Art & Photography Books

Book SynopsisThe first major publication on Ruth Maclennan's work, this book profiles the artist's videos and photographs, shot in Kazakhstan, which chart a territory somewhere between fiction and documentary. The book features an essay by Lucy Reynolds and an interview between the artist and Owen Hatherley, as well as an introduction by Steven Bode. It also contains transcripts of Maclennan's film works Anarcadia (2010) and Capital (2007), highlighting the importance of writing in her practice. These texts are complemented and enriched by a wealth of visual material, including archival images, location photos and video stills.

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Book SynopsisSimon Martin's artistic practice deftly illuminates the unsung histories of familiar objects, the unspoken dynamics of artistic canons and institutional spaces, and the unseen connections between the disparate products of different eras, or indeed our own. These longstanding preoccupations have resulted in a correspondingly crafted and eclectic body of work which encompasses various forms, and which is punctuated by regular and significant film pieces, including the trilogy Carlton (2006), Louis Ghost Chair (2012) and Ur Feeling (2014). Featuring essays by critics Dan Fox and Melissa Gronlund, and art historian Neil Mulholland, the publication focuses on these film works, while ranging across the wider backdrop of Martin's ideas and concerns. Designed by Fraser Muggeridge Studio, the book is a desirable object in its own right, as well as an indispensible primer to this compelling and intriguing artist's work.Edited by Steven Bode and Elena Hill, and with thanks to Patrick Langley.Published by Film and Video Umbrella and Elena Hill.Copyright 2015 Film and Video Umbrella, Elena Hill, the artists and the authors.

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Book SynopsisThis publication accompanies the Jerwood/FVU Awards 2016, for which emerging artists Karen Kramer and Alice May Williams were commissioned to create major new works. The artists' works respond in different ways to the theme of Borrowed Time', with its allusion to escalating levels of personal and national debt and a wider feeling of economic unease or ecological threat caused by our exploitation of natural resources and the impact it has on the environment.With dedicated texts by Steven Bode and an essay by Laurence Scott, the publication probes these ideas and explores the ways in which the theme resonates with the new works by Kramer and Williams.The Jerwood/FVU Awards are a collaboration between Jerwood Charitable Foundation and FVU in association with CCA, Glasgow and University of East London.

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Book SynopsisMaking New Worlds: Li Yuan-chia & Friends is the first book to document the extraordinary activity at the LYC Museum & Art Gallery in Banks, Cumbria between 1972 and 1983. The LYC was the singleminded effort of the artist Li Yuan-chia, who moved to the rural North of England by way of London, Bologna, Taipei and Guangxi, China. At the LYC, Li organised exhibitions, published books, exhibited archealogical artefacts, arranged workshops and welcomed an array of visitors from local and international artists and art workers to nearby residents and travellers, many of whom became friends. In this book, which accompanies an exhibition of the same name at Kettle's Yard, the curators Hammad Nasar, Amy Tobin and Sarah Victoria Turner, establish Li's work at the LYC as a form of worldmaking, connecting his cosmic conceptual art practice, to his interest in participation and friendship as well as his engagement with nature and the landscape. Nasar, Tobin and Turner's account is accompanied by nine short texts – by Elizabeth Fisher, Ysanne Holt, Annie Jael Kwan, Lesley Ma, Gustavo Grandal Montero, Luke Roberts, Nick Sawyer & Harriet Aspin, Nicola Simpson and Diana Yeh – that trace the diverse threads and ramifications of Li's practice historically and in the present. Richly illustrated, Making New Worlds offers a provocative new way of thinking the history of British art in the 20th century. Table of ContentsMaking New Worlds: Li Yuan-chia & Friends Written by Hammad Nasar, Sarah Victoria Turner and Amy Tobin Nine short texts by: Elizabeth Fisher Ysanne Holt Annie Jael Kwan Lesley Ma Gustavo Grandal Montero Luke Roberts Nick Sawyer & Harriet Aspin Nicola Simpson Diana Yeh Afterword by the Director of Kettle's Yard

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Book SynopsisReactor 4 at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station, three kilometres from Pripyat in the then Soviet Republic of Ukraine, was beset by a series of explosions. This book explores the disaster's continued impact from local struggles to global implications through word and image.

