Book picks similar to
Formal Structure In Islamic Architecture by Klaus Herdeg
ma
architecture
art-history
Arts and Ideas
William Fleming - 1955
Using lively anecdotes, Fleming shows how the styles are linked together by common purposes, themes, and ideas.
Walks through Lost Paris: A Journey into the Heart of Historic Paris
Leonard Pitt - 2002
Eventually, he led tours and gave lectures on the demolition and reconstruction that changed the city forever. Walks through Lost Paris chronicles Paris's great periods of urban reconstruction through four walking tours. With a special focus on the work of Georges-Eugene Haussmann, this book provides a history of each site along with the motives behind the urban redesign and the reactions of Parisians who witnessed it. Detailed maps take you through a city whose changes were captured by photographers and artists in each stage. Hundreds of color photos, diagrams, and engravings splendidly survey the massive transformation that resulted in the Paris of today.
Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees: A Life of Contemporary Artist Robert Irwin
Lawrence Weschler - 1982
Traces the life and career of the California artist, who currently works with pure light and the subtle modulation of empty space.
The Alhambra
Robert Irwin - 2004
In his absorbing new book, Robert Irwin, Arabist and novelist, examines its history and allure.The Alhambra is the only Muslim palace to have survived since the Middle Ages. Built by a threatened dynasty of Muslim Spain, it was preserved as a monument to the triumph of Christianity. Every day thousands of tourists enter this magnificent site to be awestruck by its towers and courts, its fountained gardens, its honeycombed ceilings and intricate tile work. It is a complex full of mysteries--even its purpose is unclear. Its sophisticated ornamentation is not indiscriminate but full of hidden meaning. Its most impressive buildings were designed not by architects, but by philosophers and poets. The Alhambra, which resembles a fairy-tale palace, was constructed by slave labor in an era of economic decline, plague, and political violence. Its sumptuously appointed halls have lain witness to murder and mayhem. Yet its influence on art and on literature--including Orientalist painting and the architecture of cinemas, Washington Irving and Jorge Luis Borges--has been lasting and significant. As our guide to this architectural masterpiece, Robert Irwin allows us to fully understand the impact of the Alhambra.
Leonardo Da Vinci - the First Scientist
Michael White - 2000
But few guessed at the extent of his scientific investigations and experiments. In a vast collection of notebooks (over 5,000 pages), Leonardo meticulously detailed his research on optics, mechanics, astronomy, and anatomy. He kept his findings hidden for fear his ideas would be stolen. Had they been shared or published, they might well have changed the course of scientific discovery, for they prefigured the work of Newton, Galileo, and Kepler. Instead, after Leonardo's death, his papers were lost to the world for nearly 200 years; some were never recovered. Using newly available documents, Michael White illuminates Leonardo's groundbreaking achievements and weaves together the elements of his life and times-his unhappy childhood, his homosexuality, his relationship with everyone from Machiavelli to Cesare Borgia to Michelangelo. Leonardo: The First Scientist restores to this Renaissance genius the place he deserves in the pantheon of modern discovery About The Author: Michael White is the author of the international best-seller Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science (with John Gribbin), the award-winning Isaac Newton: the Last Sorcerer, Life Out There, and Weird Science . He is currently working on a book about scientific rivalry from Newton to Bill Gates. White lives with his wife and family near London.
History of Modern Art: Painting Sculpture Architecture Photography
H. Harvard Arnason - 1968
Long considered the survey of modern art, this engrossing and liberally illustrated text traces the development of trends and influences in painting, sculpture, photography and architecture from the mid-nineteenth century to the present day. Retaining its comprehensive nature and chronological approach, it now comes thoroughly reworked by Michael Bird, an experienced art history editor and writer, with refreshing new analyses, a considerably expanded picture program, and a more absorbing and unified narrative.
Skyway: The True Story of Tampa Bay's Signature Bridge and the Man Who Brought It Down
Bill DeYoung - 2013
Directly in the ship’s path was the Sunshine Skyway Bridge--two ribbons of concrete, steel, and asphalt that crossed fifteen miles of open bay. Suddenly, a violent weather cell reduced visibility to zero at the precise moment when Lerro attempted to direct the 20,000-ton vessel underneath the bridge. Unable to stop or see where he was going, Lerro drove the ship into a support pier; the main span splintered and collapsed 150 feet into the bay. Seven cars and a Greyhound bus fell over the broken edge and into the churning water below. Thirty-five people died.Skyway tells the entire story of this horrific event, from the circumstances that led up to it through the years-long legal proceedings that followed. Through personal interviews and extensive research, Bill DeYoung pieces together the harrowing moments of the collision, including the first-person accounts of witnesses and survivors. Among those whose lives were changed forever was Wesley MacIntire, the motorist whose truck ricocheted off the hull of the Summit Venture and sank. Although he was the lone survivor, MacIntire, like Lerro, was emotionally scarred and remained haunted by the tragedy for the rest of his life. Similarly, DeYoung details the downward spiral of Lerro’s life, his vilification in the days and weeks that followed the accident, and his obsession with the tragedy well into his painful last years. DeYoung also offers a history of the ill-fated bridge, from its construction in 1954, through the addition of a second parallel span in 1971, to its eventual replacement. He discusses the sinking of a Coast Guard cutter a mere three months before Skyway collapsed and the Department of Transportation’s dire warnings about the bridge’s condition. The result is a vividly detailed portrait of the rise and fall of a Florida landmark.
