Search results for ""Art/Books""

A personal and expert account of the artists and events that defined the medium’s first 50 years, written a true expert in the field‘London’s book excites because it brings new artists into a lineage worthy of greater stuff. Her passion for lesser-known figures … is contagious.’ – ARTnews, The Best Art Books of 2020Since the introduction of portable consumer electronics nearly a half century ago, artists throughout the world have adapted their latest technologies to art-making. This first-hand account by the curator who has been following video art from its beginnings in the late 1960s, when artists first adapted portable consumer technology to art-making, spotlights video’s ongoing importance in the art world, tracing the genre’s development alongside the advances in technology that have continued to open up new possibilities for artists. London has worked closely and personally with the artists she writes about, who span generations, including Joan Jonas, Nam June Paik, Bill Viola, Shirin Neshat, Pipilotti Rist, Miranda July, Ragnar Kjartansson, and Ian Cheng. The text is both art-historical and personal – weaving together background information and insightful interpretations with unique anecdotes and experiences to trace the history of video art as it transformed into the broader field of media art – from analog to digital, small TV monitors to wall-scale projections, and clunky hardware to user-friendly software. In doing this, she reveals how video evolved from fringe status to be seen as one of the foremost art forms of today.

Read more less

*One of The Times Best Art Books of the Year*'Looking to Sea is a remarkable and compelling book... I loved it.' Edmund de Waal'In her first, transporting book, Lily Le Brun sweeps the beaches of the past century of British art, collecting treasures from sea, shingle and shore... A book to pack in your picnic basket for shivering dips, heatwave day trips and ice-cream Sundays' The TimesAn alternative history of modern Britain, Looking to Sea is an exquisite work of cultural, artistic and philosophical storytelling. Looking to Sea considers ten pivotal artworks, from Vanessa Bell's Studland Beach, one of the first modernist paintings in Britain, to Paul Nash's work bearing the scars of his experience in the trenches and Martin Parr's photographs of seaside resorts in the 1980s, which raised controversial questions of class. Each of the startlingly different pieces, created between 1912 and 2015, opens a window onto big ideas, from modernism and the sublime, the impact of the world wars and colonialism, to issues crucial to our world today like the environment and nationhood. In this astonishingly perceptive portrait of the twentieth century, art critic Lily Le Brun brings a fresh eye to a vast idea, offering readers an imaginative new way of seeing our island nation.'Le Brun's writing is at once bold and delicate, far-reaching and fine-tuned. Her book explores the inexhaustible variety of human perception.' Alexandra Harris'A smart and clear-eyed set of meditations on marine gaze, made with a painterly touch worthy of the chosen artists. Empathy and intelligence lift memoir into cultural history.' Iain Sinclair'Elegant and endlessly interesting . . . as much a rich compendium of social history as it is a hard consideration of art itself' Critic

Read more less

Childhood joy, pleasure, and creativity are not often associated with the civil rights movement. Their ties to the movement may have faded from historical memory, but these qualities received considerable photographic attention in that tumultuous era. Katharine Capshaw’s Civil Rights Childhood reveals how the black child has been—and continues to be—a social agent that demands change. Because children carry a compelling aura of human value and potential, images of African American children in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education had a powerful effect on the fight for civil rights. In the iconography of Emmett Till and the girls murdered in the 1963 Birmingham church bombings, Capshaw explores the function of children’s photographic books and the image of the black child in social justice campaigns for school integration and the civil rights movement. Drawing on works ranging from documentary photography, coffee-table and art books, and popular historical narratives and photographic picture books for the very young, Civil Rights Childhood sheds new light on images of the child and family that portrayed liberatory models of blackness, but it also considers the role photographs played in the desire for consensus and closure with the rise of multiculturalism.Offering rich analysis, Capshaw recovers many obscure texts and photographs while at the same time placing major names like Langston Hughes, June Jordan, and Toni Morrison in dialogue with lesser-known writers. An important addition to thinking about representation and politics, Civil Rights Childhood ultimately shows how the photobook—and the aspirations of childhood itself—encourage cultural transformation.