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Book SynopsisShowcasing IWM's extensive collection, this book includes works from the major artists of the time such as John and Paul Nash, Orpen, Spencer and Singer Sargent as well as other artists who are less familiar to us today. With an introductory essay by the late Roger Tolson, former Head of Art at Imperial War Museums, this book offers an insight into the huge range and power of wartime art during the First World War.

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Book Synopsis'If we want to achieve a different society where the principle of money operates equitably, if we want to abolish the power money has developed over people historically, and position money in relationship to freedom, equality and fraternity ...then we must elaborate a concept of culture and a concept of art where every person must be an artist...' - Joseph Beuys. The world of finance exerts a huge influence over our lives, being responsible for economic turmoil and seemingly interminable peaks and crashes. Whereas money was once a simple means of exchange, today it is a commodity in itself and as 'capital' exerts power over individuals, degrading work to tradable labour. Can we find a new way of understanding money today, so that we can begin to overcome its destructive aspects? In November 1984, a remarkable discussion took place at the Meeting House in Ulm, Germany. It featured the radical artist Joseph Beuys, two professors (of Financial Sciences and Political Economics) and a banker. Beuys would appear to be out of place among these heavyweight academics, professionals and authors. But rather than being intimidated by his fellow panellists, Beuys - also a social and political activist - demonstrates his groundbreaking thinking on the subject, and his ability to bring fresh perspectives. Here for the first time is a transcript of this debate, together with analysis by Ulrich Rosch, which will be of equal interest to artists, economists and spiritual seekers.Table of ContentsForeword 'What is Money' A report of a debate held on 29 November 1984 at the Meeting House in Ulm, Germany between Joseph Beuys, Johann Philipp von Bethmann, Hans Binswanger, Werner Ehrlicher and Rainer Willert Introducing the participants Appendix One can only understand what Joseph Beuys says by having already understood him: an overview of Joseph Beuys's concepts of money and capital by Ulrich Rosch

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Book SynopsisWorking from surviving garments and contemporary tailoring books and patterns, Anne Tyrrell has put together a pattern book of key 20th-century costumes with fascinating historical details on dress. A decade for each chapter, the book features garments such as war uniforms, a 1930s evening gown, a Teddy Boy outfit, a 1960s maxi coat and many more. Wonderful illustrations of period dress are accompanied by information on notable features, underwear and accessories for each period. Scale patterns follow for each outfit shown, complete with detailed notes on making up, using techniques appropriate to the period. A grid for enlargement of the pattern pieces is provided together with full instructions. This is an essential book for any dressmaker interested in recreating period dress, especially film and theatre costume-makers, but also fashion designers looking for inspiration in authentic historical dress of the recent past.Trade ReviewPacked with historical and vintage patterns from 1900-1970, this is a practical and inspiring pattern book, providing an essential reference for film and theatre costume-makers, fashion designers or anyone interested in recreating classic vintage fashions. Sew Today Magazine.

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Book SynopsisRecycling is one of the hottest new trends in embroidery, and this is the first book to cover it. Embroiderers recycle for many different reasons: to conserve old pieces of ephemera for the future, to give their work a personal touch, to convey meaning, or simply for economy. Covering both hand and machine embroidery, this book is packed with ideas for using many different types of salvaged material, such as fabric, paper, nature's materials including dried flowers and tree bark, plus plastic, wood and metal waste, and precious personal objects such as broken jewellery or special souvenirs. Illustrated in colour throughout with work from the world's leading contemporary embroiderers, the book covers : Introduction: Why recycle? • How to collect salvaged objects • Finding your own meaning • Fibre waste • Fabric waste • Recycling old embroidery • Paper and natural waste • Plastic waste • Wood, metal and mineral waste • Recycling packaging and booksTable of ContentsIntroduction: Why recycle? • How to collect salvaged objects • Finding your own meaning • Fibre waste • Fabric waste • Recycling old embroidery • Paper and natural waste • Plastic waste • Wood, metal and mineral waste • Recycling packaging and books

