Individual artists, art monographs Books

Book SynopsisFrom rural Japan to international icon - Yayoi Kusama has spent her remarkable life immersed in her art. Follow her incredible journey in this vivid graphic biography which details her bold departure from Japan as a young artist, her embrace of the buzzing New York art scene in the 1960s, and her eventual return home and rise to twenty-first-century super-fame.

Read more less

Book SynopsisSarah Lucas is an internationally celebrated artist known for the provocative use of materials and imagery in her work. Incorporating ordinary objects in unexpected ways, she has consistently challenged our understandings of sex, class and gender over the last four decades. Looking beyond the generation of 1990s Young British Artists during which Lucas emerged, this visually stunning exhibition book invites the public to marvel at the diversity of her work across sculpture, installation and photography. Featuring an artist interview with Louisa Buck, new texts by writers Lauren Elkin and Nathalie Olah and a new poem by the artist Cerith Wyn Evans, Happy Gas is a brash, tender and boundary-breaking exploration of what makes us human.

Read more less

Book SynopsisSelf-portraiture then is a way to interrogate not just who I am in terms of my identity and sexuality, but, more importantly, who I can fantasise myself to be.Ajamu X, born in Huddersfield in 1963, is a British photographic artist, curator, archivist and activist. He is best known for his fine art photography which explores same-sex desire, the erotic and sensory, and the Black queer body. As a leading specialist in Black British LGBTQ+ history, heritage and memory, his work as an archivist and activist documents the lives and experiences of Black LGBTQ+ people in the United Kingdom. His work is held in many private and public collections, including Tate, the Rose Art Museum, Autograph, Arts Council of England, and the Victoria & Albert Museum. I think photography privileges the visual, but in the darkroom the other senses kick in: the sonic, the tactility, the smell is important too.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisKeep it like a Secret In 2019, Stefan Marx began his series of monotypes. In collaboration with Berlin-based screen printer Bjorn Wiede, he developed his own working method: Three individual images are created in three steps - one positive, one negative and the ghost. What initially fascinated him about this new approach was the bold application of paint and the intensity of the pigments. During the application of the paint, the surface of the picture itself is not touched - instead the image results from the manipulations on the silkscreen itself. Many of these Monotypes are typefaces - Marx's signature wry sayings and quotations-but there are also figurative motifs, including animal drawings and other symbols from his pictorial inventory. This book follows on from the volume Type Works from 2020. Again, Marx has developed this book as an artists' book, creating a fascinating interleaving between the final works and the design sketches from his notebooks.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe most famous 18th-century copper engraver, Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778) made his name with etchings of ancient Rome. His startling, chiaroscuro images imbued the city’s archaeological ruins with drama and romance and became favorite souvenirs for the Grand Tourists who traveled Italy in pursuit of classical culture and education. Today, Piranesi is renowned not just for shaping the European imagination of Rome, but also for his elaborate series of fanciful prisons, Carceri, which have influenced generations of creatives since, from the Surrealists to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Edgar Allan Poe, Jorge Luis Borges, and Franz Kafka. Loosely based on contemporary stage sets rather than the actual dingy dungeons of Piranesi’s day, these intricate images defy architectural reality to play instead with perspective, lighting, and scale. Staircases exist on two planes simultaneously; vast, vaulted ceilings seem to soar up to the heavens; interior and exterior distinctions collapse. With a low viewpoint and small, fragile figures, the prison scenes become monstrous megacities of incarceration, celebrated to this day as masterworks of existentialist drama.Trade Review“The Eternal City has never looked as poetic as in the hand of Giovanni Battista Piranesi, the greatest printmaker of the 18th century. This new oversize coffee table book unites all his etchings of Rome’s crumbling monuments and fantastical gardens.” * The New York Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn 1953 Marlon Brando donned a black leather Perfecto motorcycle jacket, military