Individual artists, art monographs Books

Book Synopsis“Girls, Gags & Giggles,” ran publisher Robert Harrison’s recipe for dishing up pin-up to the American male. Men loved his tasty dishes, a mixture of strippers and starlets dressed in outfits so fetishistic no one noticed they were never nude. While other magazines delivered the girl next door, Harrison’s publications banked on bad girls in satin and leather, fishnet stockings, and six-inch heels performing slapstick stunts straight from the burlesque stage. Harrison lured his readers in with vibrantly painted covers by top pin-up artists Earl Moran, Billy DeVorss and, most famously, Peter Driben. This Bibliotheca Universalis edition celebrates this eye-catching candy with every single cover from Beauty Parade, Wink, Titter, Eyeful, Flirt, and Whisper, from 1942 to 1955, as well as interior spreads, featuring, among others, a budding Bettie Page. In an age when far more graphic material is the norm, 1000 Pin-Up Girls celebrates an era of pin-up and pulp style to fuel your erotic imagination.Trade Review“To look at these pictures is to remember that there was a time when taking off your clothes was a potent gesture, when the mere fact of a naked woman could be thrilling.” * National Post *

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Book SynopsisAbstraction shook Western art to its core. In the early part of the 20th century, it refuted the reign of clear, indisputable forms and confronted audiences instead with vivid visual poems devoid of conventional representational imagery and characterized by allegories of emotion and sensation. This radical artistic adventure established new artistic means, as much as narratives. Expression became characterized by shocking juxtapositions of color, light, and line. Artists abandoned the conventions of brush and easel and played with new materials and methods of artistic gesture: commercial paints and housepainter’s brushes, working on unstretched and unprimed canvases, moving the canvas to the floor, and applying paint with hands. This essential introduction spans the international breadth, conceptual depth, and seismic impact of abstract art with a thorough survey not only of the big names such as Picasso, Klee, Kline, Rothko, and Pollock, but also lesser-known figures who made equally significant contributions, including Antoni Tàpies, K. O. Götz, Ad Reinhardt, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp.

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Book SynopsisLatifa Echakhch studied at the art academies of Grenoble, Paris-Cergy, and Lyon. Now based in Switzerland, Eckakhch is concerned with the concept of culture as well as personal and collective memory in between the poles of social and political debate. Her work often features installations that make use of a wide variety of materials, such as brick and raw earth, which she mixes with ink. This book is part of the new On Words series that presents conversations with contemporary women artists. Through them, readers come to understand the sources from which they draw inspiration, the themes in their work, and their view of the world. Edited by Julie Enckell, Federica Martini, and Sarah Burkhalter and bringing together a wide range of viewpoints, the On Words series adds a new narrative to polyphonic art history as told by those who actively shape it. Text in English and French.

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Book SynopsisBrett Charles Seiler lives and works in Cape Town, South Africa, where he also graduated from the Ruth Prowse School of Art in 2015. Seiler's work has elements of painting, installation, and object art, with a strong emphasis on the use of text and language. Sometimes poetic, nostalgic, or romantic, it is an integral part of his art or stands on its own as a piece as well. In his paintings, the space is indeterminate, the figures are not located and sketchily fleeting, the writing elements seem spontaneous like statements from street art. The colour scheme moves in a narrow spectrum between black, grey, white and brown tones, often using wood. His themes are sexual interaction, oppression, homosexuality, gender, men. Originally from Zimbabwe, a state where human rights violations are commonplace, his work also makes a mark in the struggle for equal sexual orientation in education, media, and institutions. “[My work] is a deep longing for understanding. It is from the point of view of something that I’ve missed, something that I cannot go back to. It’s a process of research.” Text in English and German.Trade Review"A collection of Seiler’s most notable works, the artist’s latest offering continues his exploration of equality and LGBTQA+ rights. Drawing from the experiences in his own state, a place where human rights violations are the norm, Seiler’s provocative work aims to spotlight the struggles that his community face across the globe." - HypeBae"A collection of Seiler’s most notable works, the artist’s latest offering continues his exploration of equality and LGBTQA+ rights." - Hypebae

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Book SynopsisExperience the wonder of child prodigy Akiane Kramarik’s divinely inspired artwork firsthand.Akiane’s nonreligious parents were bewildered when their four-year-old daughter started sharing her dreams of angels, heaven, and Jesus. Her spiritual insight quickly expressed itself through impressive sketches, drawings with oil crayons, paintings, and eventually poetry, and her artwork began a conversation that brought her whole family to Christianity and to the attention of national media. Akiane: Her Life, Her Art, Her Poetry shares the young artist’s story in rich detail, including her mother’s firsthand account of Akiane’s emerging faith and artistic talent; a collection of full-color paintings created by Akiane from ages 4 to 10, along with the amazing stories that surround each piece of art; and selected poems of profound beauty and insight, authored by Akiane in her childhood.

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Book SynopsisEveryone needs things to look forward to: big things and small things, on good days and on bad days, whether we actively create delight for ourselves or simply allow it to enter our lives. In these pages, beloved author and illustrator Sophie Blackall has gathered a collection of joys for all of us - reminders that every day the sun comes up and new babies are born. She includes suggestions that you bake muffins for a friend, or draw a face on an egg and put it in the fridge where it will smile at you each time you open the door. With wisdom, whimsy, and compassion, the 52 illustrated ideas in this book offer moments of uplift and serendipity for yourself and your loved ones. A message of hope and solace in hard times and of joyful anticipation at times of new beginnings - whether you're grieving a loss or starting a new chapter - and for all the days in between - THINGS TO LOOK FORWARD TO is full of gentle reminders of the objects, occasions, gestures, and ideas that warm our hearts. There is always something bright on the horizon, and sometimes that horizon can be a lot closer than we think.