Read more less

An unprecedented look at Nellie Mae Rowe’s art as a radical act of self-expression and liberation in the post-civil rights-era South A New York Times critics' pick | Best Art Books 2021 During the last 15 years of her life, Nellie Mae Rowe lived on Paces Ferry Road, a major thoroughfare in Vinings, Georgia, and welcomed visitors to her “Playhouse,” which she decorated with found-object installations, handmade dolls, chewing-gum sculptures and hundreds of drawings. Rowe created her first works as a child in rural Fayetteville, Georgia, but only found the time and space to reclaim her artistic practice in the late 1960s, following the deaths of her second husband and her longtime employer. This book offers an unprecedented view of how Rowe cultivated her drawing practice late in life, starting with colorful and at times simple sketches on found materials and moving toward her most celebrated, highly complex compositions on paper. Through photographs and reconstructions of her Playhouse created for an experimental documentary on her life, this publication is also the first to juxtapose her drawings with her art environment. Nellie Mae Rowe (1900–82) grew up in rural Fayetteville, Georgia. When her Playhouse became an Atlanta attraction, she began to exhibit her art outside of her home, beginning with Missing Pieces: Georgia Folk Art, 1770–1976, a traveling exhibition that brought attention to several Southern self-taught artists, including Rowe and Howard Finster. In 1982, the year she died, Rowe’s work received a new level of acclaim, as she was honored in a solo exhibition at Spelman College and included as one of three women artists in the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s landmark exhibition .

Read more less

“This debut has it all: music, books, aliens, adventure, resistance, queerness, and a bold heroine tying it all together. ”—Ms. MagazineCan a girl who risks her life for books and an Ilori who loves pop music work together to save humanity?When a rebel librarian meets an Ilori commander…Two years ago, a misunderstanding between the leaders of Earth and the invading Ilori resulted in the death of one-third of the world’s population. Today, seventeen-year-old Ellie Baker survives in an Ilori-controlled center in New York City. All art, books and creative expression are illegal, but Ellie breaks the rules by keeping a secret library.When young Ilori commander Morris finds Ellie’s illegal library, he’s duty-bound to deliver her for execution. But Morris isn’t a typical Ilori…and Ellie and her books might be the key to a desperate rebellion of his own.“The Sound of Stars is a marvelous genre-bending debut." —The Nerd Daily“The Sound of Stars is a stunning exploration of the comforts that make us human and the horrors that challenge our humanity.”—K. Ancrum, author of The Wicker King "This book has everything! Aliens set on conquering earth! A determined heroine with a hidden stash of books! And the power of music and stories to give those with every reason to hate the power to love. Who could want anything more?"—Joelle Charbonneau, New York Times bestselling author of The Testing and Verify “An absolute must-read for everyone.” —Book Riot “Dow's debut is a testament to hope and the power of art.” —Buzzfeed Also by Alechia Dow:The Kindred

Read more less

One of Hyperallergic's Top Ten Art Books for 2021 Approximately 300 daily and weekly newspapers flourished in New York before the Civil War. A majority of these newspapers, even those that proclaimed independence of party, were motivated by political conviction and often local conflicts. Their editors and writers jockeyed for government office and influence. Political infighting and their related maneuvers dominated the popular press, and these political and economic agendas led in turn to exploitation of art and art exhibitions. Humbug traces the relationships, class animosities, gender biases, and racial projections that drove the terms of art criticism, from the emergence of the penny press to the Civil War. The inexpensive “penny” papers that appeared in the 1830s relied on advertising to survive. Sensational stories, satire, and breaking news were the key to selling papers on the streets. Coverage of local politicians, markets, crime, and personalities, including artists and art exhibitions, became the penny papers’ lifeblood. These cheap papers, though unquestionably part of the period’s expanding capitalist economy, offered socialists, working-class men, bohemians, and utopianists a forum in which they could propose new models for American art and society and tear down existing ones. Arguing that the politics of the antebellum press affected the meaning of American art in ways that have gone unrecognized, Humbug covers the changing politics and rhetoric of this criticism. Author Wendy Katz demonstrates how the penny press’s drive for a more egalitarian society affected the taste and values that shaped art, and how the politics of their art criticism changed under pressure from nativists, abolitionists, and expansionists. Chapters explore James Gordon Bennett’s New York Herald and its attack on aristocratic monopolies on art; the penny press’s attack on the American Art-Union, an influential corporation whose Board purchased artworks from living artists, exhibited them in a free gallery, and then distributed them in an annual five-dollar lottery; exposés of the fraudulent trade in Old Masters works; and the efforts of socialists, freethinkers, and bohemians to reject the authority of the past.

