You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
A comprehensive and beautifully illustrated history of watercolor, printed on a special paper stock As an artistic medium, watercolor is so widely practiced, and so widely beloved, that it can be startling to reflect on its humble origins. For hundreds of years, nevertheless, watercolor labored in the shadow of oil painting; it was dismissed as a mere tool for creating preparatory studies, or as a “feminine” pastime. But, from the Renaissance, there have been artists who recognized the unique potential of watercolor: its luminosity, its immediacy, its ability to create atmosphere—qualities that derive directly from the quick-drying, translucent nature of water-based pigments. In this l...
An illustrated tour of the elegant entrances to New York City’s most celebrated apartment houses This handsome, oversized book introduces us to the grandest entrances of New York City’s residential buildings. These posh portals come in an array of forms and styles, such as the porte cochere, with a passage to admit carriages or motor cars; the classic awning, originally meant to be retracted in good weather; and Neoclassical, Romanesque, and Gothic revivals. Architectural historian Andrew Alpern highlights approximately 140 entrances, from the nineteenth century to the present, including those of the Dakota, the first true luxury apartment house in New York; San Remo, one of Central Park...
Beautiful black-and-white photographs of Santorini taken between 1954 and 1964—depicting idyllic landscapes and traditional island culture Today Santorini is visited by some 2.5 million people a year. But when Robert McCabe and his brother arrived there in 1954, they were the only visitors on the island. In this collection of stunning photographs from the 1950s and 1960s—reproduced as tritones of surpassing quality—McCabe has recorded the hardscrabble, yet often romantic, life of a vanished era. Picturesque whitewashed houses dug into the volcanic pumice; the harvest of the island’s famous cherry tomatoes; the winding road to the ruins of ancient Thera—all this was captured by his lens. McCabe’s photographs are complemented by two essays from the noted Greek journalist Margarita Pournara, one poetically evoking her grandmother’s childhood on Santorini and the other explaining the geological forces that have given this volcanic island its dramatic form. A companion to McCabe’s recent volume on Mykonos, this book will fascinate modern-day visitors to Santorini, as well as those who trace their roots to the Greek islands.
"The preface to the second Italian edition was translated by Marguerite Shore"--T.p. verso.
A lavishly illustrated presentation of work by one of the most admired architects of the 20th century, this volume serves to inform and inspire and will be valued by architects, travellers, and artists of all stripes. Material is arranged in chapters devoted to overlapping chronological periods that highlight the evolution of various themes in Gaudi's work, beginning in 1870 and ending in 1926. Bassegoda has written many books on Gaudi and is affiliated with the School of Architecture at the Polytechnical University of Catalonia (Barcelona); photographs are by Melba Levick. 10.5x9.25". Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
The two-volume work Modernism has been awarded the prestigious 2008 MSA Book Prize! Modernism has constituted one of the most prominent fields of literary studies for decades. While it was perhaps temporarily overshadowed by postmodernism, recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in modernism on both sides of the Atlantic. These volumes respond to a need for a collective and multifarious view of literary modernism in various genres, locations, and languages. Asking and responding to a wealth of theoretical, aesthetic, and historical questions, 65 scholars from several countries test the usefulness of the concept of modernism as they probe a variety of contexts, from individual texts to national literatures, from specific critical issues to broad cross-cultural concerns. While the chief emphasis of these volumes is on literary modernism, literature is seen as entering into diverse cultural and social contexts. These range from inter-art conjunctions to philosophical, environmental, urban, and political domains, including issues of race and space, gender and fashion, popular culture and trauma, science and exile, all of which have an urgent bearing on the poetics of modernity.
A landmark, hardcover, slipcased volume that tells the story of the archetypal Renaissance city anew, through its art. Placed at the heart of Italy, Florence was already in the Middle Ages a center of commerce and fine craftsmanship. Spurred on by a few powerful dynasties of merchants and financiers—above all the Medici, but also the Strozzi, the Pitti, and others—the city became the leading force in the Renaissance of the arts, literature, and science. Challenging the primacy of the Venetian Republic and even the city of the Popes, Florence attained a glory that was reflected down through the later centuries of Medici rule. And Florence was all along a city of painters, who recorded its...
A sumptuous artistic tribute to the city of lights, this hardcover, slipcased volume brings Paris to life in paintings that range from the medieval to the modern. “Paris is a moveable feast,” Ernest Hemingway once proclaimed. The city of lights, or the city of love, Paris is indeed a feast for the senses. Paris’s rich history has been justly captured by the many artists sheltered by its garrets and supported by its patrons for centuries. Finally the story and grandeur of this beautiful city are revealed in this luxurious slipcased volume. The over 300 full-color illustrations, including four breathtaking gatefolds, present Paris from its days as a medieval city on the Ile de la Cité, ...
A one-of-a-kind collection of movie posters spanning fifty years, from silent films to Cinemascope For four decades film historian Ira M. Resnick has been amassing a superb collection of 2,000 vintage movie posters and 1,500 stills, which has never before been published. Starstruck: Vintage Movie Posters from Classic Hollywood features the best of Resnick’s collection, with vivid reproductions of 250 posters and forty stills from the golden age of Hollywood, 1912 to 1962. In a moving introduction, Resnick relates how his love of vintage movie art translated into a career as a collector and the founder of the Motion Picture Arts Gallery, the first gallery devoted exclusively to the art of t...
Examines the history and influences of the De Stijl abstract art movement and analyzes the work of artists, including Piet Mondrian, Bart van der Leck, and Gerrit Rietveld