cap, denim jeans, and engineer boots to portray Johnny, sneering leader of the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, in The Wild One. In 1954 Tom of Finland abandoned brown leather in his artwork to create his own wild ones: muscular, hyper-masculine, black leather-clad rebels with powerful engines between their legs. The look was adopted by the Satyrs Motorcycle Club, the first gay outlaw club, that same year, making Tom’s fantasy world reality. Of course, being Tom, he soon customized his new gay icons, adding leather jodhpurs, knee high boots and leather caps, and every motorcycle bore the brand name “Tom” on the gas tank. Tom’s bikers first appeared as two “Motorcycle Boys” in Physique Pictorial, Winter 1958. Another made the cover of the April 1960 issue. Bikers dominated his PP content from then on, as a nod to its American readership as much as his growing obsession. When he sought an ongoing character, a personal avatar, in 1968, he created Kake as the ultimate biker leatherman, and elaborated on his riding adventures – of every kind - through 26-panel stories. Tom adopted Kake’s gear as his own, presenting in black leather jacket, white t-shirt, jeans, and high boots to the end of his life. The Little Book of Tom: Bikers includes Tom’s earliest images for Physique Pictorial, Kake in motorcycle gear, biker panel stories, and sizzling single drawings, all packed into 192 pages of sexy, masculine men enjoying other masculine men in black leather, blue jeans, and high black boots. On bikes.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Kisokaidō route through Japan was ordained in the early 1600s by the country’s then-ruler Tokugawa Ieyasu, who decreed that staging posts be installed along the length of the arduous passage between Edo (present-day Tokyo) and Kyoto. Inns, shops, and restaurants were established to provide sustenance and lodging to weary travelers. In 1835, renowned woodblock print artist Keisai Eisen was commissioned to create a series of works to chart the Kisokaidō journey. After producing 24 prints, Eisen was replaced by Utagawa Hiroshige, who completed the series of 70 prints in 1838.Both Eisen and Hiroshige were master print practitioners. In The Sixty-Nine Stations along the Kisokaidō, we find the artists’ distinct styles as much as their shared expertise. From the busy starting post of Nihonbashi to the castle town of Iwamurata, Eisen opts for a more muted palette but excels in figuration, particularly of glamorous women, and relishes snapshots of activity along the route, from shoeing a horse to winnowing rice. Hiroshige demonstrates his mastery of landscape with grandiose and evocative scenes, whether it’s the peaceful banks of the Ota River, the forbidding Wada Pass, or a moonlit ascent between Yawata and Mochizuki.Taken as a whole, The Sixty-Nine Stations collection represents not only a masterpiece of woodblock practice, including bold compositions and an experimental use of color, but also a charming tapestry of 19th-century Japan, long before the specter of industrialization. This TASCHEN volume is sourced from one of the finest surviving first editions and revives the series in our compact anniversary edition.Trade Review“A masterpiece of Japanese woodblock prints, an exquisitely designed illustrated book.” * Kulturzeit *“An incredible ticket to travel.” * L’Express *“Spectacular views, local delicacies, hot spring baths, and other more carnal pursuits.” * The New York Times *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn this fully revised and richly illustrated edition, author and journalist Will Ellsworth-Jones pieces together a complete picture of the life and work of Banksy, perhaps the most iconic, enigmatic and controversial artist of modern times. For someone who shuns the limelight so completely that he conceals his name, never shows his face and gives interviews only by email, Banksy is remarkably famous. This fully updated and illustrated story of Banksy’s life and career builds an intriguing picture of his world and unpicks its contradictions. Whether art or vandalism, anti-establishment or sell-out, Banksy and his work have become a cultural phenomenon and the question ‘Who is Banksy?’ is as much about his career as it is ‘the man behind the wall’. From his beginnings as a Bristol graffiti artist, his artwork is now sold at auction for seven-figure sums and hangs on celebrities’ walTable of ContentsIntroduction 1. The Art of Infiltration 2. Once Upon a Time 3. Graffiti Decoded 4. Finding his own Style 5. Anonymously Happy 6. The Artist and Organiser 7. The Outlaw Returns Home 8. Dismal Delights 9. Holiday Snaps 10. Welcome to Team Banksy 11. Psst… Anyone Want to Buy a Wall 12. The Business of Banksy 13. Biting the Hand that Tempts Him 14. Art without a Theory

