's time to paint, no excuses!- 22 demonstrations for sketching and watercolor painting. - 13 exercises for practicing backgrounds, focal images, color mixing, layering and details. - 13 resource sections loaded with journaling and painting prompts to keep you inspired.

What Painting Is


James Elkins - 1998
    Alchemy provides a magical language to explore what it is a painter really does in her or his studio - the smells, the mess, the struggle to control the uncontrollable, the special knowledge only painters hold of how colours will mix, and how they will look.Written from the perspective of a painter-turned-art historian, What Painting Is is like nothing you have ever read about art.

Draw Stronger: Self-Care For Cartoonists and Other Visual Artists


Kriota Willberg - 2018
    

The DC Comics Guide to Digitally Drawing Comics


Freddie E. Williams II - 2009
    Author Freddie E Williams is one of DC Comics' hottest artists and a leader in digital penciling and inking–and here, in clear, step-by-step directions, he guides readers through every part of the digital process, from turning on the computer to finishing a digital file of fully inked comic art, ready for print. Creating a template, sketching on the computer, penciling, and finally inking digitally are all covered in depth, along with bold, timesaving shortcuts created by Williams, tested by years of trial and error. Step into the digital age, streamline the drawing process, and leap over the limitations of mere physical drawing materials with The DC Guide to Digitally Drawing Comics.

Watercolor Painting Outside the Lines: A Positive Approach to Negative Painting


Linda Kemp - 2004
    Linda Kemp shows beginners and advanced artists how to harness the power of these often overlooked areas surrounding a painting's focal point. Troubleshooting suggestions and secrets are included.

Drawing the Head and Figure


Jack Hamm - 1962
    Offers simplified techniques and scores of brand-new hints and helps. Step by step procedures. Hundreds of illustrations.

Facial Expressions: A Visual Reference for Artists


Mark Simon - 2005
    For those artists (and their long-suffering friends), here is the best book ever. Facial Expressions includes more than 2,500 photographs of 50 faces—men and women of a variety of ages, shapes, sizes, and ethnicities—each demonstrating a wide range of emotions and shown from multiple angles. Who can use this book? Oh, only every artist on the planet, including art students, illustrators, fine artists, animators, storyboarders, and comic book artists. But wait, there’s more! Additional photos focus on people wearing hats and couples kissing, while illustrations show skull anatomy and facial musculature. Still not enough? How about a one-of-a-kind series of photos of lips pronouncing the phonemes used in human speech? Animators will swoon—and artists will show a range of facial expressions from happy to happiest to ecstatic.