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Book SynopsisAsk the Dust is an epic journey through ruins from the genteel parlours of long dead haute bourgeoisie families to the sparse industrial beauty of mid-century factories as they quietly rust away. Like a vivid daydream, you find yourself absorbed in wordless reveries from page to page. Ask the Dust is a feast of urban ruin photography, executed in gorgeous full colour, full page spreads framed by the overview of the young French adventurer behind the camera. Featuring a potent blend of haunting images of never before seen locations and new angles on classic subjects - Ask the Dust is a visual treat for anyone who cannot keep their eyes away from the elegant corruption of decomposing buildings. Romain Veillon, light hunter, adventurer, urban explorer - goes out to discover the things that progress has left behind and bring them back to the rest of us in his hauntingly beautiful images. The edge of the world is now found in the crumbling edifices left behind by the endless expansion of the built environment. Into these weird castles he brings his big light, to reanimate, for the space of a hot-triggered-slave-flash-fire, a fragment of a sunken reality.This collection of images is as disturbing and hypnotic as any requiem should be - and it offers an exquisite moment of escape from a culture increasingly experienced as a lifetime of frenetic activity divorced from any chance for reflection. Discover: Epecuen: The town that drowned. Ghostly images from the real life Atlantis that was under water for over 25 years. Kolmanskop: The abandoned diamond ghost town that was swallowed by sand. Urban Exploration: A spectacular and captivating photographic record of European abandonment. Evocative imagery and thought provoking commentary combine to powerful effect."

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Book SynopsisBanksyisms. The Wit, Wisdom and Inspiration of An Art Outlaw is an in-depth look at his inspirational and witty commentary, complemented by images of his most iconic work. Featuring observations and insight, vibrantly illustrated with photography it also includes a timeline spanning his full career to date.From self-help to help-yourself all the way to just plain old, help! If you?ve been crying yourself to sleep over your failings as a rat athlete in the rat olympics of late-capitalist life then take comfort. This book is for you.Features his very latest work and includes: Nottingham Hula Hoop Girl, Bristol Valentines? Day, Turf War Exhibition, Girl With Balloon, Birmingham Reindeer Bench, London Extinction Rebellion, Calais Steve Jobs, Devolved Parliament, New York You Loot We Shoot. Spanning Gaza, London, Bristol, New York, LA and Paris among many many more.

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Book SynopsisPublished to accompany the first major exhibition of John Byrne's work for over 20 years, the book provides an overview of Byrne''s eclectic career, and showcases his work as an artist, writer, playwright, screen writer and set and costume designer.

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Book SynopsisThe geology of the Thames Valley provides little good building stone, so the towns are made very largely of local brick. Reading is particularly rewarding for the brick-fancier, thanks to the variety of colours available and the inventive patterns that Victorian bricklayers loved to make. Illustrated throughout with photographs of surviving examples, Bricks and Brickwork in Reading gets back to basics with bonding, tells the 100-year story of a successful Victorian brick maker, pays homage to Alfred Waterhouse and revels in the delights of air bricks and crinkle-crankle walls. A walking tour gives the reader the opportunity to see the more notable examples of Reading's brickwork for themselves.