Read more less

Book SynopsisRachel Owen’s hauntingly beautiful illustrations for Dante’s Inferno take a radically new approach to representing the world of Dante’s famous poem. The images combine the artist’s deep cultural and historical understanding of 'The Divine Comedy' and its artistic legacy with her unique talent for collage and printmaking. These illustrations, casting the viewer as a first-person pilgrim through the underworld, prompt us to rethink Dante’s poem through their novel perspective and visual language. Owen’s work, held in the Bodleian Library and published here for the first time, illustrates the complete cycle of thirty-four cantos of the Inferno with one image per canto. The illustrations are accompanied by essays contextualising Owen’s work and supplemented by six illustrations intended for the unfinished Purgatorio series. Fiona Whitehouse provides details of the techniques employed by the artist, Peter Hainsworth situates Owen’s work in the field of modern Dante illustration and David Bowe offers a commentary on the illustrations as gateways to Dante’s poem. Jamie McKendrick and Bernard O’Donoghue’s translations of episodes from the 'Inferno' provide complementary artistic interpretations of Dante’s poem, while reflections from colleagues and friends commemorate Owen’s life and work as an artist, scholar and teacher. This stunning collection is an important contribution to both Dante scholarship and illustration.Table of ContentsContents Rachel Owen 1968-2016 In Memory of Rachel Guido Bonsaver The Inferno Illustrations Rachel Owen Remaking the Inferno Fiona Whitehouse An Original Vision Peter Hainsworth Hell, A Pilgrim’s-Eye View David Bowe The Ulysses Canto Jamie McKendrick Fra Alberigo’s Bad Fruit Bernard O’Donoghue Singing the Second Realm: The Beginnings of Purgatorio David Bowe and Fiona Whitehouse The Purgatorio Illustrations Rachel Owen Contributors Notes Further Reading Picture Credits Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisAccompanies a major exhibition in the Ashmolean Museum on the early work of acclaimed German artist Anselm Kiefer. It focuses on his paintings, drawings, photographs and artist books created between 1969 and 1982, in the private collections of the Hall Art Foundation.This book accompanies a major exhibition in the Ashmolean Museum on the early work of internationally acclaimed German artist Anselm Kiefer. It focuses on his paintings, drawings, photographs and artist books created between 1969 and 1982, in the private collections of the Hall Art Foundation. Anselm Kiefer: Early Works is the first institutional show and publication in the UK dedicated to Kiefer’s early practice. The book introduces themes, subjects and styles that have become signature to Kiefer’s work, while providing a more intimate and complementary context for his large-scale installations that he is best known for today. The early works are accompanied by three recent paintings from the artist’s own collections and White Cube, chosen by the artist himself. Art historians, artists, curators and experts of Kiefer’s art from Germany, Austria, Belgium, Britain and the US have contributed 46 original texts on individual works, organized in a chronological structure. An illustrated chronology at the end of the book compiled by Stephanie Biron from the Hall Art Foundation provides an overview of the artist’s early practice and life, to contextualize the works. The book begins with Kiefer’s iconic Occupations and Heroische Sinnbilder series, created in 1969 and 1970, which Kiefer views as his first serious works. Kiefer was among the first generation of German post-war artists to directly confront the country’s troubled past and identity. Full of complex references to German socio-political history but also to culture, literature and his personal life, Kiefer’s early works carry a unique iconography, linking classic ideas of great art with a distinctive understanding of concrete artistic materiality. The landscapes in his watercolors are historically charged; hand-written words on paintings are closely linked with poetry well known to most German viewers; motifs and symbols point at Nazi ideologies and a collective feeling of guilt.

Read more less

Book SynopsisImmerse yourself in the colourful world of Frida Kahlo with this search and find book which details key aspects of her life - from her eccentric teenaged years and infatuation with Diego Rivera, to her dynamic arrival as an international artist, her incredible studio and house in Mexico and her deep love of Mexican culture. With twelve intricately drawn scenes, you can find Frida, among other places, at home with Diego Rivera, among a bustling Day of the Dead scene and at her Paris gallery opening.Find Frida not only features the iconic and flamboyant artist but is populated with a huge cast of over 200 extras for you to spot - including artists, filmmakers, writers and photographers - allowing the book to tell the complete story of Kahlo's life and her huge cultural influence.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe first properly posthumous retrospective, this book highlights the significance of Kelley's influential four-decade career on the development of art since the 1970s.