Read more less

Spark Your Creativity with Calligraphy“I found Lettering from A to Z to be an open door, inviting me to play and create in entirely new ways.” —Sherry Richert Belul, author of Say it Now and founder of Simply CelebrateWinner Indie Book Award for Gift/Specialty/Novelty Book in 2021Winner 15th Annual National Indie Excellence Awards (2021) for Crafts & Hobbies#1 New Release in Handwriting Reference, Mixed Media, and PrintmakingLettering artist Phawnda Moore has been teaching calligraphy and design for 25 years. An award-winning author, she steps into beginning students’ shoes to select content, address anticipated questions, and offer solutions to the unexpected yet inevitable problems that are encountered in hand lettering.Your creative life will be enriched with step-by-step tutorials “from A to Z.” Written in conversational narrative, this full-color book includes more than 200 images of Phawnda’s professional work, published articles, and guidance from her class demos to make beautiful projects. Blending traditional design principles and modern tools, it inspires you to find your own style.Phawnda's instruction includes: 12 styles (Uncial calligraphy, Italic calligraphy, script calligraphy, brush lettering, faux calligraphy, rainbow lettering, monoline letters, handwriting and drawn letters) Customized, printable practice sheets Recommended writing tools, papers, sources, printing tips Layout, color, and design basics Lettering projects for youngsters Tips on how to organize your studio space Tips on sharing your skills in teaching, business, events, home, garden, and community Illustrating with calligraphy tools Projects to make handmade birthday cards, holiday cards, journals of your life, and easy-to-design art books If you enjoyed Hand Lettering 101, The Lost Art of Handwriting, or Hand Lettering for Relaxation, then it’s time to grab a copy of Lettering from A to Z and reconnect to your natural creativity.

Read more less

This gemlike Ray Johnson book celebrates his friendship with writer and logophile William S. Wilson in pictures and words A New York Times critics' pick | Best Art Books 2020 Dubbed "Ray Johnson's Boswell," writer and logophile William S. Wilson was one of legendary artist Ray Johnson's closest friends and biggest champions. He was also perhaps Johnson’s most trusted poetic muse and synthesizer of referents and references. The influence was mutual: throughout their lifelong friendship, begun when both men were in their twenties, writer and artist challenged and enriched one another’s work. Published on the occasion of the exhibition of Ray Johnson works from Wilson's archive at the Art Institute of Chicago, Frog Pond Splash embodies the energy, expansiveness and motion of their work and their friendship. Editor Elizabeth Zuba has selected short, perspicacious texts by Wilson (from both published and unpublished writings) and collage works by Johnson to create juxtapositions that do not explicate or illustrate; rather, they form a loose collage-like letter of works and writings that are less bound than assembled, allowing the reader to put the pieces together, to respond, to add to and return to the way Johnson required of his correspondents and fellow travelers. Taking its title from Wilson's haiku equivalence of Johnson's process, Frog Pond Splash is a small book but many things: a collage-like homage to their friendship, a treasure chest of prismatic "correspondances," as well as an unusual portrait of the disappearing, fractured Johnson through Wilson's words. Zuba's nuanced selection and arrangement of images and texts in this sumptuous little volume honors Johnson's "open system" (which rejected closed and consistent meanings, codes and symbols) in its open, associative, and intimate playfulness.

Read more less

A deserted Paris house holds the mystery of a brilliant Viennese modernist who worked alongside Le Corbusier and Adolf Loos before vanishing.Wyeth takes readers on a deeply personal and revelatory journey. This research process, which readers experience vicariously, makes Wyeth’s prose exhilarating as tiny details become breakthroughs of grand proportions. […] For late architect and painter Jean Welz, designs should reflect one’s aesthetic and political commitments. This narrative will resonate with anyone interested in the politics of architecture, or the pursuit of knowledge at large.—Hyperallergic "BEST ART BOOKS OF 2022"Welz’s having been “lost” is indeed a travesty of architectural history to which the book serves as a welcome antidote.—Artforum A leading painter still highly regarded in South Africa, Jean Welz's prior architectural career has been virtually unknown until a string of discoveries unfolded for author and filmmaker Peter Wyeth, allowing him to narrate this amazing true tale of genius. Trained in ultra-sophisticated, but conservative Vienna, Welz was sent to Paris for the 1925 Art Deco exhibition by his influential employer, renowned architect Josef Hoffmann. There he met preeminent modern architects Le Corbusier and Adolf Loos. The latter employed him to assist in building a house for the founder of Dada, Tristan Tzara. They all mixed in avant-garde circles at the Dôme Café in Montparnasse along with Welz’s classmate from Vienna, later Chicago-based architect Gabriel Guevrekian; Welz’s future employer Raymond Fischer, whose archive was mostly destroyed by Nazis; and photographer André Kertész. Through Welz’s South African family archive, author Wyeth retrieves stories, letters, portfolios, and photographs generations after Welz’s death that unravel his heroic designs, his stunning built critique of Corbusier’s “Five Points of Architecture,” a gravestone for Marx’s daughter, and the many ways that Welz disappeared amongst his collaborators, intentionally and not. This account of why Jean Welz did not become a famous name in architecture takes us through his brother’s Nazi-art-dealings, illness, betrayal, emigration, and an uncompromising artist’s vision at the same time sifting through significant, literally-concrete evidence of Welz’s built projects and visionary designs.