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Book Synopsis"Hallum's painting is charged with delight in colour, line, surface and composition, in powerfully unconventional ways." - Hettie JudahThis is the first monograph on the London-born, Devon-based artist Jacqui Hallum. The publication documents Hallum's solo exhibition at The Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool (10 October 2019 - 1 March 2020), along with a series of solo, two-person and group exhibitions held between 2014 and 2020.Hallum is best-known for her mixed-media paintings on textiles - techniques she has developed and refined over the course of twenty years since completing her studies. Incorporating imagery and visual languages ranging from medieval woodcuts and stained-glass windows to Art Nouveau children's illustrations, tarot cards and Berber rugs, Hallum employs ink staining, painting, drawing and printing to create layers of pattern, abstraction and passages of figurative imagery. As part of her working process, Hallum often leaves the fabrics in the open air, exposed to the elements, in order to introduce weathering into the works. History, religion, mysticism and the beliefs and creativity of past civilisations are among the themes that overlap - often in a literal sense of pieces of fabrics layered, pinned, draped and hung together - to form painterly palimpsests that carry a sense of the past with them into the present.Along with a foreword by Professor Caroline Wilkinson, Director of the School of Art and Design at Liverpool John Moores University, and an introductory essay by artist, curator and director of Kingsgate Workshops and Project Space in London, Dan Howard-Birt, the publication features newly commissioned essays by arts journalist and critic Hettie Judah and by Andrew Hunt, Professor of Fine Art and Curating at the University of Manchester. Also featured is the edited transcript of a conversation between Hallum and Howard-Birt held at The Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.Jacqui Hallum (b.1977, London) graduated with a BA in Fine Art from Coventry School of Art& Design, Coventry University, in 1999, and an MFA in Painting from the Slade School of Fine Art, University of London, in 2002. Hallum’s solo exhibition at The Walker Art Gallery followed a three-month fellowship at Liverpool John Moores University, which resulted from winning the prestigious John Moores Painting Prize in 2018.The monograph, designed by work-form and edited by Susan Taylor, has been produced by Kingsgate Project Space and co-published with Anomie Publishing.

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Book SynopsisZygotes and Confessions is a publication devoted to the work of London-based artist Nick Hornby, and has been produced to accompany his first solo exhibition in a public gallery. The exhibition, which shares its title with the publication, is presented at MOSTYN, Wales, UK, from November 2020 to April 2021.Hornby is known for his monumental site-specific works that combine digital software with traditional materials such as bronze, steel, granite and marble. In this publication he presents a substantial new body of smaller, more intimate work comprising three discrete yet interrelated series of works inspired by the history of sculptural busts, modernist abstractions and mantelpiece ceramic dogs. United by glossy photographic surfaces created by means of an industrial process in which his marble and resin composite sculptures are dipped into liquid photographs, these new works explore themes of portraiture, the body, identity, sexuality and intimacy in the digital era. A number of the works have been made in collaboration with fashion photographer Louie Banks.Along with a foreword by Helen Boyd, Head of Marketing and Publisher Relations at the Casemate Group, the publication features a text by MOSTYN director Alfredo Cramerotti and an essay by London-based publisher, editor and writer Matt Price. Price writes: "With one eye on the sculpture of the past and the other on that of tomorrow, technology is at the heart of London-based Nick Hornby’s practice and is central to the production of his often imposing, mind-bending and futuristic-looking sculptures. Using materials such as bronze and marble, his work points back towards the Renaissance or the nineteenth century, yet his use of resin and digital technology positions him very much in the present, exploring languages both figurative and abstract, often simultaneously."The texts are presented in both English and Welsh. Newly commissioned studio photography of the works by Ben Westoby, along with installation views of the exhibition commissioned by MOSTYN from Mark Blower, illustrate the publication, which has been designed by Joe Gilmore / Qubik. The publication is co-published by MOSTYN, Wales, UK, and Anomie Publishing, London, and distributed internationally by Casemate Art, a division of the Casemate Group.Nick Hornby (b.1980) is a British artist living and working in London. Hornby studied at the Slade School of Art and Chelsea College of Art. His work has been exhibited at Tate Britain, Southbank Centre London, Leighton House London, CASS Sculpture Foundation, Glyndebourne, Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, Museum of Arts and Design New York, and Poznan Biennale, Poland. Residencies include Outset (Israel) and Eyebeam (USA), and awards include the UAL Sculpture Prize. His work has been reviewed in the New York Times, frieze, Artforum, The Art Newspaper, The FT, and featured in Architectural Digest and Sculpture Magazine.