Read more less

Book SynopsisMary Fedden (1915-2012) is one of Britain's most popular artists. The focus of this acclaimed book, newly available in paperback in celebration of her life's achievement, is the artist's creative process in various different media - oil, gouache, pencil and collage.While Fedden is often considered almost exclusively a still-life painter, still life was far from being her only preoccupation, as this book shows. Fantasy and imagination always also played a strong part, as is particularly evident in her small gouaches. A quietly surreal, enigmatic streak runs through much of her work.Fedden's collages are a witty and affectionate homage to the work of her husband, Julian Trevelyan. They lived, worked and travelled together from 1949 to 1988. The book re-emphasises her debt to him, but also her independence, even during their early life together when he stimulated her move into Modernism. In an engaging text, which draws on numerous conversations with the artist during her final years, Christopher Andreae considers why Fedden has always had such a popular following, looks at the English quality of her work, and talks about the commercialisation of her art and her attitudes to the art market. Fedden is shown to be an original, serious and prolific artist, a draftsman of unusual sensitivity and prowess, and a colourist of power and subtlety.Profusely illustrated with works from private and public collections, this is a book for Mary Fedden's existing devotees as well as newcomers to her work.Trade Review'This book is a delight...' RA MagazineTable of ContentsContents: Thanks and Acknowledgments; Introduction: Mary Fedden: Themes, Variations, and Enigmas; Chapter One: A Gallery of Mary Feddens; Chapter Two: Three Beginnings; Interlude: Poetical; Chapter Three: Fedden vis a vis Other Artists; Chapter Four: Painting and Other Media; Chapter Five: Still Life; Interlude: Flowers and Cats; Chapter Six: Figures - Memory, Imagination, and Fantasy; A Bizarre Interlude; Chapter Seven: Pattern, Composition, Colour; Chapter Eight: Travels; Chapter Nine: Sidelines; Interlude: Familiarity Breeds Contentment; Chapter Ten: Repeats, Replications and Re-explorations; Final Thoughts; Index of Works.

Read more less

Book SynopsisA groundbreaking and essential survey of the art of Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, offering an in-depth discussion of the development of the artist and positioning her work within a wider history of portraiture. Lynette Yiadom-Boakye: Fly In League With The Night celebrates the work of one of the most significant and acclaimed figurative painters of her generation. Fact and fiction fuse in Yiadom-Boakye’s paintings: they appear to be portraits, yet the people she depicts are not real but invented. Created from a composite of found images and her own imagination, her characters seem to exist outside of a specific time or place: they feel at once familiar yet mysterious. This ambiguity resonates again in the enigmatic titles she gives to her artworks. The artist is also a writer of poetry and prose, and for her, the two forms of creativity complement each other: ‘The things I can’t paint, I write, and the things I can’t write, I paint.’ This perceptive and engaging publication provides a comprehensive account of Yiadom-Boakye’s practice over the past two decades. With contributions by the celebrated poet Elizabeth Alexander and curators Andrea Schlieker and Isabella Maidment, alongside new writing by Yiadom-Boakye, Fly In League With The Night reflects the dual aspects of the artist’s career as both a painter and a writer and offers an intimate insight into her creative process.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis magnificent boxed-set features stunning, accordion-fold, color reproductions of Monet's essential works, accompanied by a separate booklet with background and descriptions of each painting. Fans of Impressionism will delight in seeing some of their favorite works presented in generously sized accordion fold pages, which bring Monet's representations of nature to exquisite life. Arranged chronologically, this volume helps readers appreciate the achievements of a long and fruitful career. Natural beauty, color and light were the object of Monet's incessant research, and he never lost sight of what was essential to him - the truth of his sensations. From the faithful transcription of the landscape in his early days to the gestural drawing of the final water lilies at Giverny, this book allows us to follow and understand the evolution of his creativity. The themes of Monet's work (the seashore, the Seine, gardens, the seasons) are discussed, as well as the techniques he used, such as the decomposition of light and color through the brushstroke; the use of repetition and series to better reflect atmospheric variations; and the progressive dissolution of forms, which led to him being considered the precursor of abstraction. Packaged in an elegant slipcase, this volume reflects the beautiful artistry and timeless traditions that are embodied in the artworks themselves.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe most wide-ranging and up-to-date volume available on the enigmatic and controversial graffiti artist, this deeply researched and highly personal tribute explores how Banksy continues to defy accepted wisdom about artistic success, growing only more famous and powerful even as he sticks to his anti-establishment platform and to his mission to give a voice to the voiceless. Accompanied by stunning full-page, full-color reproductions and photographs of works in situ—including many that have been lost to time­–photographer and street art expert Alessandra Mattanza’s impassioned and informed text follows Banksy’s career trajectory from creator of message-laden stencils on London’s city walls to a sought-after champion of human and environmental rights. She investigates many of the key images that populate Banksy’s work—animals, children, historic figures, balloons, cartoon characters, police officers, and others. She shows how Banksy’s oeuvre has expanded beyond graffiti and stenciling and how his art has helped support his activism in a variety of causes—from calls for peace in the Middle East to the preservation of the natural environment. Best of all she helps readers make sense of the rather unusual path Banksy has chosen—an artist who uses his global platform to raise awareness about the underserved, rather than to his own celebrity. Readers will come away with a new understanding of how Banksy helped transform an illegal act of criminal damage into a high art form, and how, by ridiculing institutionalized art, he has achieved enormous fame within those very institutions.