Read more less

One of Hyperallergic's Top Ten Art Books for 2021 Approximately 300 daily and weekly newspapers flourished in New York before the Civil War. A majority of these newspapers, even those that proclaimed independence of party, were motivated by political conviction and often local conflicts. Their editors and writers jockeyed for government office and influence. Political infighting and their related maneuvers dominated the popular press, and these political and economic agendas led in turn to exploitation of art and art exhibitions. Humbug traces the relationships, class animosities, gender biases, and racial projections that drove the terms of art criticism, from the emergence of the penny press to the Civil War. The inexpensive “penny” papers that appeared in the 1830s relied on advertising to survive. Sensational stories, satire, and breaking news were the key to selling papers on the streets. Coverage of local politicians, markets, crime, and personalities, including artists and art exhibitions, became the penny papers’ lifeblood. These cheap papers, though unquestionably part of the period’s expanding capitalist economy, offered socialists, working-class men, bohemians, and utopianists a forum in which they could propose new models for American art and society and tear down existing ones. Arguing that the politics of the antebellum press affected the meaning of American art in ways that have gone unrecognized, Humbug covers the changing politics and rhetoric of this criticism. Author Wendy Katz demonstrates how the penny press’s drive for a more egalitarian society affected the taste and values that shaped art, and how the politics of their art criticism changed under pressure from nativists, abolitionists, and expansionists. Chapters explore James Gordon Bennett’s New York Herald and its attack on aristocratic monopolies on art; the penny press’s attack on the American Art-Union, an influential corporation whose Board purchased artworks from living artists, exhibited them in a free gallery, and then distributed them in an annual five-dollar lottery; exposés of the fraudulent trade in Old Masters works; and the efforts of socialists, freethinkers, and bohemians to reject the authority of the past.

Read more less

THE SUNDAY TIMES ART BOOK OF THE YEAR A Sunday Times Best Paperback of 2022 Christie's Best Art Books of the Year 'Deft and richly detailed ... rescues the artist from John Bull caricature' - Michael Prodger, Sunday Times 'Marvellous ... a vivid and compelling reconstruction of the settings of Hogarth's life and artistic achievements, and of the nature of the man' - Professor Linda Colley, author of The Gun, the Ship, and the Pen 'Full of richness, originality and considered humour, unafraid to shock with thrilling new insight ... terrific' - Dr Gus Casely-Hayford, Director of V&A Stratford & Sky Arts 'The full technicolour panorama of Georgian life laid out in a huge and passionate book' - Lucy Worsley, Chief Curator at Historic Royal Palaces and author of Courtiers: The Secret History of the Georgian Court On a late spring night in 1732, a boisterous group of friends set out from their local pub. They are beginning a journey, a 'peregrination' that will take them through the gritty streets of Georgian London and along the River Thames as far as the Isle of Sheppey. And among them is an up-and-coming engraver and painter, just beginning to make a name for himself: William Hogarth. Hogarth's vision, to a vast degree, still defines the eighteenth century. In this, the first biography for over twenty years, Jacqueline Riding brings him to vivid life, immersing us in the world he inhabited and from which he drew inspiration. At the same time, she introduces us to an artist who was far bolder and more various than we give him credit for: an ambitious self-made man, a devoted husband, a sensitive portraitist, an unmatched storyteller, philanthropist, technical innovator and author of a seminal work of art theory. Following in his own footsteps from humble beginnings to professional triumph (and occasional disaster), Hogarth illuminates the work and life of a great artist who embraced the highest principles even while charting humanity's lowest vices.