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Book SynopsisThis, London-based painter Sarah Medway’s second publication from Anomie Publishing, is devoted to the subject of the River Thames. The publication presents a series of twenty-eight oil paintings created in Medway’s canal-side studio in central London during the Covid-19 lockdowns of 2020-21.The Thames is beautiful, terrifying, powerful, alluring and dangerous. Medway captures the river’s eclectic dynamics, rhythms and energy through the language of abstract painting, the ripples, bubbles, eddies and currents, the reflections and refractions denoted through sinuous lines, ellipses and spots, dots and loops, flecks and swirls. Referencing 20th-century modernist movements such as De Stijl, Tachisme and post-war American Abstract Expressionism, Medway’s own, lyrical, often graphic approach to painting the Thames results in a vivid interplay between pattern and colour. The paintings have overt musical resonances – tempo, rhythm and dynamics as might be encountered in an orchestral score. Like the river, the paintings are at times joyous and playful, at other times brooding and menacing, yet always moving, in flux, traveling onwards towards the sea.An introductory text by critic and writer Sue Hubbard takes readers through the series, exploring how the paintings engage with the qualities and complexities of the river. An in-person conversation between Medway and writer, editor and curator Anna McNay provides insight into the artist’s life and work, discussing the processes by which Medway makes her paintings and the thinking behind them. Designed and produced by Peter B. Willberg, this foil-blocked, cloth-bound hardback publication with a special dustjacket also features an illustrated chronology documenting Medway’s life and career.Sarah Medway (b.1955, Seaton Carew, UK) is a painter based in London. As well as group exhibitions at institutions such as Tate Britain, the Whitechapel, the Royal Academy, the World Trade Center and Austin Museum of Art, Medway’s solo shows include Flowers East, London, Chelsea Hotel, New York, Kienbaum Gallery, Frankfurt, The Mandalai, Thailand, and Atelier Gallery, Spain. She has works in many public, private and corporate collections in the UK, US, Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Hong Kong and Thailand.

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Book SynopsisVolume 3 of The Anomie Review of Contemporary British Painting surveys solo exhibitions that define recent contemporary painting.

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Book SynopsisA publication documenting Scottish artist Callum Innes's Tondos round paintings that continue a long tradition in art history and extend the acclaimed artist's explorations into abstraction, colour, line, shape and form. This richly illustrated publication features an introduction by Jeffrey Grove and an essay by art historian Éric de Chassey.

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Book SynopsisLarry Towell first encountered the Mennonites near his home in Ontario, Canada, and his friendship with them gained him unique access to their communities. Rather than compromise their way of life, Mennonites have continually been forced to migrate around the world to maintain their freedom to live as they choose. Towell photographed Mennonites in Canada and Mexico for over ten years, and his own texts tell in detail his experiences with their communities: the harshness and poverty of their rural existence, the disciplines and contradictions of their religion, their hunger for land and work, and the constant struggle to keep the modern world at bay. This second edition, reedited and re-sequenced includes forty new images from the photographer’s archive.

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Book SynopsisA visually stunning introduction to the world of European bronze sculptures, seen through the remarkable collections of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.This book looks at bronze through the remarkable collections of European bronze sculptures in the Ashmolean Museum of the University of Oxford. Largely thanks to the generosity of Charles Drury Edward Fortnum (1820-1899), the Ashmolean houses one of the world’s great collections of Renaissance and Baroque small bronzes. The book provides a survey of the collection and an overview of the development of small bronze sculpture during a period of six centuries running from c.1200 to around 1800, although most of the works illustrated here were made within the shorter time frame of c.1450-1650. Any such survey is inevitably shaped by the strengths of the collection, which is conditioned by Fortnum’s taste, notwithstanding later acquisitions that have broadened its scope. He especially loved earlier Italian bronzes and so-called utensils — objects such as inkstands, candlesticks, salt-cellars, mirrors and seals — that are functional as well as beautiful. Fortnum was less interested in sculpture from the later 1500s onwards although, as this selection shows, he acquired some very interesting bronzes from the 17th and 18th centuries that deserve to be better known.