Read more less

Book SynopsisWith a career spanning seven decades, Catalan-born Joan Miró (1893–1983) was a polymath giant of modern art, producing masterworks across painting, sculpture, art books, tapestry, and ceramics, and embracing ideologies as varied as Fauvism, Surrealism, Dada, Magic Realism, Cubism, and abstraction. Over the course of his prodigious output, Miró evolved constantly, seeking to eschew categorization and the approval of “bourgeois” art critics as much as he pursued his own dreamlike worlds. Emerging into the public spotlight in the early 1920s, he first experimented with Fauvism and Cubism before developing a distinctive style of symbols and pictograms, arranged in elusive visual narratives, with frequent reference to Catalan life. As his career progressed, Miró moved towards Surrealism, and, despite never fully identifying with the movement, emerged as one of its most celebrated practitioners with techniques including automated drawing, Lyrical Abstraction, and Color Field painting. In later years, he diversified his media further, working with ceramics, textiles, and even proposing sculptures made of gas. Through his vivid colors, dreamlike fantasies, and enigmatic symbols, this book brings together the numerous strands of Miró’s kaleidoscopic oeuvre to introduce his fascinating career, its interaction with major modernist movements, and how it made him into a modernist legend.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe life and times of Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1526/30–1569) were marked by stark cultural conflict. He witnessed religious wars, the Duke of Alba’s brutal rule as governor of the Netherlands, and the palpable effects of the Inquisition. To this day, the Flemish artist remains shrouded in mystery. We know neither where nor exactly when he was born. But while early scholarship emphasized the vernacular character of his painting and graphic work, modern research has attached greater importance to its humanistic content. Starting out as a print designer for publisher Hieronymus Cock, Bruegel produced numerous print series that were distributed throughout Europe. These depicted vices and virtues alongside jolly peasant festivals and sweeping landscape panoramas. He would eventually increasingly turn to painting, working for the cultural elite of Antwerp and Brussels. This monograph is a testament to Bruegel’s evolution as an artist, one who bravely confronted the issues of his day all the while proposing new inventions and solutions. Rather than idealizing reality, he addressed the horrors of religious warfare and took a critical stand against the institution of the Church. To this end, he developed his own pictorial language of dissidence, lacing innocuous everyday scenes with subliminal statements in order to escape repercussions. This collection captures all the breadth and splendid detail of Bruegel’s oeuvre like never before, and gathers all 40 paintings, 65 drawings, and 89 engravings in pristine reproductions—each piece a unique witness to both the religious mores and the close-knit folk culture of Bruegel’s time.Trade Review“Packed with superlative reproductions.” * The Times *“One of the most imaginative, original and captivating artists in history.” * The Guardian *“Like Shakespeare, Bruegel can capture the theatre of life in scenes that are comic yet full of acute psychological portraits.” * The Guardian *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis first real biography reveals the deliberate artist behind the image of the secretive nanny and claims a space for Maier as one of the great photographers of our time.Trade Review"Patiently and lucidly detailed by Pamela Bannos in her nearly forensic biography--which unties many knots and brings order to what was previously a chaotic welter of information and misinformation."--Luc Sante "Bookforum " "This is an excellent book that reads like a mystery novel tracing Vivian Maier's life and work as a photographer through the photographs themselves. Bannos uses historical research and interviews as well as Maier's photographs to string together a story of her whereabouts, interests, and evolution as a photographer. Wonderful and engrossing."