Book picks similar to
Marie Antoinette by Sofia Coppola


non-fiction
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Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies


Ross King - 2016
    Seeing them in museums around the world, viewers are transported by the power of Monet's brush into a peaceful world of harmonious nature. Monet himself intended them to provide “an asylum of peaceful meditation.” Yet, as Ross King reveals in his magisterial chronicle of both artist and masterpiece, these beautiful canvases belie the intense frustration Monet experienced at the difficulties of capturing the fugitive effects of light, water, and color. They also reflect the terrible personal torments Monet suffered in the last dozen years of his life.Mad Enchantment tells the full story behind the creation of the Water Lilies, as the horrors of World War I came ever closer to Paris and Giverny, and a new generation of younger artists, led by Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso, were challenging the achievements of Impressionism. By early 1914, French newspapers were reporting that Monet, by then 73 and one of the world's wealthiest, most celebrated painters, had retired his brushes. He had lost his beloved wife, Alice, and his eldest son, Jean. His famously acute vision--what Paul Cezanne called "the most prodigious eye in the history of painting"--was threatened by cataracts. And yet, despite ill health, self-doubt, and advancing age, Monet began painting again on a more ambitious scale than ever before. Linking great artistic achievement to the personal and historical dramas unfolding around it, Ross King presents the most intimate and revealing portrait of an iconic figure in world culture--from his lavish lifestyle and tempestuous personality to his close friendship with the fiery war leader Georges Clemenceau, who regarded the Water Lilies as one of the highest expressions of the human spirit.

The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World


Jacques Bosser - 2003
    Often architectural treasures in themselves, they were constructed in styles that befitted the riches they stored, from Neoclassical temples to Baroque palaces to Jeffersonian athaeneums. Both public in purpose and intensely private in feel, they have served the noble role of preserving and disseminating that key cultural artifact of mankind - the book - and in doing so, their role has been central to the nourishment and development of the world's great civilizations. To this day the great libraries of the world remain extraordinary environments for scholarship and enlightenment." "Here, for the first time, architectural photographer Guillaume de Laubier takes the reader on a privileged tour of twenty-three of the world's most historic libraries, representing twelve countries and ranging from the great national monuments to scholarly, religious, and private libraries: the baroque splendor of the Institut de France in Paris; the Renaissance treasure-trove of the Riccardiana Library in Florence; the majestic Royal Monastery in El Escorial, Spain; the hallowed halls of Oxford's Bodleian Library; and the New York Public Library, a Beaux-Arts masterpiece. Also included are the smaller abbey and monastic libraries - often overlooked on tourist itineraries - each containing its own equally important collections of religious and philosophical writings, manuscripts, and church history. Through color photography one can marvel at the grandeur of the great public libraries while relishing the rare glimpses inside scholars-only private archives." The accompanying text by journalist and translator Jacques Bosser traces the history of libraries from the Renaissance to the present day, vividly describing how they came to serve the famous men of letters of centuries past and the general public of the ni

Claude Monet: 1840-1926 (Big Art Series)


Karin Sagner-Düchting - 1990
    Having finally earned the money and gained the respect he sought in his early days as a struggling painter, Monet designed and built the home and gardens in the village on the Seine that would be the site of the famous "Grain Stacks" and "Water Lilies" paintings that would secure his reputation. A good, affordable introductory study of the pioneer of modern art.

Unseen: Unpublished Black History from the New York Times Photo Archives


Dana Canedy - 2017
    None of them were published by The Times--until now. UNSEEN uncovers these never-before published photographs and tells the stories behind them.It all started with Times photo editor Darcy Eveleigh discovering dozens of these photographs. She and three colleagues, Dana Canedy, Damien Cave and Rachel L. Swarns, began exploring the history behind them, and subsequently chronicling them in a series entitled Unpublished Black History, that ran in print and online editions of The Times in February 2016. It garnered 1.7 million views on The Times website and thousands of comments from readers. This book includes those photographs and many more, among them: a 27-year-old Jesse Jackson leading an anti-discrimination rally of in Chicago, Rosa Parks arriving at a Montgomery Courthouse in Alabama a candid behind-the-scenes shot of Aretha Franklin backstage at the Apollo Theater, Ralph Ellison on the streets of his Manhattan neighborhood, the firebombed home of Malcolm X, Myrlie Evans and her children at the funeral of her slain husband , Medgar, a wheelchair-bound Roy Campanella at the razing of Ebbets Field.Were the photos--or the people in them--not deemed newsworthy enough? Did the images not arrive in time for publication? Were they pushed aside by words at an institution long known as the Gray Lady? Eveleigh, Canedy, Cave, and Swarms explore all these questions and more in this one-of-a-kind book. UNSEEN dives deep into The Times photo archives--known as the Morgue--to showcase this extraordinary collection of photographs and the stories behind them.