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Book SynopsisIn terms of antiquarian fame, the Farnese Sarcophagus – elaborately carved with satyrs and maenads gathering grapes – may be the most important work of art in the Gardner collection, and perhaps of its type in America. A large, rectangular coffin of Pentelic marble, the Farnese Sarcophagus was exported from Athens to the area of Rome in the late Severan period, between c. 222 and 235 AD. The carving of the satyrs and maenads was especially suited to the artistic tastes of Mannerist and Baroque Rome, providing one of the most elegant examples of Greek imperial optic elongation to have survived from ancient times. Life Death& Revelry will offer a multi-disciplinary, multi-era look at this important monument. Published to accompany an exhibition at the Isabella Steward Gardner Museum, Boston, it will bring together archaeological analyses of the piece and its previous restorations, and numerous Renaissance prints and drawings depicting the sarcophagus during its time in Rome.

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Book SynopsisAccompanying an exhibition at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, this publication presents the glass swallow works Perched, created by the artist Felekşan Onar. While drawing on sources from her personal history as well as collective memory, Felekşan Onar’s works in glass deal with notions of identity, constructed narratives, historical relations and impacts of politics on society. In her recent project Perched, her story-telling in glass reflects on the Syrian refugee situation. Triggered by witnessing the helpless refugees strolling around the streets of Istanbul, after being forced to leave their homelands, Perched has been exhibited in the Pergamon Museum, Berlin, the New Jersey Visual Arts Center and the Victoria& Albert Museum, London. The work was interpreted as “a visceral expression of the fact that in spite of differences of religion, culture, and individual histories, what we all want most is to be in the place we call home,” by the art critic Lisa Morrow. A reading of Louis de Berniéres’ novel Birds Without Wings was an inspiration for Onar to create the series. Glass works, inspired by a book, create its own history over time and turn into a book again. This book marks the most comprehensive publication on Perched to date. The result here is a complementary structure addressing the aesthetic and political concepts inherent in Felekşan Onar’s art. Contiguity and fragility are the core of this project and provides the form for this book. Newly commissioned essays initiate sections that engage particular aspects of Onar’s work. Renowned author Louis de Berniéres contributes a short story; Prof. Dr. Stefan Weber, Mariam Rosser-Owen and Stefanie Bach propose a reading of Perched through the exhibitions in the Pergamon Museum, the Victoria& Albert Museum and the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden; and Nadania Idriss questions how is art supposed to foster a culture of peace and muses on being perched. Producing glass art, to use Onar’s own words, “not only expresses my past and present, but also my anxieties and expectations for future. Through glass, I speak, breathe and live.” This is the story of birds standing together in different places with their various colors and holding a vital crisis in their silence, breath and life.