--Elizabeth Currid-Halkett, author of Starstruck: The Business of Celebrity "Authoritative. . . . Fascinating, thorough. . . . Up to now, Maier's story has been told mostly by Maloof and two other collectors who owned much of the prints, negatives, undeveloped film and personal effects she left behind without a will or instructions as to their disposal. Unlike those collectors, Bannos has no significant financial stake in the Maier myth. Also unlike them, she is a photographer herself and a woman, and thus more naturally able to put herself in Maier's shoes." --Dmitry Samarov "New City " "The Vivian Maier who emerges from the pages of this meticulously researched book is ultimately more mysterious and important a figure than the initial, and mostly inaccurate, accounts of her life and photography portrayed. The interweaving of Maier's story and photography's technical and cultural history contextualizes her achievements and shows a reality that is much more compelling than prior characterizations of Maier as a na�ve 'nanny-photographer.' Surprisingly, Bannos' unsentimental yet powerful examination reveals a woman who was solidly in charge of her own creativity." --Lynne Warren, editor of the Encyclopedia of Twentieth-Century Photography "Vivian Maier: A Photographer's Life and Afterlife strives to correct and complicate what is known about the life and work of Vivian Maier. The intertwined stories of Maier's unconventional life and the travails of those who have 'discovered' her work make for a fascinating read. Bannos clarifies misconceptions that have proliferated around Maier's story and offers an equally interesting look at the growth of the Maier phenomenon." --Elizabeth Fraterrigo, author of Playboy and the Making of the Good Life in Modern America "Stories--like snapshots--are shaped by people, and for particular purposes. There's always an angle. A new biography, Vivian Maier: A Photographer's Life and Afterlife, by Pamela Bannos, strives to rescue Maier all over again, this time from the men who promulgated the Maier myth and profited off her work. . . . Almost point by point, Bannos refutes how Maier has been marketed. . . . The achievement of Bannos's intelligent, irritable self-reflexive study is in its restraint. She unseats the ghost and restores to us the woman--but in her own words and images, and without psychologizing. It's a portrait as direct as any of Maier's, and what a distinct pleasure it is to meet her gaze again." --Parul Sehgal "New York Times "

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn extraordinary collection of thematically linked essays, including THE UNCANNY, SCREEN MEMORIES and FAMILY ROMANCES.Leonardo da Vinci fascinated Freud primarily because he was keen to know why his personality was so incomprehensible to his contemporaries. In this probing biographical essay he deconstructs both da Vinci''s character and the nature of his genius. As ever, many of his exploratory avenues lead to the subject''s sexuality - why did da Vinci depict the naked human body the way hedid? What of his tendency to surround himself with handsome young boys that he took on as his pupils? Intriguing, thought-provoking and often contentious, this volume contains some of Freud''s best writing.

Read more less

Book SynopsisPublished to mark the artist's 90th birthday, this is the first and only book to provide an overview of Bryan Organ, one of the world's great portrait painters.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisQuentin Blake is one of Britain's most distinguished and best-loved illustrators. For twenty years he taught at the Royal College of Art where he was head of the illustration department. He has illustrated his own books and those of many celebrated collaborators, as well as classic books for adults. Blake was knighted for his services to illustration in 2013, and received the Chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur from France in 2014.