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Book SynopsisDigital artist Zheng Wei Gu (AKA Guweiz) shares his anime-inspired world in this beautifully produced and insightful book, leading you through his fantasy world with a portfolio packed with gritty detail and a surreal vibe. Guweiz began drawing when he was 17, inspired by an anime art tutorial on YouTube. Discovering a natural talent, he carried on drawing and quickly amassed a fan-base for his edgy illustration style. Throughout this book, readers will discover his artistic journey from the very beginning, with behind-the-scenes details about how some of his most popular pieces were created. He reveals his secrets for turning influences into truly original digital art, including that all-important narrative that takes drawing and painting beyond the purely visual. Step-by-step tutorials share techniques and tips to help you create these sorts of effects in your art, resulting in images with the depth of detail and intrigue that Guweiz has made his trademark. The artist’s unique urban take on the popular manga/anime style is gripping right from the first page, from the surreal take on Japanese lifestyle to the urban fantasy he creates.

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Book SynopsisLucian Freud dedicated his life to portraying the people in his world without flattery or refinement. Although his technique and style evolved tremendously over the decades, Freud never wavered in his uncompromising standards or unsentimental approach to his subjects. This introduction to Freud’s life and oeuvre opens with an illuminating essay that explores how Freud’s adherence to realism and focus on the human figure moved him in and out of the spotlight until the 1980s when renewed international interest in painting and figuration gave his work a new significance. Stunning reproductions of key works are presented chronologically, allowing readers to see how Freud’s brushwork, composition, and use of light evolved over the decades. Whether he was painting members of the royal family or the cashier at a London nightclub, Freud imbued his portraits with psychological tension, humanity, and a profound interest in the relationship between painter and model.

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Book SynopsisArtistic genius, political activist, painter and decorator, mythic legend or notorious graffiti artist? The work of Banksy is unmistakable, except maybe when it's squatting in the Tate or New York's Metropolitan Museum. Banksy is responsible for decorating the streets, walls, bridges and zoos of towns and cities throughout the world. Witty and subversive, his street art depicts monkeys with weapons of mass destruction, policemen with smiley faces, rats with drills and the iconic young girl with the heart-shaped balloon. If you look hard enough you'll find your own. His statements, incitements, ironies and epigrams are by turns intelligent and cheeky comments on everything from the monarchy and capitalism to the war in Iraq and farm animals. His identity remains unknown, but his work is prolific. And now for the first time, he's putting together the best of his work - old and new - in a fully illustrated colour volume.Trade ReviewSince spotting my first few Banksies I have been desperately seeking out more. When I do come across them, surreptitiously peeping out of an alley or boldly emblazoned on a wall, I find it hard to contain myself... they make me smile and feel optimistic about the possibilities of shared dreams and common ownership. * Simon Hattenstone, Guardian *

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Book SynopsisA forensic conceptualist's inventory of the ordinary and extraordinary lives in a Venetian hotel In 1981 Sophie Calle took a job as a chambermaid for the Hotel C in Venice, Italy. Stashing her camera and tape recorder in her mop bucket, she not only cleans and tidies, but sorts through the evidence of the hotel guests' lives. Assigned 12 rooms on the fourth floor, she surveys the state of the guests' bedding, their books, newspapers and postcards, perfumes and cologne, traveling clothes and costumes for Carnival. She methodically photographs the contents of closets and suitcases, examining the detritus in the rubbish bin and the toiletries arranged on the washbasin. She discovers their birth dates and blood types, diary entries, letters from and photographs of lovers and family. She eavesdrops on arguments and love-making. She retrieves a pair of shoes from the wastebasket and takes two chocolates from a neglected box of sweets, while leaving behind stashes of money, pills and jewelry. Her thievery is the eye of the camera, observing the details that were not meant for her, or us, to see. The Hotel now manifests as a book for the first time in English (it was previously included in the book Double Game). Collaborating with the artist on a new design that features enhanced and larger photographs, and pays specific attention to the beauty of the book as an object, Siglio is releasing its third book authored by Calle, after The Address Book (2012) and Suite Vénitienne (2015). Sophie Calle (born 1953) is an internationally renowned artist whose controversial works often fuse conceptual art and Oulipo-like constraints, investigatory methods and the plundering of autobiography. The Whitechapel Gallery in London organized a retrospective in 2009, and her work has been shown at the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Hayward Gallery and Serpentine, London; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, among others. She lives and works in Paris.Trade ReviewThese clinical yet intimate observations (and sometimes judgements) expose innumerable contradictions within this finite space, and within the thoughts of the artist herself. -- Madison Reid * Vanity Fair *Like many of Calle’s projects, the work of art is in her act of intrusion; the resulting photographs are merely the eerily beautiful evidence. -- Baya Simons * Financial Times: How To Spend It *A provocative examination of privacy, lack thereof, and what fragmented possessions might reveal about our lives -- Harriet Lloyd-Smith * Wallpaper* *A stand-alone book with a fresh redesign—the pages are edged in gold—and a selection of previously unpublished images. Playing with voyeuristic curiosity (and destroying any naive belief in privacy), Calle compiled a vast collection of color and black-and-white images along with written observations -- Sarah Moroz * Bookforum *A stunningly produced new book in English made from Calle’s 1981 project is a perfect opportunity to revisit—or introduce yourself to—the irresistible photographs derived from her masterful snooping. -- Johanna Fateman * Artforum *This book-cum-quest strikes the quintessential Calle-chord: its through line is the longing to know the lives of strangers. * Elephant *The Hotel, as a book-object, is meticulous. It presents, in size and weight, like a good quality bible kept in the bedside top drawer. -- Odette England * Photo Eye *Together they ask what our habits and possessions might reveal about us and whetherour curiosity about the private lives of others is normal or shameful. Like many of Calle’s projects, the work of art is in her act of intrusion; the resulting photographs are merely the eerily beautiful evidence. -- Baya Simons * Financial Times: Weekend *

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Book SynopsisThe volume is dedicated to the work of Jenny Saville (Cambridge, 1970), one of the greatest contemporary painters and a leading voice in the international art scene. Saville transcends the limits between figurative and abstract, between informal and gestural, managing to transfigure the news into a universal image, which puts the human figure at the center of the history of art. Huge, naked bodies, with a carnal physicality and oppressed by a weight that is more existential than material, Saville is linked to the great European pictorial tradition in constant comparison with the modernism of Willem de Kooning and Cy Twombly and the portraiture of Pablo Picasso and Francis Bacon. Her work also outlines a strong correlation with the masters of the Italian Renaissance, in particular with some of Michelangelo’s great masterpieces. The volume contains a rich catalogue of paintings and drawings from the 1990s to today.