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Book SynopsisBangladesh has been shunned by tourists from the moment it was created in 1971. Henry Kissinger described it as a basketcase. Poverty and humanitarian disasters defined Bangladesh in the ensuing decades. When Rupert Grey arrived in Dhaka in 1992, a sign announced that arrivals were ‘Welcome to Bangladesh before the tourists get here’. They still haven’t. Grey first came to Bangladesh as a London lawyer armed with three FM2 cameras. Many journeys and 30 years later he is a photographer armed with a useful legal background. The catalysts were Chobi Mela, the festival of photography, and its founder Shahidul Alam, an acclaimed photographer, human rights activist and Time magazine’s Person of the Year in 2018. This book charts Grey’s love affair with Bangladesh, including an epic transcontinental journey through India to Chobi Mela in a vintage Rolls-Royce, later portrayed in the award-winning, Sharon Stone produced film Romantic Road. His photographs, mostly taken on film, speak powerfully of the cultural vitality and energy which Kissinger missed, and which inspired Grey’s Homage to Bangladesh. As a libel and copyright lawyer Rupert has represented national papers, politicians, bankers, celebrities and explorers. He serves on the board of a number of front-line charities in the arts, education, photography and marine exploration. He has travelled on foot and horseback, by dug-out canoe, dog sledge, camel, elephant, bush-plane and Land Rover to the wild places of the earth. His photographs have been exhibited in several countries including Bangladesh, and his articles have been widely published. He lives with his wife Jan in a remote thatched cottage in Sussex, England, with their three daughters nearby.Trade Review"an extraordinary book ... about his dazzling photography, revealing how that medium can open our eyes to the reality of a crowded, diverse and profoundly interesting country." Geographical

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Book SynopsisOf all the ceramic processes, Maiolica truly requires a painter’s touch. Combining a confident sensitivity of brushwork and a vision of what might be once the subtle blends of oxides fuse with the tin glaze in the firing, it is both a rewarding and unforgiving art form. A Journey Painted in Clay celebrates the ceramic work of Agalis Manessi through its various forms of expression over a career spanning fifty years. Inspired by many historical and contemporary sources, her work is a fusion of her Mediterranean heritage and annual travels across Europe between Greece and London. Ideas are drawn from the experience of viewing subjects in churches, museums and galleries and observations directly from life. Animated vessels express a gentle humour that is offset by the suggestive poise of their condensed forms, camouflaged within the painted surface. Following in the tradition of English Delft, portrait dishes are softly coiled, with painted images built up of composite features worked up from notebook sketches. Modelled animals and figures take on a more enigmatic nature, communicating a silent yet eloquent poise. With a foreword from Jenni Lomax, curator and former director of Camden Arts Centre, and contributions from Megan Brooks, Tanya Harrod, Mina Holland, Marina Papasotiriou, Michael Petry and Liz Rideal.

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Book SynopsisFaberge: The Twilight Years introduces an incredible album of rare drawings from Carl Faberge's leading workshop in St Petersburg that have come to light in the National Archive of Finland by pure chance. The album, stored unnoticed in the archive for almost a century, contains beautifully watercoloured drawings of objects produced by Faberge during the period 1914 - 1917, among these a whole array of elegant cigarette cases, table clocks and enchanting flower studies. Most of the drawings have a completion date, which means that the finished object exists somewhere. This has sparked a treasure hunt for these pieces. A great number of objects matching the drawings have been found and are illustrated in the book. Altogether eleven well known experts on the oeuvre of Faberge have written fascinating essays related to the drawings, their history, provenance, style and technique. These contributions make the book an important addition to our knowledge and understanding of the art of the great St Petersburg jeweller.

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Book SynopsisNiko Pirosmanashvili comprehensively tells the story of the life and work of elusive Georgian painter Niko Pirosmanashvili (c.1866-1918), popularly known as Pirosmani, during one of the most interesting epochs in the history of Georgia. Key essays, both recollections by those who knew him and contemporary scholarship, explore his life as an impoverished artist living in Tbilisi. Charting his influence on the Georgian and Russian avant-gardists to the Modernists, including Picasso, and the parallels he holds with Henri Rousseau and Vincent Van Gogh, the artist''s wider cultural impact is also examined from Georgian and international perspectives, past and present. Illustrations of his artwork, alongside a wealth of photographs from Georgia from the beginning of the twentieth century, make this a richly visual resource. With a foreword by Orhan Pamuk, this evocative book is the result of a meticulous process of assemblage by two artists dedicated to broadening Pirosmanashvili's legacy an