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn expert and comprehensive new reference book on the life and works of influential artist, engineer, inventor and scientist Leonardo da Vnci

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn in-depth study of the artist in context, with a gallery of 300 celebrated paintings.

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn insightful biography and showcase of the celebrated and influential Baroque painter, sumptuously illustrated throughout.

Read more less

Book SynopsisNew scholarship on a little-known decorative commission undertaken by Pablo Picasso offers insight into the artist’s painting process and the evolution of Cubism In 1910, Pablo Picasso began a series of 11 decorative paintings intended for the Brooklyn residence of American artist, collector, and critic Hamilton Easter Field. This publication is the first in-depth examination of this commission which, despite never being completed, offers new insights into a little-known chapter in Picasso’s art that coincided with a critical moment in the development of Cubism. Based on new research, including letters and archival material from both Picasso and Field, this book shows how the unrealized commission challenged Picasso to move beyond easel painting and adapt Cubist forms to an immersive aesthetic experience. Authors investigate the progression of Cubist ideas and show how Picasso used Easter Field’s proposal as a place of experimentation by both subverting and paying homage to decorative painting traditions. Published to coincide with Celebration Picasso, marking the fiftieth anniversary of the artist’s death, this compact volume provides a compelling look at what might have been, as well as a fascinating portrait of art and patronage in the early twentieth century. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Distributed by Yale University Press Exhibition Schedule:The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (September 12, 2023–January 14, 2024)

Read more less

Book SynopsisShio Kusaka’s ceramic vessels articulate poetic connections, creating a cohesive and unique installation. ---------- “It’s a striking effect—some pieces are bowl-shaped, others are cylindrical, a few have slim, sloping necks. Their linear arrangement suggests some kind of progression through time and space.” — Document Journal ----------- While pulling inspiration and techniques from ancient Japanese ceramics as well as from popular culture and everyday life, Kusaka carves new language into her artwork. Employing various types of clay and firing methods, she experiments with line, color, and size to bring fresh life to the medium. This harmonious presentation is created from individual pieces and thematic groupings, resulting in an extraordinary, unified installation to be experienced in the round. Created in close collaboration with the artist and with many detail images, this book provides a deep dive into Kusaka’s incredible work one light year. Published after Kusaka’s hugely successful exhibition at David Zwirner, New York, in 2022, this catalogue studies her singular installation from all angles. A text by Kusaka illuminates her working process and provides unique insight into this particular work.

Read more less

Book SynopsisFew artists have exerted such an influence on modern art as Paul Cezanne. Picasso, Braque and Matisse all acknowledged a profound debt to his painting, and many historians regard him as the father of modernism. This new biography reexamines Cezanne's life and art, discussing the central events and people who shaped his work and placing his oeuvre in the context of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century art and culture.Jon Kear examines Cezanne's youth in Provence, a formative period which left a deep and abiding impression on the artist's painting, as well as exploring his turbulent time in Paris and the larger-than-life artistic persona he created for himself during these years. His initial style, characterized by violent and explicit subject-matter and a rugged manner of painting, gave rise to an enduring mythology of the artist. Paul Cezanne explores the personal and artistic relationships that influenced Cezanne: from his close friendship with Emile Zola to his artistic dialogue with Manet, collaboration with Camille Pissarro and association with the Impressionists. Above all, Paul Cezanne tells the story of his life as a part of the pivotal shift towards the twentieth century, illuminating how much his work and ideas helped to usher it in.

Read more less

Book SynopsisA most striking, design-led reference book, A to Z Great Modern Artists features artist and graphic designer Andy Tuohy's portraits of 52 key modern artists, rendered in each artist's own characteristic style - including Aleksandr Rodchenko in his constructivist poster style, Andy Warhol as a classic repeat print, and Barbara Hepworth illustrated to resemble one of her distinctive bronze and rod sculptures. With expert text by art historian Christopher Masters, each artist's entry includes a summary of the essential things you need to know about the artist; their biographical details, why they're so significant, where you can find their works today, and a surprising fact about them plus reproductions of key works.Whether you're already an art expert, or looking for a helpful cheat to navigating around a gallery, you'll love this stunning and intelligent guide to global artists of the modern age.