A Worldly Art: The Dutch Republic, 1585-1718
Mariet Westermann - 1996
Now back in print, this classic book (originally published in 1996) examines the country’s rich artistic culture in the seventeenth century, providing a full account of Dutch artists and patrons; artistic themes and techniques; and the political and social world in which artists worked.Distinguished art historian Mariët Westermann examines the “worldly art” of this time in the context of the unique society that produced it, analyzing artists’ choices and demonstrating how their pictures tell particular stories about the Dutch Republic, its people, and its past. More than 100 color illustrations complement this engaging discussion of an extraordinary moment in the history of art.
Visual Shock: A History of Art Controversies in American Culture
Michael Kammen - 2006
Now one of our most respected cultural historians chronicles these clamorous debates about the public appropriateness of paintings, sculpture, memorials, and monuments.Michael Kammen examines the nature, diversity, and persistence of major disputes generated by art and artists and shows what has changed since the 1830s and why. He looks at the role of artists and patrons, local and national governments, conservatives and liberals, and the media in creating and sustaining heated controversies. We see the notable acceleration of such episodes since the 1960s; the effect of the democratization of American museums; the quest for provocative shows to attract crowds; the increased visibility resulting from the public art movement that has stirred anger and created some of our stormiest battles; the desire of many artists and galleries to shock, provoke, and contest, engendering the perplexity, if not outright hostility, of audiences; the use of art as social criticism; the effort to include and appeal to minorities; the threat of litigation and the role of courts; and the commercialization stemming from dependence on corporate sponsorship.Kammen’s central themes include such questions as, What kind of art is most appropriate for a democratic society? What should our relationship be to Old World criteria of excellence in the arts? How can we achieve a distinctively American art? Why have so many controversies hinged upon issues of nudity, decency, and sexuality? Why has public art (most notably sculpture) become so politicized that began in the late 1960s? He explores the “death-of-art” debate since the 1970s and issues of censorship that have arisen over time. Finally, he asks whether art controversies have invariably had a negative effect—noticing the interesting ways in which minds have been changed and museums have overcome difficult episodes. He also reminds us that when New York’s Museum of Modern Art celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary, President Dwight Eisenhower declared “as long as artists are at liberty to feel with high personal intensity, as long as our artists are free to create with sincerity and conviction, there will be healthy controversy and progress in art.” Kammen agrees.
Gothic Art: Glorious Visions
Michael Camille - 1996
In this radical reappraisal of Gothic art in Europe, the word "Gothic" describes not only an art style but a changing concept of space, time, and society - a new kind of perception, both visual and spiritual, in which light is of central importance. Camille shows us how the art of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries was seen in its own time and explores the way vision itself was understood. In this age of glorious painting, magnificent, intricate architecture and sculpture, and jewellike manuscript illumination, art was an expression of religious passion and earthly power, of public and private wealth; of science and learning. The new vision led to an explosion of brilliant images but had its grim side, rarely noticed by art history: the distorted representation of "others" like Jews, heretics, and lepers; a new vision not only of the marvelous, but also of the grotesque.
The Photograph
Graham Clarke - 1997
From the first mistyheliograph taken by Joseph Nicephore Niepce in 1826 to the classic compositions of Cartier-Bresson and Alfred Steiglitz and the striking postmodern strategies of Robert Mapplethorpe, Clarke provides a groundbreaking examination of photography's main subject areas--landscape, the city, portraiture, the body, and reportage--as well as a detailed analysis of exemplary images in terms of their cultural and ideological contexts. With over 130 illustrations, The Photograph offers a series of discussions of major themes and genres providing an up-to-date introduction to the history of photographyand creating a record of the most dazzling, penetrating, and pervasive images of our time.
The Production of Space
Henri Lefebvre - 1991
His work spans some sixty years and includes original work on a diverse range of subjects, from dialectical materialism to architecture, urbanism and the experience of everyday life. The Production of Space is his major philosophical work and its translation has been long awaited by scholars in many different fields. The book is a search for a reconciliation between mental space (the space of the philosophers) and real space (the physical and social spheres in which we all live). In the course of his exploration, Henri Lefebvre moves from metaphysical and ideological considerations of the meaning of space to its experience in the everyday life of home and city. He seeks, in other words, to bridge the gap between the realms of theory and practice, between the mental and the social, and between philosophy and reality. In doing so, he ranges through art, literature, architecture and economics, and further provides a powerful antidote to the sterile and obfuscatory methods and theories characteristic of much recent continental philosophy. This is a work of great vision and incisiveness. It is also characterized by its author's wit and by anecdote, as well as by a deftness of style which Donald Nicholson-Smith's sensitive translation precisely captures.
Stories in Stone: A Field Guide to Cemetery Symbolism and Iconography
Douglas Keister - 2004
Douglas Keister has created a practical field guide that is compact and portable, perfect for those interested in family histories and genealogical research, and is the only book of its kind that unlocks the language of symbols in a comprehensive and easy-to-understand manner.Douglas Keister has photographed fourteen award-winning, critically acclaimed books (including Red Tile Style: America's Spanish Revival Architecture, The Bungalow: America's Arts & Crafts Home, and Storybook Style: America's Whimsical Homes of the Twenties) earning him the title "America's most noted photographer of historic architecture." He also writes and illustrates magazine articles and contributes photographs and essays to other books, calendars, posters, and greeting cards. Doug lives in Chico, California, and travels frequently to photograph and lecture on historic architecture and photography.
Indian Art
Roy C. Craven - 1975
Much of Indian art is immediately accessible to the outsider, but much is also enigmatic, needing interpretation and guidance before it can be enjoyed in depth: the strange pantheon of the Hindu gods, the subtle insights of Buddhist mysticism, or the complex symbolism of the miniatures. For this edition, the late Professor Craven thoroughly revised the text and incorporated works by contemporary artists, linking their achievements to the traditions of Indian art. A new glossary and time line are also included.