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Book SynopsisFor more than five centuries The Last Supper has been an artistic, religious and cultural icon. The art historian Kenneth Clark called it ''the keystone of European art'', and for a century after its creation it was regarded as nothing less than a miraculous image. And yet there is a very human story behind this artistic ''miracle''. Ross King''s Leonardo and the Last Supper is both a ''biography'' of one of the most famous works of art ever painted and a record of Leonardo da Vinci''s last five years in Milan.Trade Review[A] richly entertaining tale of how Leonardo came to paint The Last Supper. King, who had previously written acclaimed accounts of Brunelleschi's Florentine dome and Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling, has an infectious relish for the gaudy, brutal and brilliant world of the Italian Renaissance * Mail on Sunday *The story of Leonardo's creation of the work has now found an ideal chronicler in Ross King ... King has the gift of clear, unpretentious exposition, and an instinctive narrative flair * Guardian *Extraordinary -- Must Reads * Sunday Times *A gripping account ... Fascinating * New York Times *A thrilling account of the mercurial Leonardo and the making of his most puzzling masterpiece ... A perfectly controlled, seriously documented story that you really want to read * Scotsman *Absorbing ... A truly immersive portrait of an era * Daily Telegraph *

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Book SynopsisWith the patronage of the powerful Medici family, a canon of secular and religious work, and contributions to the celebrated Sistine Chapel, Sandro Botticelli (1444/45–1510) was well placed for fame. After his death, however, his work was eclipsed for some four hundred years. It wasn’t until the 19th century that the painter began to gain major art-historical recognition. Today, Botticelli is hailed as a towering figure of the Florentine Early Renaissance. His secular works The Birth of Venus and Primavera, mostly read as an allegory of Spring, are among the most recognized paintings in the world, resplendent in their delicate details, graceful lines, and compositional balance. His arrangements are fluid yet poised, his figures serene yet sensual. Venus, in particular, is held up as art-historical icon of beauty: pale-skinned, delicately featured, soft with fecund promise. This essential introduction presents key works from Botticelli’s oeuvre to understand the making of a Renaissance legend. Through the painter’s most famous mythological and allegorical scenes, as well as his radiant religious works, we explore a mastery of figuration, movement, and line, which has gone on to inspire artists from Edgar Degas to Andy Warhol, René Magritte to Cindy Sherman.

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"...excellent...highly detailed...fascinating..." - Martin Bailey, The Art Newspaper'... it is packed with information and event. Few biographies of artists can be described as gripping. This often is.'---Martin Gayford, The Sunday Telegraph"... a magisterial portrait of a deeply troubled man. It is both humerous and tragic in its account of Munch's abortive relationships with women, his dependence on drink, and his struggle for success and recognition.'---Frances Spalding, The Sunday Times"[An] assured and vivid biography."—Peter Schjeldahl, New Yorker"...a significant addition to the literature on the Norwegian artist... It is among Prideaux's achievements to give us a thousand...details that pull Munch into sharper focus." - Christopher Riopelle, Apollo Magazine"Sue Prideaux's marvellously detailed study of Munch's extraordinary life takes us deep into the very soul of an astonishing Scandinavian painter who must be measured by no ordinary yardstick."---Birmingham Post "Beautifully illustrated, this is one of the most engaging biographies I have read this year."---Mohara Gill, Art Buyer at Foyles Bookshop, The Bookseller"Already a successful novelist, [Prideaux] combines a scholar's precision with a writer's insight."---The Brighton Argus"In Edvard Munch: Behind the Scream, Sue Prideaux, who speaks fluent Norwegian and was able to read Munch's diaries first hand, extends the understanding of this complex man."---Sue Hubbard, The Independent"[Munch] once wrote: 'Just as Leonardo studied the recesses of the human body and dissected cadavers, I try from self-scrutiny to dissect what is universal in the soul.' Prideaux has written a life which goes a long way towards upholding his aim and anyone who wants to know how and why he painted as he did should read this book."---Tom Rosenthal, The Independent on Sunday'... [an] absorbing account of the social and intellectual forces, as well as the personal demons, that Munch struggled against - or solicited - in order to create.'---Alan Jenkins, Times Literary Supplement"This fine biography succeeds in explaining why this deeply troubled man, in many ways forgotten, was and is an important and profound artist." ---Alastair Lack, Oxford TimesWinner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography in 2005, awarded by the University of Edinburgh.Selected for Association of American University Presses (AAUP) Books for Public and Secondary School Libraries, 2006“Such was the nature of Edvard Munch’s life that this book makes a gripping read. Prideaux provides a convincing sense of the psychological experiences of Munch and also the flavor of the times that he occupied.”—John Milner, University of Newcastle“Munch emerges as a real person, rather like you and me.”—Karl Ove Knausgård“Munch emerges as a real person, rather like you and me.”—Karl Ove Knausgård -- Karl Ove Knausgård