Read more less

Book SynopsisDiscover the work of Aubrey Beardsley, a complex and intriguing artist who shocked and delighted late-Victorian London Aubrey Beardsley (1872&;1898) is best remembered for his powerful illustrations for Salome by Oscar Wilde. Spanning just seven years, his intense, prolific career as a draftsman and illustrator was cut short when he died at the age of 25. His subversive black-and-white drawings and his complex persona became synonymous with decadence: He alighted on the perverse and erotic aspects of life and legend, shocking audiences with his bizarre sense of humor and fascination with the grotesque. His keen observation of his contemporaries makes him of his time, but his distinct style has resonated with subsequent generations. A major influence on the development of Art Nouveau, and on psychedelic pop culture and design in the late 1960s, Beardsley&;s drawings remain a key reference for many artists today. Here, short essays on aspects of Beardsley&;s remarkable career complement reproductions of his fascinating work.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisChris Orr, the well known British painter and printmaker, takes us on a tour of his prodigious and penetrating vision of the world over the last twelve years.

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn Delightful, Enchanting' Annabel Fairfax shows us the vivid humour of her work, with oil and watercolour paintings from her many travels around the world to the peaceful haven of her studio on the Isle of Wight. Fairfax's art captures scenes as they are in the moment, with a painterly dexterity that deploys wit and imagination. Her paintings are an interpretation of the subject matter, the world seen through this artist's eyes and the results are works of art that are collected and hung by art lovers all over the world.

Read more less

Book SynopsisA haptic, funky body of ceramic works from the artist shaping the future of ceramics The San Francisco–based artist Woody De Othello (born 1991) finds inspiration for his paintings and ceramics by adapting a position of porousness to the things around him. Through his adroit interventions, everyday artifacts of the domestic—tables, chairs, television remotes, telephone receivers, lamps and air purifiers—are anthropomorphized in glazed ceramic, bronze, wood and glass. The result is often tubular, drooping and coated in vibrant reds, purples and magnetic blacks, imbued with the subterranean futurity of jazz. Fittingly, this catalog, published following the eponymous solo exhibition in New York, is titled after jazz musician Grant Green’s 1971 tune. The new body of ceramic works in Maybe Tomorrow brim with spiritual charge; the domestic objects are treated as repositories of psychic significance. The catalog explores this thematic wellspring, along with other topics, in an essay by Jason R. Young, as well as in two conversations with the artist.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisNina Malterud is one of Norway’s most prominent ceramics artists. Over the course of her five-decade-long career, she has developed a unique artistic oeuvre with references to traditional ceramic objects like plates, bowls, and tiles, but the emphasis is more on expression than on function. She explores the possibilities of clay and glazes in a free and undogmatic way, and is open to the visual results that can arise through controlled coincidences. The traces of the process are an essential part of her visual language. Sometimes the motifs are recognizable, but for the most part, she works with abstraction. The pieces radiate both tenderness and fragility, strength, and power. Combined with the materiality and weight of ceramics, the results are artworks with a strong sensory appeal.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThough numbering just 35 known works, the œuvre of Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) is hailed as one of the most important and inspiring portfolios in art history. His paintings have prompted a New York Times best seller, a film starring Scarlett Johansson, and record visitor numbers at art institutions from Amsterdam to Washington. Vermeer’s subjects focus on daily domestic activities, from letter writing to music playing to preparations in the kitchen. The scenes astound with their meticulous detail, majestic planes of light, and with Vermeer’s extraordinary ability to draw out narrative intrigues. In such beloved paintings as Lady Standing at a Virginal, A Lady Writing a Letter with Her Maid and, most famously, the enigmatic, wide-eyed, and enchanting Girl with a Pearl Earring, Vermeer evokes not only the effects of substance and texture, but also the many stories and secrets that reside beneath the surface. Featuring all Vermeer’s known works and succinct, accessible texts, this essential introduction explores Vermeer’s leading place in art history and his unique ability to transform oil paint into a living, breathing scene of human life.

Read more less