The Passion of Artemisia


Susan Vreeland - 2001
    From extraordinary highs - patronage by the Medicis, friendship with Galileo and, most importantly of all, beautiful and outstandingly original paintings - to rape by her father's colleague, torture by the Inquisition, life-long struggles for acceptance by the artistic Establishment, and betrayal by the men she loved, Artemisia was a bold and brilliant woman who lived as she wanted, and paid a high price.

Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolution


Michelle Moran - 2011
    but who was this woman who became one of the most famous sculptresses of all time? In these pages, her tumultuous and amazing story comes to life as only Michelle Moran can tell it. The year is 1788, and a revolution is about to begin.Smart and ambitious, Marie Tussaud has learned the secrets of wax sculpting by working alongside her uncle in their celebrated wax museum, the Salon de Cire. From her popular model of the American ambassador, Thomas Jefferson, to her tableau of the royal family at dinner, Marie's museum provides Parisians with the very latest news on fashion, gossip, and even politics. Her customers hail from every walk of life, yet her greatest dream is to attract the attention of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI; their stamp of approval on her work could catapult her and her museum to the fame and riches she desires. After months of anticipation, Marie learns that the royal family is willing to come and see their likenesses. When they finally arrive, the king's sister is so impressed that she requests Marie's presence at Versailles as a royal tutor in wax sculpting. It is a request Marie knows she cannot refuse - even if it means time away from her beloved Salon and her increasingly dear friend, Henri Charles. As Marie gets to know her pupil, Princesse Élisabeth, she also becomes acquainted with the king and queen, who introduce her to the glamorous life at court. From lavish parties with more delicacies than she's ever seen to rooms filled with candles lit only once before being discarded, Marie steps into a world entirely different from her home on the Boulevard du Temple, where people are selling their teeth in order to put food on the table. Meanwhile, many resent the vast separation between rich and poor. In salons and cafés across Paris, people like Camille Desmoulins, Jean-Paul Marat, and Maximilien Robespierre are lashing out against the monarchy. Soon, there's whispered talk of revolution... Will Marie be able to hold on to both the love of her life and her friendship with the royal family as France approaches civil war? And more important, will she be able to fulfill the demands of powerful revolutionaries who ask that she make the death masks of beheaded aristocrats, some of whom she knows? Spanning five years, from the budding revolution to the Reign of Terror, Madame Tussaud brings us into the world of an incredible heroine whose talent for wax modeling saved her life and preserved the faces of a vanished kingdom

The Art of the Hunchback of Notre Dame


Stephen Rebello - 1996
    The stunning art and evocative text of The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame take the reader on a fascinating journey through the making of the movie, the world of medieval France, the nineteenth-century Gothic literature that embraced that world, and the imaginations of the creative artists who have masterfully combined these challenging elements into a magnificent animated musical. The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame features the rarely seen spectrum of art created in the making of the film, as the story is imagined and re-imagined in a variety of media - from conceptual paintings, to story sketches and layout, drawings, through the many stages of animation and background painting, computer generated imagery, effects animation, and final art from the production. The range of artwork is both vital and luminous, capturing the beauty and splendor of this stunning realization of fifteenth-century Paris. The lively, informative text features background on the original Hugo novel, as well as the historical influences, inspirations, and ideas the creators of the film brought to the animation, story, and music.

Peter Lindbergh. a Different Vision on Fashion Photography


Peter Lindbergh - 2016
    The image didn t just bring revered faces together for the first time; it marked the beginning of a new fashion era and a new understanding of female beauty. Coinciding with his major retrospective at the Kunsthal in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, this book gathers more than 400 images from four decades of Lindbergh s photography to celebrate his unique and game-changing storytelling and the new romantic and narrative vision it brought to art and fashion. Whether in striking single portraits or dramatic situations of figure and setting, we trace the photographer s cinematic inflections and his provocative play with female archetypes as subjects adopt the guise of dancers, actresses, heroines, and femmes fatales. Raw and seductive at once, we see how Lindbergh s trademark monochrome pictures also redefined standards of beauty by emphasizing spirit and personality as much as looks, celebrating the elegance and sensuality of older women, and privileging natural and authentic beauty in an era of pervasive retouching. In a testimony to Lindbergh s illustrious status in the fashion world, his images are contextualized by commentaries from collaborators such as Jean Paul Gaultier, Nicole Kidman, Grace Coddington, Cindy Crawford, and Anna Wintour, who chose Lindbergh to shoot her first US Vogue cover. Their tributes explain what makes Lindbergh s images so unique and powerful. Exhibition Peter Lindbergh. A Different History of Fashion at Kunsthal, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, September 10, 2016 February 12, 2017Text in English, French, and German"

To Infinity and Beyond!: The Story of Pixar Animation Studios


Karen Paik - 2007
    Their goal: create a computer animated feature, despite predictions that it could never be done. An unprecedented catalog of blockbuster films later, the studio is honoring its history in this deluxe volume. From its fledgling days under George Lucas to ten demanding years creating Toy Story to the merger with Disney, each milestone is vibrantly detailed. Interviews with Pixar directors, producers, animators, voice talent, and industry insiders, as well as concept art, storyboards, and snapshots illuminate a history that is both definitive and enthralling.