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Book SynopsisThe Lammermuir Hills have been an important trade route between Scotland and England for generations, as well as an effective barrier when necessary. Drawn by the long history of south-eastern Scotland and the many conflicting elements in play in its natural environment – among them wind farms, pylons, forestry plantations, grouse moors and sheep – the distinguished Scottish painter and printmaker Barbara Rae CBE RA has made numerous studies of these wild expanses. This handsome volume reproduces a wide selection of her intensely colourful images with accompanying photographs and maps, and texts by the art critic Duncan Macmillan, Emeritus Professor of the History of Scottish Art at the University of Edinburgh, and Maureen Barrie, who worked for many years at National Museums Scotland.Table of ContentsThe Caledonian Antisyzygy 9 duncan macmillan Letting the Paint Do the Talking 17 barbara rae in conversation with duncan macmillan Different Views 23 maureen barrie Plates 1997–98 46 2020–21 60 Artist’s Biography 125 Bibliography 127 Index of Works 128

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Book SynopsisAddress book companion to the exciting and luxurious Flame Tree Notebooks. Combining high-quality production with magnificent fine art, the covers are printed on foil in five colours, embossed, then foil stamped. And they're powerfully practical: a pocket at the back for receipts and scraps, two bookmarks and a solid magnetic side flap. These are perfect for personal use and make a dazzling gift. This example features Bodleian Libraries: A Readers' Delight. The Bodleian Library is one of the oldest libraries in Europe and is the main research library of the University of Oxford. It holds over 13 million printed items and this handsome trio of spines are just three examples of the beautiful objects in the Library’s collection. With colourful illustrations and charming tales, these story anthologies showcase the sports and hobbies young people could enjoy during the 1930s.

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Book Synopsis"A collection of essential quotations from the renowned fashion designer, DJ, and stylist"--Trade Review"Virgil Abloh says the darndest, most illuminating things—enough in his young fashion career to fill a 160-page book titled Abloh-isms. . . . The book maps out Abloh’s unique thinking in chapters devoted to his early years, his inspirations and influences, his creative methods, his impact and his singular point of view on streetwear, fashion and art . . . breathtakingly incisive."---Miles Socha, Women’s Wear Daily online"[Abloh-isms] spotlights a diverse selection of quotes by Virgil Abloh who has made a profound mark in the worlds of fashion, art, design and pop culture. Authored by Larry Warsh, the book features a collection of quotes by Abloh that were gathered from interviews, discussions, media outlets and other sources. The quotes touch on Abloh’s creativity, passion, innovation, race, and what it means to be an artist of his generation."---Keith Estiler, Hypebeast"Abloh-isms is the new Bible for all the fans of the American designer. . . . An unmissable volume for all Abloh fans, and for all fashion lovers." * NSS Magazine *"This set of quotes reflects the unique and peculiar perspective, idea and philosophy that accompanied Virgil Abloh throughout his life showing us how he became an icon of our time." * Collater.al *

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Book SynopsisAs his personal circumstances move in constant flux, Ai Weiwei remains a cultural magnet. Renowned for his political activism and social media activity almost as much as for his social interventions, contemporary approach to the readymade, and knowledge of Chinese traditional crafts, Ai’s fame extends throughout and beyond the art world. Drawn from TASCHEN’s limited Collector’s Edition, this monograph explores each of Ai’s career phases up until his release from Chinese custody. It features extensive visual material to trace Ai’s development from his early New York days right through to his recent practice. Focus moments include his international breakthrough in the early 2000s, his porcelain Sunflower Seeds at the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern, his response to the Sichuan earthquake of 2008, and his police detention in 2011. With behind-the-scenes studio pictures, production shots, and numerous statements derived from exclusive interviews with Ai, we gain privileged access to the artist’s process, influences, and importance. The book includes texts from Uli Sigg, Ai’s longtime friend and former Swiss ambassador to China and Roger M. Buergel, who curated the 2007 documenta and hosted the artist’s Fairytale piece.Trade Review“A comprehensive excursion, complete with abundant illustrations and material, through the life and work of this star artist, who like no one since Joseph Beuys has succeeded in intertwining scupltural, media and political thinking. A seminal work!” * Art *“A landmark monograph for sure.” * Paris Match *“The first comprehensive monograph on the life and work of Ai Weiwei.” * ARTNews *