Read more less

Named One of the "Best Art Books of 2018" by the New York Times Fifty years after Martin Luther King Jr.'s death—and at a time when race relations and social justice are again at the forefront of our country's consciousness—this book expands on a Frist Art Museum exhibition to present a selection of approximately one hundred photographs that document an important period in Nashville's struggle for racial equality. The images were taken between 1957, the year that desegregation in public schools began, and 1968, when the National Guard was called in to surround the state capitol in the wake of the civil rights leader's assassination in Memphis. Of central significance are photographs of lunch counter sit-ins in early 1960, led by a group of students, including John Lewis (who contributed the book's foreword) and Diane Nash, from local historically black colleges and universities. The demonstrations were so successful that King stated just a few weeks later at Fisk University: "I did not come to Nashville to bring inspiration but to gain inspiration from the great movement that has taken place in this community." The role that Nashville played in the national civil rights movement as a hub for training students in nonviolent protest and as the first Southern city to integrate places of business is a story that warrants reexamination. The book also provides an opportunity to consider the role of images and the media in shaping public opinion, a relevant subject in today's news-saturated climate. Photographs from the archives of both daily newspapers are included: the Tennessean, which was the more liberal publication, and the Nashville Banner, a conservative paper whose leadership seemed less interested in covering events related to racial issues. Some of the photographs in the exhibition had been selected to be published in the papers, but many were not, and their disclosure reveals insight into the editorial process. In several images, other photojournalists and news crews are visible, serving as a reminder of the almost constant presence of the camera during these historic times. Essays by Linda Wynn of Fisk University and the Tennessee Historical Commission and Susan H. Edwards, executive director of the Frist Art Museum, offer historical context on Nashville during the civil rights era and on photojournalism, respectively. Congressman John Lewis's foreword recounts memories of his time in Nashville and reminds us that there is still work to be done to build King's Beloved Community.

Read more less

Scotland-born, London-based artist Caroline Walker is celebrated for her paintings exploring the lives of women, from those living luxury lifestyles to those fleeing oppression. In this publication, which was produced to accompany Walker’s first exhibition with Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, in autumn 2020, the artist turns her attention closer to home, presenting a series of paintings in which the focus is the artist’s own mother, Janet, as she goes about her daily tasks: cooking, cleaning, tidying and tending the garden of the Fife home where the artist spent her childhood.The publication features a newly commissioned essay and an interview with the artist by critic and author Hettie Judah. The essay opens by comparing Walker’s works to the Dutch Golden Age, encouraging consideration of everyday domestic scenes. Judah then leads the reader through Walker’s latest series of works, exploring the daily routines and household chores that have filled Walker’s mother’s days for the past forty years, along with the artist’s treatment of these activities. Judah deftly locates this latest body of work within Walker’s wider practice, opening up discussion of women at work in different industries and notions of invisibility. She asserts: ‘While "Janet" extends Walker’s long-held interest in women’s work, the series is also a loving undertaking. The artist offers us her mother with great pride, both in particular, and on behalf of other mothers overlooked and working out of sight.’ The interview offers further insight into Walker’s thoughts in relation to the "Janet" series, and to the working processes behind it.The publication features around eighty illustrations of the preparatory studies and paintings that comprise this new body of work. It has been designed by Joanna Deans, Identity, with photography by Peter Mallet. The publication was produced by Ingleby, Edinburgh, and printed by Die Keure, Bruges. It was co-published in 2020 by Ingleby and Anomie Publishing, London, in an edition of 1500 copies.Caroline Walker was born in Dunfermline, Scotland, in 1982. She attended Glasgow School of Art from 2000-04, before completing her MA at the Royal College of Art in 2009. Recent and forthcoming exhibitions include Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, the Midlands Arts Centre (MAC), Birmingham, and participation in the ninth edition of the British Art Show. She is represented in a number of public collections including the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, the UK Government Art Collection, London, Kistefos Museum, Jevnaker, Norway, and Museum Voorlinden & Kunstmuseum den Haag, in the Netherlands.Hettie Judah is chief art critic of the British daily newspaper The i, a regular contributor to The Guardian, The New York Times, Frieze, Art Quarterly, Numéro Art and The Art Newspaper, and a contributing editor to The Plant. Recent publications include a short biography of Frida Kahlo (Laurence King, 2020) and Art London (ACC Art Books, 2019).

Read more less