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Book SynopsisPrince Albert was the first Chairman of the first Royal Fine Art Commission, appointed by Queen Victoria to commission art for the new Houses of Parliament. At the age of just twenty-two, he deftly navigated the complex project, leaving a remarkable artistic legacy and honing the skills that made him one of the Renaissance Men of the nineteenth century. Albert then set the template for a second Royal Fine Art Commission, created in 1924 as a priority of Britain's first ever Labour Government. From the aftermath of the Great War to the eve of the Third Millennium, this Commission gave elite architects and designers from Edwin Lutyens to Henry Moore a platform to apply their minds to a democratic cause, putting in countless hours analysing the design of buildings, street furniture, roadsand bridges.The story of the two Commissions, told together for the first time, is a compelling one of civic duty performed freely in the public interest, against the background of high politics, difficul

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Book Synopsisconcise introduction to the artist's life and work, written by an established expert on British modern art. Includes a biographical overview and shorter chapters explore key aspects of her work in more depth.

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Book SynopsisBalkan Fabrications explores the nature and place of Fra Newbery's move to Balkan subjects in the 1920s. In so doing it simultaneously focuses on the work of his wife, Jessie Newbery, the original head of embroidery at Glasgow, whose interest in Balkan textiles proved an inspiration for her husband's painterly experiments. Through probing the Newberys' interpretations of folk crafts and conventions of southeastern Europe, the book considers what they, and others whose gazes were similarly directed, have to say about notions of womanhood and modernity. Thereby it also reveals the refinement of their respective eyes as it charts their discernment of threads of quotidian beauty.From their home in Corfe Castle, Dorset, the Newberys articulated a visual language that is shown to fit with the early-twentieth-century context of European, not least British, interest in the ways of the Balkan peoples. By highlighting political motivations as well as artistic responses Howard paints a picture of diverse, sometimes conflicting, ideas and values with wide-reaching ramifications. Parallels and alternatives to the Newberys' creative expression of concern for the observed Balkan designs and customs are revealed through a survey of work by other, under-appreciated, artists. While most of these are British and female, e.g. De Courcy Lewthwaite Dewar, Kathleen Mann, Annie Dickinson, Ethel Mairet and Jean Milne, their art is examined alongside that of several from the peninsula (e.g. Ivan Meštrovic, Nadežda Petrovic, Lena Jovicic and Valcho Antonov) who convey counterpart constructions of Balkan identity. Howard's text uncovers the couple's notions of what is art', and, with these, a fresh understanding for the relations between art and life that is as pertinent today as it was in their era.

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Book SynopsisWindtower offers a unique insight into a past way of life, exploring Dubai's rich and storied past and heritage. This new and extended edition celebrates the 50th anniversary of the formation of the United Arab Emirates, diving deeper into the merchant community's central role in Dubai's pre-oil economy and social life. This new edition also considers the lessons to be learned from Dubai's traditional windtowers at a time of global warming and climate crisis, and how this knowledge might benefit contemporary urban design. The title features a foreword from His Highness, Charles, Prince of Wales, who writes: "I do hope this book will enable other people to join in appreciating the unique nature of these buildings and that it will encourage an awareness of how relevant many of their distinctive features are to the modern challenges of building sustainable communities in a way that maximizes the use of renewable energy." With exclusive archival photography, custom maps, as well as original architectural plans and diagrams, Windtower is a must-have book for anyone interested in Dubai's architecture, culture and fascinating historical development.Trade Review''I do hope this book will enable other people to join in appreciating the unique nature of these buildings and that it will encourage an awareness of how relevant many of their distinctive features are to the modern challenges of building sustainable communities in a way that maximises the use of renewable energy.'' HRH Charles, Prince of Wales

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Book SynopsisAn exploration of Yemen's rich culinary heritage. Dive into the origins, developments and transformations of Yemeni culinary traditions as evocative photography and meticulous research portray everyday practices, cooking techniques, and livelihoods against the backdrop of Yemen's unique landscapes, architecture and heartwarming gatherings.

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