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Book SynopsisJohn Richardson was born in London in 1924. He studied art at the Slade School but soon gave up painting for art criticism. In 1949 he moved to France, where befriended Picasso, Braque, Léger, and Cocteau. The first volume of his magisterial four-volume A Life of Picasso won the Whitbread Prize in 1991. He was also the author of the memoir, The Sorcerer's Apprentice; an essay collection, Sacred Monsters, Sacred Masters; and books on Manet and Braque. He wrote for the New York Review of Books, New Yorker and Vanity Fair. He was made a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy in 1993, and served as the Slade Professor of Fine Art at Oxford University from 1995 to 1996. He died in 2019.Trade ReviewClever, amusing, flamboyant and outrageous... Even incomplete, this is Richardson's masterpiece. * The Times, *Books of the Year* *Richardson's monumental biography...comes at you like a roar... As biographer, Richardson is clever, amusing, flamboyant, outrageous - a worthy match for his subject... Even incomplete, this is Richardson's masterpiece. -- Laura Freeman * The Times *Magnificent, unparalleled... How [Volume IV] manages to be as gripping as it is, as fresh as it is, only the gods of art can answer... Richardson is both an intimate witness and a ravenous historian... No one will ever again be able to combine Richardson's personal familiarity with Picasso with such impressive levels of history, insight, detail, gossip and breezy writing. The greatest art biography ever written can never have a proper ending. It's an incomplete masterpiece. But a masterpiece nevertheless. -- Waldemar Januszczak * Sunday Times *What a magnificent resource this four-volume biography is, unfinished...yet unrivalled in its blend of erudition and gossipy insights. * Financial Times, *Books of the Year* *Magisterial... What has always made Richardson's biographical work on Picasso so alive is the fact of his personal friendship with the artist. It is thrilling to read a narrative in which scholarly prose is regularly interrupted with the phrase "Picasso once told me ... " followed by an entirely fresh anecdote... How lucky we are...that Richardson lived long enough to get this far. -- Kathryn Hughes * Guardian *One of the great biographical enterprises of our times. * New Statesman, *The Best Books of 2022 So Far* *Terrifically enjoyable... irresistible. -- Alastair Sooke * Daily Telegraph *No previous biographer of Picasso has commanded such detail, range and depth when dealing with this unendingly inventive and ferociously experimental artist. This fourth volume...reflects Richardson's gift for merging the personal with the professional. * Literary Review *Gripping, highly readable and thoughtfully illustrated... It's hard to imagine that he could be bettered as our guide in the labyrinth of the minotaur. -- Stephen Smith * Financial Times *Enlivened by...anecdotal intimacy... Richardson...has ingeniously deciphered the art without demystifying the artist. -- Peter Conrad * Observer *Every page carries an entertaining story or a fascinating gobbet of artistic gossip. -- Craig Brown * Mail on Sunday *A fluent writer with a gift for narrative and a sensitive ability to read the artist's work in relation to his life... The decade covered in this volume, which turns on Picasso's identification with the part-beast, part-man mythical Minotaur, is a tumultuous one, both in public and in private life... [it is] deftly presented as Richardson moves from the man to his circle to his art to larger historical events. -- Siri Hustvedt * New York Times Book Review *Personal and political collide in lively fourth volume of detailed biography... The Minotaur Years retells what might be considered a familiar story, but carries it off with a liveliness generated by short chapters, sharp judgements and occasionally waspish dismissals, all dispatched at pace. It is the fruit of 60 years of thinking, conversing and speculating about the artist, underpinned by detailed looking, research and investigation of his movements moment by moment. -- Matthew Gale * The Art Newspaper *[Richardson] set the standard for modern artists' biographies...The fourth and final volume...is a worthy follow-up to its predecessors... just as rich, just as astounding. -- Sebastian Smee * Washington Post *The final chapter of a magisterial biography... The author's unique, extensive knowledge and insider information about Picasso - both the man and artist - informs insightful explications of the nuances and symbolism in Picasso's works... A masterful accomplishment. * Kirkus Reviews *Monumental... Nobody has brought us closer [than Richardson] to understanding this extraordinary and complex artist. -- Miranda France * Prospect *[A] magisterial work... superbly illustrated. -- Nicky Haslam * Oldie *[A] magisterial and superbly illustrated biography. -- Ysenda Maxtone Graham * Daily Mail, *Book of the Week* *Monumental... This uncompleted project will surely be the Ozymandias of all biographies, since Richardson's talents were uniquely matched to his protean subject. -- Fram Dinshaw * Catholic Herald *Wonderfully lively, greatly informative and memorably insightful... a great read. -- Alexander Adams * Jackdaw *

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Book SynopsisA deluxe, large-format edition of this beautifully illustrated introduction to Utagawa Hiroshige, thought to be the most successful ukiyo-e artist of Japan's Edo period. From the author of Hokusai: A Life in Drawing comes an illuminating account of Utagawa Hiroshige (17971858), the last great artist of the ukiyo-e tradition. Ukiyo-e, meaning images of the floating world', was a ubiquitous genre of Japanese woodblock prints during Japan's Edo period, often depicting popular actors, sumo wrestlers, beautiful women and majestic landscapes. Hiroshige's serene, atmospheric prints stood out from his predecessors, capturing the essence of the world around him, and eventually gained widespread acclaim in Europe and America, influencing western European artists like Manet, Monet and van Gogh. This book offers a fascinating look at Hiroshige's life and work, tracing the journey of a fire warden who turned to printmaking later in life. It invites readers to follow in Hiroshige's footsteps through 19th-century Tokyo, discovering the iconic landscapes he immortalized while traveling the famed Tokaido and Kiso Kaido roads. It features an exceptional selection of works accompanied by vivid text, drawing from Hiroshige's diaries, his talent for humorous poetry, taste for travel (with all its pleasures and challenges) and deep affinity for the natural world. In making accessible a deep understanding of Hiroshige's body of work, this volume transports readers to Edo, Japan, via the artist's timeless prints.

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Book SynopsisA biography and gallery of one of Spain's great masters, stunningly illustrated throughout.

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Book SynopsisAre you looking to focus your heart amid the bustle and preparation leading up to Christmas? Are you seeking the peace, hope, love, and joy at the heart of the holiday? Anne Neilson''s Christmas Angels invites you to quiet your spirit as you focus on the wonder of the Savior''s birth and the messengers who heralded the good news to the shepherds that first Christmas.Fine artist and bestselling author Anne Neilson beautifully captures the angels'' essence in this devotional designed especially for Advent. Gorgeous original art throughout showcases Anne''s iconic angels alongside daily devotions that will usher you into the sacredness and beauty of the Christmas season.This stunning and inspirational book: Weaves all-new art from Anne with Bible verses, poetry, prayers, and personal reflections Offers devotions for each day of Advent, organized weekly in the themes of hope, love, joy, and peace Makes a perfect hostess

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Book SynopsisWith full colour illustrations and simple text: this book tells the well loved ancient folklore story of Marina, a simple traditional forest dwelling Yugoslavian mother of many children, who led a double life as a misunderstood radical performance artist. This book was commissioned for a specially curated shop by artist, Marina Abramovic as part of her forthcoming solo exhibition at the Royal Academy from Sept 2023 - Jan 2024. This is the first ever solo show by a female artist in the main galleries of this historic institution since opening in 1768. This title will tour with Marina's show for 5 years, internationally.

