These large, colorful works are the capstone of his engagement with nature, not only in England but also in the American Southwest, through the media of painting and photography. This book, the catalog of the first major Hockney museum exhibition in many years, offers a glorious view of the landscape as seen by the artist, and it includes not only his recent paintings but also his iPhone and iPad drawings. Essays by leading art historians—as well as a more literary piece by novelist Margaret Drabble and Hockney’s own reflections on his recent work—explore Hockney’s art from various perspectives.Praise for David Hockney:"Supplemented with numerous essays by art critics and Hockney himself, this is a mesmerizing volume of an established artist who continues to assert his dynamic relevancy." —Publishers Weekly (starred review) "This glorious volume showcases this unique and exhilarating body of work, which celebrates the pulse of life in trees, fields, flowers, and clouds over the great cycle of the seasons . . . The enlightening commentary is merely prelude to a swoon once the reader turns to the 300 resplendent color reproductions." —Booklist, starred review

    Blow by Blow is a captivating journey through Issie’s life, a one-of-a-kind look at her unforgettable impact on the fashion world, and a moving exploration of her inspiring and ultimately tragic tale.

    Since it first appeared in 1977, Michael Crichton's Jasper Johns has been considered the preeminent study of one of America's foremost living artists. Abrams is proud now to publish this completely revised, expanded, and updated version of a modern classic. Jasper Johns has often been called an "artist's artist." In his use of found objects and commonplace imagery, he creates tantalizing, intellectually demanding works of unparalleled originality and uncommon beauty. His new work, with its puns, optical illusions, and embedded images ranging from George Ohr pots to the Isenheim Altarpiece to Picasso etchings, has attracted an unprecedented level of intense critical attention. Here Michael Crichton, author of The Andromeda Strain, Jurassic Park, and Rising Sun, among other bestsellers, brings to bear his own extraordinary gifts, particularly his analytic skill and his superior abilities as narrator and storyteller. Crichton, who has known Johns and collected his work for more than twenty years, offers a dazzling succession of intimate glimpses of Johns' potent and seemingly contradictory aspects, many of them highlighted by interviews with the artist, his dealers, and distinguished contemporary critics. He also conducts a powerful, sensitive, and wide reaching critique of Johns' work - and in so doing offers an intriguing investigation into the very nature of the artistic response. Accompanying Crichton's text are 186 black-and-white illustrations, including works by Johns, photographs of him, and comparative examples. Then comes a spectacular display of 231 paintings, prints, sculptures, and drawings by Jasper Johns, ranging from his earliest pieces to his most recent works, some forty years later. Of these, 128 are reproduced in duotone and 103 in full color, including six magnificent foldout pages - t

    Yet no full colour collection of her work has been available until now. This comprehensive volume consists of 108 colour plates accompanied by text written by the artist.

    A retrospective that celebrates the art and life of one of America's most iconic artists, the world-renowned illustrator and author of several classic children's books.

    Introducing students to a variety of established theories of art, he presents the traditional sets of criteria of Realism, Expressionism, and Formalism, which are in turn updated by recent sources of Poststructuralism. Barrett applies each of these theories to challenging works of contemporary art, pointing out the strengths and weaknesses of each mode of interpretation. He encourages students to consider many criteria when evaluating an artwork, to critically examine judgments made by others, and to make informed judgments of their own. Ideal for courses in aesthetics, art theory, art criticism, and the philosophy of art, Why Is That Art? is organized chronologically according to the history of aesthetics. It features sixty-seven illustrations (twenty-six in a full-color insert), discusses a wide range of American and European artists, and includes an exceptional overview of postmodern pluralism. This unique book will provide students with a newfound appreciation for contemporary art, scholarship, and reasoned argumentation, giving them the confidence to join the fascinating discourse on contemporary art.

    Picardie's unprecedented research illuminates Chanel’s path from little-known seamstress to the aristocracy of style in this stunning look at the fashion icon, illustrated with more than sixty color and black-and-white images.

    His distinctive and original posters and his decorative panels in le style Mucha became almost synonymous with French Art Nouveau. The admirer and iconographer of Sarah Bernhardt, he was also well known as the creator of familiar advertisements and as a book illustrator. Yet there was much more to Mucha’s achievement than this. At the height of his career as a decorative artist, he became convinced that art should serve ideas, he became chief artistic and cultural adviser to the interwar Czech government, and he completed a major and controversial fresco cycle, the Slav Epic, as well as portraits and large symbolic paintings.This book—the first full-scale treatment of Mucha’s entire oeuvre—includes discussions and reproductions of paintings, posters, panneaux decoratifs, pastels, drawings, and illustrations from throughout his career. In addition, the authors provide essays on Mucha’s Paris years; his association with Sarah Bernhardt; the importance of American patronage on his later work; his graphic and painterly techniques; and the problems connected with the conservation of the large canvases. This lavishly illustrated book is the catalogue for an exhibition of Mucha’s work that will tour the United States, beginning in San Diego in 1998.Published in association with Art Services International, Washington, D.C.