Life Moves Pretty Fast: The Lessons We Learned From Eighties Movies (And Why We Don't Learn Them From Movies Any More)


Hadley Freeman - 2015
    Comedy in Three Men and a Baby, Hannah and Her Sisters, Ghostbusters, and Back to the Future; all a teenager needs to know in Pretty in Pink, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Say Anything, The Breakfast Club, and Mystic Pizza; the ultimate in action from Top Gun, Die Hard, Beverly Hills Cop, and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom; love and sex in 9 1/2 Weeks, Splash, About Last Night, The Big Chill, and Bull Durham; and family fun in The Little Mermaid, ET, Big, Parenthood, and Lean On Me.In Life Moves Pretty Fast, Hadley puts her obsessive movie geekery to good use, detailing the decade’s key players, genres, and tropes. She looks back on a cinematic world in which bankers are invariably evil, where children are always wiser than adults, where science is embraced with an intense enthusiasm, and the future viewed with giddy excitement. And, she considers how the changes between movies then and movies today say so much about society’s changing expectations of women, young people, and art—and explains why Pretty in Pink should be put on school syllabuses immediately.From how John Hughes discovered Molly Ringwald, to how the friendship between Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi influenced the evolution of comedy, and how Eddie Murphy made America believe that race can be transcended, this is a “highly personal, witty love letter to eighties movies, but also an intellectually vigorous, well-researched take on the changing times of the film industry” (The Guardian).

Waiting for Robert Capa


Susana Fortes - 2009
    During the Spanish Civil War, Capa and Taro risked everything documenting Francisco Franco’s Fascist uprising—even as they risked everything for love. The two artists’ passion stands out in sharp relief against the terrifying realities of war in this internationally acclaimed novel, a book that will resonate with fans of Possession, Loving Frank, Suite Francaise, and Pan’s Labyrinth. With a film adaptation already underway from producer Michael Mann (Public Enemies, The Insider, Manhunter, Collateral), Fortes’ Waiting for Robert Capa is a tale that will touch millions of hearts, mixing the poignancy of a timeless love story with the immediacy of a vivid snapshot from a bygone era.

Me: Stories of My Life


Katharine Hepburn - 1991
    Now Miss Hepburn breaks her long-kept silence about her private life in this absorbing and provocative memoir.A NEW YORK TIMES Notable Book of the YearA Book-of-the-Month-Club Main Selection

Vogue and The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute: Parties, Exhibitions, People


Hamish Bowles - 2014
    With subjects that both reflect the zeitgeist and contribute to its creation, each exhibi­tion—from 2005’s Chanel, to 2011’s Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty and 2013’s Punk—creates a provocative and engaging narrative attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors. The show’s opening-night gala, produced in collaboration with Vogue magazine and attended by the likes of Beyoncé, George Clooney, and Hillary Clinton, is regularly referred to as the Party of the Year.Covering the Costume Institute’s history and highlighting exhibitions of the 21st century curated by Harold Koda and Andrew Bolton, this book offers insider access of the first order. Anchored by photo­graphs from the exhibitions themselves in tandem with the Vogue fashion shoots they inspired, it also includes images of exhibited objects and party photos from the galas. Drawn from the extensive Vogue archives, the featured stories showcase the photographs of icons such as Annie Leibovitz, Mario Testino, Steven Meisel, and Craig McDean; the vision of legendary Vogue editors like Grace Coddington and Tonne Goodman; and the knowledge and wit of writers such as Hamish Bowles and Jonathan Van Meter.

Core Memory: A Visual Survey of Vintage Computers


John Alderman - 2007
    Vivid photos capture these historically important machinesincluding the Eniac, Crays 13, Apple I and IIwhile authoritative text profiles each, telling the stories of their innovations and peculiarities. Thirty-five machines are profiled in over 100 extraordinary color photographs, making Core Memory a surprising addition to the library of photography collectors and the ultimate geek-chic gift.

My Week With Marilyn


Colin Clark - 2000
    The film united Britain's leading actor, Laurence Olivier, with Hollywood's most glamorous sex symbol, Marilyn Monroe - and clashes between them entered film legend.For one glorious week, the world's biggest star sought comfort in the arms of the set's most junior employee. This is the frank, fresh and comic story of how Clark came to share Monroe's confidences - and her bed!This edition combines Colin Clark’s acclaimed 'The Prince, the Showgirl and Me' (191995) and his 'My Week with Marilyn' (2005).'More illuminating than the millions of words and pictures pumped out to expose or dish the dirt on the Monroe legend.' - Sunday TelegraphClark’s extraordinary experiences on and off set have now been turned into a major film starring Michelle Williams, Eddie Redmayne, Judi Dench, Emma Watson, Kenneth Branagh and Dominic Cooper.