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Book SynopsisNow available in paperback, this is the first work in English to tell the full story of Claude Cahun’s art and life. It both recounts her life and analyses her complex writings and images, making them available to a wide audience. Shaw’s account embeds Cahun’s work in the exciting milieu of Paris between the wars and follows it into the dangerous territory of the Nazi-occupied Isle of Jersey. Using letters and diaries, Shaw brings Cahun’s ideas and feelings to life and contributes to our understanding of photography, Surrealism and the histories of women artists and queer culture. This book includes a full range of illustrations by Cahun and other renowned photographers, as well as writings never before translated into English. Shaw’s book will appeal to art and photography lovers and scholars alike.Trade Review'Scholars of Cahun will appreciate Shaw’s survey as a well-organized and well-researched biographical resource, as well as a compendium of Cahun’s extensive oeuvre. Exist Otherwise is a valuable contribution to the scant body of English-language scholarship on Cahun, one that hopefully opens the door to further excavations and analyses toward an “otherwise” history in the face of more dominant accounts of the era.' – Erin Silver, CAA Reviews; 'As a Jewish, gender-nonconforming artist living amid the rise of fascism and widespread anti-Semitism, Cahun’s artwork challenged social norms of the time. The new book Exist Otherwise . . . features her photographs, sculptures, and illustrations along with diary entries and writing clips that have never before been translated in English.' – The Cut; 'Claude Cahun may not be particularly well known outside the art world, but this highly readable biography of the twentieth-century French writer, artist, and photographer ought to help change this situation. Shaw has written a fascinating book about a gender-bending lesbian intellectual who challenged ideas of gender and sexuality in both her life and art . . . Filled with reproductions of photographs and detailed descriptions and analyses of her writings, Exist Otherwise is a comprehensive introduction to Claude Cahun’s art and writing. With any luck it will bring readers back to her unique body of work.' – Gay & Lesbian Review; 'In this first full biography of the pseudonymous visual artist and writer Claude Cahun, Shaw is intensely responsive to Cahun’s life and work (verbal, visual, political). In the process of examining and commenting on Cahun’s unique life, Shaw travels across time and across surrealism, Dada, a world war, and the anti-fascists and their effect on art and life in Paris, Jersey, and Germany . . . Homosexuality is an important focal point, as are the anti-fascists and the active rebellion of the modern against the traditional. Shaw writes that as an outsider woman, lesbian, and Jew, Cahun ‘trumpeted her role.’ This book deserves a wide readership . . . Highly recommended.' – Choice; 'Shaw has written the first full biography of Cahun in English . . . The originality of Shaw’s approach lies in her situating Cahun’s work and thought within contemporary Symbolist and Surrealist aesthetic and political positions, while drawing on recent feminist theory, unlike Leperlier, who tends to bypass Cahun’s lesbianism, and unlike some recent scholarly work which, in seeking to integrate Cahun into the corpus of women artists of the late twentieth century, can risk losing sight of her historical and cultural specificity . . . This study is a richly documented and well-balanced account of a major twentieth-century artistic figure, in which Cahun’s life and work are interwoven in such a way that they illuminate each other.' – H-France Reviews; 'Exist Otherwise is elegantly written and beautifully illustrated with artwork, and includes an appendix with short, translated excerpts of Cahun’s writings . . . In Shaw’s telling, Cahun models how to practice radical art and action during politically fraught times like hers—and our own.' – Wellesley Review; 'Claude Cahun’s writings and artworks tell the story of her own critical self-discovery, and Shaw follows suit, placing the works at the center of her gripping biography of Cahun as a woman artist and lesbian who managed to "exist otherwise" long before transgender and gay rights. In the graceful flow of Shaw’s prose, Cahun’s photographic projects illuminate and amplify her life, from the French provinces to Surrealist Paris to the occupied island of Jersey, where her guerilla anti-Nazi art led to harrowing arrest and near execution. Shaw calls Cahun her hero, and convinces us that Cahun should be ours as well, in our moment of Brexit and Trump.' – Christina Kiaer, Northwestern University

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Book SynopsisWhat were Montmartre and Montparnasse really like in their hey-day, roughly between 1904, when the youthful Picasso had just arrived on the Hill of Martyrs, and 1920, when Amedeo Modigliani, justly called 'the prince of Bohemians', died of consumption and dissipation in Montparnasse? This book, written by an Englishman who lived in Montmartre for 30 years and knew its famous habitue intimately, gives a vivid description. It reveals the truth behind the many legends, is packed with authentic stories about writers and painters whose names are now household words, and contains much hitherto unpublished information about the life and career of Modigliani obtained from his family and friends. Much of the text was written in Montmartre amid the scenes described, and after personal consultation with survivors of the great days when Frede presided over the Lapin Agile and Libion, patron of the Cafe de la Rotonde, was beginning to rival him in Montparnasse. It is the most complete account which has yet been written in English of the birth of Cubism and other contemporary movements in modern painting, and of the lives and loves who started them.

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Book SynopsisFor Kurt Jackson (b.1961), ‘Painting the sea could become an obsession, an entire oeuvre in its own right, an endless life absorbing task.’ And, as this book attests, Jackson’s dedication to capturing its constant shape shifting – stillness to thundering force, shallows to mysterious depths – have brought forth paintings that communicate the sea's ebb and flow, its magic and elusiveness.Kurt Jackson's Sea captures the beauty of the artist's constantly evolving relationship with one of nature's most challenging subjects. Two hundred colour images complement Jackson's reflections on his interactions with inspirational coastal landscapes - largely experienced in his native Cornwall, but stretching way beyond the county too. Trade Review’If it is possible to say a book smells and tastes of the sea . . . I love the sea and I feel as if Kurt Jackson has captured it in all its moods just for me to take to some place where I’ll never see or hear it again, but the memory will be indelibly etched in these pages by these glorious, life affirming paintings. The Chinese have a saying that you can never cross the same river twice. They are right and the same holds true for the view of the sea from a great artist at the peak of his powers’. – Sir Tim Smit KBE, Executive Co-Chair Eden Project International and Executive Vice Chair & Co-Founder Eden Project'a beautifully produced book...I close [it] with a sense of surfacing, from seawater mixed with paint...the paintings bring back half-forgotten moments of connection at the edge of the sea: the sheen of mudflats, the marbling of foam where a wave has passed, times when the sea is the source of the light...It feels like I’ve been to the beach.' – Caught by the River Table of ContentsForeword by Julian Spalding; Introduction; Chapter 1: Compelled; Chapter 2: In, On, Under; Chapter 3: Cove; Chapter 4: Obsession; Chapter 5: Retreat; Chapter 6: Cornish Islands; Chapter 7: Lighthouses; Chapter 8: North Sea; Chapter 9: Scottish Seas; Chapter 10: Greek Seas; About Kurt Jackson; Selected Solo and Group Exhibitions; Awards and Residencies; Broadcasts; Public Collections; Selected Bibliography; Acknowledgements and Credits; Index.