    From blonde to ginger, the brown that changed the way battles were fought to the white that protected against the plague, Picasso's blue period to the charcoal on the cave walls at Lascaux, acid yellow to kelly green, and from scarlet women to imperial purple, these surprising stories run like a bright thread throughout history.In this book, Kassia St. Clair has turned her lifelong obsession with colors and where they come from (whether Van Gogh's chrome yellow sunflowers or punk's fluorescent pink) into a unique study of human civilization. Across fashion and politics, art and war, the secret lives of color tell the vivid story of our culture.

    Where does our current obsession for interactivity stem from? After the consumer society and the communication era, does art still contribute to the emergence of a rational society? Bourriaud attempts to renew our approach toward contemporary art by getting as close as possible to the artists works, and by revealing the principles that structure their thoughts: an aesthetic of the inter-human, of the encounter; of proximity, of resisting social formatting.

    Situations include these men in art and antiquity sharing keen insight on the female anatomy, an eloquent defense of catcalling, or offering sage advice about horseback riding to the woman who owns the horse and many more situations.

    With their compelling composition and glowing colour, these works are admired for their beauty and for their power to transport the viewer into a romantic world of myth and legend. At the same time, Waterhouse's wistful heroines also reflect the troubled attitudes of nineteenth-century male artists towards women.In this carefully researched new study, Peter Trippi presents a fresh and absorbing analysis of the artist's seductresses, martyrs and nymphs, and the cultural and historical circumstances in which they were produced. He also draws on new research to provide an accessible biography of the artist. Themes explored include Waterhouse's passion for Italy, literature and the classical world, the role of the Royal Academy in his life, his stylistic influences and studio practice, and his relations with collectors, dealers, critics and curators.Neglected throughout much of the twentieth century, Waterhouse has enjoyed a dramatic revival of fortune. Trippi's monograph provides a timely re-evaluation that combines a close reading of Waterhouse's imagery with a candid appraisal of the milieu in which he worked.

    Set amid the most turbulent social and political period of modern times, Ninth Street Women is the impassioned, wild, sometimes tragic, always exhilarating chronicle of five women who dared to enter the male-dominated world of twentieth-century abstract painting -- not as muses but as artists. From their cold-water lofts, where they worked, drank, fought, and loved, these pioneers burst open the door to the art world for themselves and countless others to come. Gutsy and indomitable, Lee Krasner was a hell-raising leader among artists long before she became part of the modern art world's first celebrity couple by marrying Jackson Pollock. Elaine de Kooning, whose brilliant mind and peerless charm made her the emotional center of the New York School, used her work and words to build a bridge between the avant-garde and a public that scorned abstract art as a hoax. Grace Hartigan fearlessly abandoned life as a New Jersey housewife and mother to achieve stardom as one of the boldest painters of her generation. Joan Mitchell, whose notoriously tough exterior shielded a vulnerable artist within, escaped a privileged but emotionally damaging Chicago childhood to translate her fierce vision into magnificent canvases. And Helen Frankenthaler, the beautiful daughter of a prominent New York family, chose the difficult path of the creative life. Her gamble paid off: At twenty-three she created a work so original it launched a new school of painting. These women changed American art and society, tearing up the prevailing social code and replacing it with a doctrine of liberation. In Ninth Street Women, acclaimed author Mary Gabriel tells a remarkable and inspiring story of the power of art and artists in shaping not just postwar America but the future.

    Plastic Man is more than just a putty face--with his bad-boy past, he literally embodies the comic book form: the exuberant energy, flexibility, boyishness, and subtle hints of sexuality. And as cartoonists "become" each character they create, it can be said that Jack Cole himself resembles Plastic Man. Cole revealed the true magnitude and intensity of his imagination and inner thoughts as Plastic Man slithered from panel to panel--shifting forms and dashing from male to female, or freely morphing from a stiff upright figure to a being as soft as a Dali clock. With a compelling history, a V-necked red rubber leotard, a black-and-yellow striped belt, and very cool tinted goggles, Plastic Man is truly a cult classic, and this art-packed book will delight any fan.

    Born to the artist Orazio Gentileschi at the beginning of the 1600s, when artists were the celebrities of the day, Artemisia was apprenticed to her father at an early age, showing such remarkable talent that he viewed her as the most precious thing in his life. But at the age of seventeen Artemisia was raped by her father's best friend and partner. The Gentileschi name was dragged through scandal, for Artemisia refused, even when tortured, to deny it happened. Indeed, she went further: she dared to plead her case in court. All of Rome was riveted by the trial. Artemisia won the case, but lost the love of her father and of all of Rome. Artemisia sought revenge through her art, portraying women liberating their fellow citizens from tyrants. Her stunning works took Rome by storm, overturning the prejudices of her time and winning the admiration of patrons, courtesans, and monarchs. Lapierre brings the historical Artemisia Gentileschi to vivid life, capturing the sights, sounds, and smells of Baroque Italy as well as the life of this remarkable woman.