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Book SynopsisDescribed by Art Review as 'one of the most influential people in the contemporary art world in 2018', Theaster Gates (b. 1973, Chicago) explores the complex and interweaving issues of race, territory and inequality as a socially engaged artist. Living and working in Chicago, Gates began his career studying urban planning, followed by ceramics, both of which continue to inform his work. At the heart of the book, Gates looks at the history of Malaga island in Maine, USA. In 1912, the state governor evicted the island's ethnically diverse population with no offer of housing or support. Gates's body of work - sculpture, installation, film, music and dance - responds to this little-known story, connecting it with the wider history of African-American people. A new film called 'Dance of Malaga 2019' features the choreography of acclaimed American dancer Kyle Abraham, and a highlight of the publication are the many beautiful stills from the film. Through a combination of essays, Theaster Gates's own words and a careful selection of illustrations, this publication will underline the artist's influence in contemporary art and interracial relationships, while its accessible approach will appeal to all.

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Book SynopsisThe first major exhibition of visionary artist Ithell Colquhoun and the first major accompanying publication on the artist. One of the most radical artists of her generation, Colquhoun was an important figure in British Surrealism during the 1930s and 1940s. An innovative writer and practicing occultist, Colquhoun charted her own course, investigating surrealist methods of unconscious picture-making and fearlessly delving into the realms of myth and magic. Colquhoun explored the possibilities of a divine feminine power as a path to personal fulfilment and societal transformation. Her understanding of the world as a connected spiritual cosmos brought her to Cornwall, where she deepened her creative explorations, inspired by the region's ancient landscape, Celtic traditions, and sacred sites. This landmark exhibition and publication of over 200 artworks and archival materials traces Colquhoun's evolution, from her early student work and engagement with the surrealist movement, to her fascination with the intertwining realms of art, sexual identity, ecology and occultism. It culminates in a room dedicated to Colquhoun's interpretation of the Taro deck her most accomplished fusion of her artistic and magical practice. Explore Colquhoun's enthralling, multi-layered universe through writings, drawings, paintings, early theatre projects and mural designs, many of which have never been shown publicly before.

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Book SynopsisThe first book to focus on Dame Paula Rego’s little-known monumental triptych, Crivelli’s Garden, featuring an original short story by novelist Chloe Aridjis, new photography, and an art historical essay Dame Paula Rego RA (1935–2022) was a British-Portuguese artist whose large-scale figurative paintings explored human relationships and the experience of women through compelling, often subversive compositions. Inspired by the predella panel of Carlo Crivelli’s altarpiece La Madonna della Rondine (after 1490), Rego produced Crivelli’s Garden in 1990−91 while she was artist in residence at the National Gallery. This monumental triptych reimagined the site of Crivelli’s panel as a radical space populated by female figures from myth, folklore, and the Bible, alongside animals drawn from Aesop’s fables and other classical texts. Literature was a major influence on Rego’s practice throughout her career: this publication in turn celebrates the far-reaching influence of Rego’s paintings with an original short story by Mexican novelist Chloe Aridjis, inspired by Rego’s triptych. Illustrated with previously unpublished preparatory drawings and newly photographed details of the painting, the book also features an art historical essay on the work. Published by National Gallery Global/Distributed by Yale University PressExhibition Schedule: The National Gallery, London; (July 20–October 29, 2023)

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Book SynopsisInspired by the recent identification of a third autograph version of Gainsborough’s masterpiece The Cottage Door, this book examines the significance of the multiple versions of designs that the artist produced during the 1780s. It demonstrates that without the pressure of exhibiting his work annually at the Academy and without a string of sitters waiting for their finished portraits, Gainsborough’s work became more personal, more thoughtful. This study of the last phase of the artist’s work is a totally fresh interpretation of not only The Cottage Door but other key works such as Mrs Sheridan and Diana and Acteon. Gainsborough’s creative energies changed around 1780. He became restless and wanted to promote his landscape painting more effectively. He started to paint coastal scenes using an innovative painting technique to depict the water and he embarked on a series of`fancy’ pictures that he would position him as a descendant of an Old Master tradition. He was never happy with the constraints of the Royal Academy and he was at odds with the dictatorial opinions promoted by its president, Sir Joshua Reynolds. Removing himself from the Academy enabled him finally to do what he wanted. He began to turn to portrait compositions that he had developed and refined over a number of years. With subtle alterations they could be made suitable for a variety of sitters. The subtlety of his skilled observation was less easy to accommodate in standard-sized full-length canvases and in these portraits he sometimes resorted to rhetoric gesture that fought against the closely observed likenesses in his best portraits. The margin between`fancy’ pictures and portraits became blurred and the categorization of some of these paintings changed while they were on the easel. Always finding composition difficult, rather than begin something new he often revisited earlier designs that had pleased him. He would paint them again and make slight changes of tone and emphasis that would radically change the concept and intention of the design. The subject matter in some of his late paintings veers towards the autobiographical and shows a certain rift between him and his family.

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Book SynopsisPublished to coincide with the exhibition at the Foundling Museum in London, this fascinating book will re-introduce Joseph Highmore (1692–1780), an artist of status and substance in his day, who is now largely unknown. It takes as its focus Highmore’s small oil painting known as The Angel of Mercy (1746, Yale), one of the most shocking and controversial images in 18th-century British art. The painting depicts a woman in fashionable mid-18th-century dress strangling the infant lying on her lap. A cloaked, barefooted fi gure cowers to the right as an angel intervenes, pointing towards the Foundling Hospital, the recently built refuge for abandoned infants, in the distance. The image attempts to address one of the most disturbing aspects of the Foundling Hospital story – certainly a subject that many (now as then) would consider beyond depiction. But if any artist of the period had attempted such a subject it would surely be William Hogarth, not the portrait painter Joseph Highmore? In fact, the painting was attributed to Hogarth for almost two centuries, until its reattribution in the 1990s. Even so, it is surprising that despite the wealth of scholarship associated with Hogarth and the `modern moral subject’ of the 1730s and 1740s, The Angel of Mercy has received little attention until now. The book (and exhibition) seeks to address this, while encouraging greater interest in, and appreciation for, this signifi cant British artist. Highmore expert, Jacqueline Riding, will set this extraordinary painting within the context of the artist’s life and work, as well as broader historical and artistic contexts. This will include exploration of superb examples of Highmore’s portraiture, such as his complex, monumental group portrait The Family of Sir Eldred Lancelot Lee and the exquisite small-scale `conversations’ The Vigor Family and The Artist and his Family, juxtaposed with analysis of key subject paintings, including the Foundling Museum’s Hagar and Ishmael and Highmore’s `Pamela’ series, inspired by Samuel Richardson’s bestselling novel. Collectively they tackle relevant and highly contentious issues around the status and care of women and children, master/servant relations, motherhood, abuse, abandonment, infant death and murder.Trade ReviewHighmore (1692–1780) was much more than just a society painter ... his connection with the Foundling Hospital alerted him to the inequalities and injustices of his time and to the plight of women and children at the mercy of men who always held the keys ... [The ] `Angel of Mercy’ still has the power to shock and, sadly, tells a very modern story. * The Spectator *Highmore’s works include many paintings showing his sympathetic approach to the plight of powerless women ... [This is] the first major publication of his work. * The Guardian *It is the commonality between high and low that Basic Instincts reveals so well. We aren’t as divided as we think. Highmore scratches away at the veneer of respectability that coats the art of his age, and finds darkness beneath. Regardless of position, everyone has the same capacity for bad behaviour. And unfortunately, as Highmore shows, all too often women bore the brunt of this behaviour. * Rake's Digress *'Basic Instincts' brings Joseph Highmore out of the shadows. * Apollo Magazine *

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Book SynopsisBernard Leach (1887-1979) was as renowned in Japan and the East as in Europe and America, both as an artist-craftsman and as a thinker. His interpretation of the traditions of the Orient in the making of pots - and in evolving a philosophy of life - was a lodestar for many potters in the West. Beyond East and West, first published in 1978, is more than an autobiography. Full of sharply- etched and amusing recollections, it contains much of Leach’s deeper thought and a great deal too about the practical application of his ideas. Its recurrent theme is the meeting of East and West at all levels - artistic, cultural, social, political.

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Book SynopsisAs London evolves into a Babylonian-style city of lofty towers, the artist Anna Keen has been inspired to paint this London Metamorphosis. While each new edifice heads to the heavens, the exposed entrails of these vast construction sites strangely resemble ruins. Her large canvases are enriched with details stemming from patient observation and on-the-spot sketches, and from voyages around the city made by helicopter, boat, road and on foot. Like the eighteenth-century artist J.M Gandy, who simultaneously painted London in ruins and in construction, Anna Keen takes us just beneath the surface of the metropolis, to where the emotional landscape lurks and to where the soul of London is heading. London-based art historian Edward Lucie-Smith has followed Anna Keen's painting since 1995 in Rome.

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Book Synopsis

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

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Book SynopsisFifty years after Picasso’s death, this magnificent collection of drawings offers a career-spanning tour of the artist’s brilliant and dynamic use of line and a window into the heart and soul of the most prolific aspect of his œuvre.From his early studies to his final works, drawing was, for Picasso, an ever-renewing exploration of the powers of the line. Comprising over three hundred reproductions from his massive oeuvre, this collection features both well-received and rarely seen works, as well as images from his extraordinary notebooks. It features fifty penetrating essays that examine the themes, symbols and techniques that echo throughout Picasso’s career— from monsters, crucifixions, and self-portraits to crayon, cross- hatching, and ink. It includes book illustrations and plans for sculptures; color and figure studies; collage and journal entries. Stunning full-color reproductions allow readers to appreciate the enormous inventiveness

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Book SynopsisTom’s taste for police officers and felons—and for sexual tension between the two—developed late in his career. “I’ve never been to prison,” he told a class at the California Institute of the Arts in 1985, “but I hear it’s a closed world where there are different roles and people behave different from when they walk free. It fascinates me. It is another subject I come back to again and again.” By which he meant fantasized about again and again, since only those subjects that aroused him sexually made it into his art. The uniforms of the California Highway Patrol motorcyclists were his favorite: tan and tight, with high boots and soft black leather gauntlet gloves. He created his own uniform variants as well, a cross between military and civilian police gear, and invented suitably butch criminals for his cops to apprehend, though once apprehended the power struggle could go either way. Tom was determined to show top and bottom as equally masculine roles, and his cops were as likely to end up happily speared by criminal cock as delivering corrective coitus. Though criticized by some for what appeared to be a glorification of power, Tom was always quick to remind that the world he created was a fantasy world, where anything was possible, and everything was consensual—even in prison. The Little Book of Tom: Cops & Robbers explores Tom’s fascination with criminal justice through a mixture of multi-panel comics and single-panel drawings and paintings, all in a compact and affordable 192 pages. Historic film stills and posters, personal photos of Tom, sketches, and Tom’s own reference photos make this far more than another Tom’s Comics re-tread.

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

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