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Naum Gabo (1890-1977), whose eventful life took him from his native Russia to Berlin, Paris, London, and finally the United States, achieved renown as one of the most inventive and controversial figures in twentieth-century sculpture. This book is the first comprehensive account of Gabo's life, career, and artistic theory and practice. Martin Hammer and Christina Lodder explore in detail the evolution of the artist's work and his aesthetic concerns, creative processes, assimilation of such new materials as plastic, and approach to public sculpture. The authors also examine his response to the scientific and political revolutions of his age and trace the origins and development of Gabo's utopian conviction that Constructivist art was profoundly in tune with modernity, social progress, and advances in science and technology. Drawing on Gabo's extensive and largely unpublished archives of letters, diaries, notebooks, models, and sketchbooks, Hammer and Lodder discuss the sculptor's work in the context of his relations with other avant-garde artists, architects, and critics, including his brother Antoine Pevsner. They also situate his aesthetic theory and practice within the Constructi
The art of Francis Bacon (1909-1992) epitomises the angst at the heart of the modern human condition. His dramatic images of screaming figures and distorted anatomies are painted with a richly gestural technique, alluding to such old masters as Titian, Velázquez and Rembrandt. Displaying repressed and raw emotion, his body of work includes portraits of Lucian Freud and John Deakin.
Born in 1909, Francis Bacon's entire early adulthood was penetrated by the tragedy of the Second World War. Unlike many of his contemporaries in Britain, he did not participate in the war or become a war artist. Rather, he is unique amongst his generation of artists as independently choosing Hitler, Nazi Germany and Fascist propaganda to be one of the most influential sources for his practice. In this new scholarly study, Martin Hammer addresses the question of how and why Bacon appropriated the photographs and documentation of Fascist imagery to his own expressive ends, emphasising how it was used technically in his painting as a visual aid, and how, far from being an artist of private spaces and personal anguish, he in fact found inspiration from mass circulated media and the use of it for the promotion of global ideals. Featuring an extensive selection of colour and black-and-white reproductions of both paintings and source material from Bacon's own collected archive, Hammer uses focussed visual engagement with Bacon's work, illuminating the artist's aims to comment and reflect on the wider contemporary world.
A fascinating look at Irving Penn's platinum prints, which the photographer carefully made of some of his most iconic images.
Reveals the history of naked portraiture comparing artworks and photographs.
The superb new novel from the international No.1 bestselling author of Scrublands. 'Vivid and mesmerising' Sunday Times 'Hammer is a great writer - a leader in Australian noir' Michael Connelly, bestselling author of Dark Sacred Night A HOMECOMING MARRED BY BLOOD Journalist Martin Scarsden returns to Port Silver to make a fresh start with his partner Mandy. But he arrives to find his childhood friend murdered - and Mandy is the prime suspect. Desperate to clear her name, Martin goes searching for the truth. A TERRIBLE CRIME The media descends on the coastal town, compelled by a story that has it all: sex, drugs, celebrity, and religion. Martin is chasing the biggest scoop of his career, and ...
Detective Lou Decker's life is in disarray. Since the death of his wife, questionable actions on the job as a detective have led to his suspension. Alcohol fuels his dissolution. He lacks family ties, and the only person of importance in his life is his sister. Decker is then suddenly challenged by the disappearance of his sister at the hands of a religious cult. In his attempt to rescue her, Decker comes face-to-face with the startling reality and power of supernatural evil. Along the way, he encounters a host of characters, both mundane and supernatural, who will impact this search and life indelibly. Will Decker find his sister? Will Decker find spiritual redemption? And finally, will Decker survive the deadly confrontation with evil?
You think you know someone... Would you bet your life on it? A detective came to her home, drugged her and kidnapped her. She tries to make sense of it, but only one conclusion is possible: it's the past, come to claim her. His new life seemed perfect - right up until the moment a missed call shatters everything. Ex-journalist Martin Scarsden checks his voicemail, and all he hears is his partner Mandy's terrified scream before the phone cuts off. Racing home, he finds an unconscious man sprawled on the floor and Mandy gone. Someone has abducted her. But who, and why? So starts a riveting tale of intrigue and danger, as Martin probes the hidden past of the woman he loves. But can he trust her...
* * *NOW A MAJOR BBC TV SERIES * * * THE #1 BESTSELLING AUSTRALIAN CRIME NOVEL WINNER OF THE CWA JOHN CREASEY DAGGER SUNDAY TIMES CRIME BOOK OF THE YEAR 2019 'Shimmers ... a tortured tale of blood and loss' Val McDermid 'Stunning ... Scrublands is that rare combination, a page-turner that stays long in the memory' Sunday Times (Crime Book of the Month) In an isolated country town ravaged by drought, a charismatic young priest opens fire on his congregation, killing five men before being shot dead himself. A year later, journalist Martin Scarsden arrives in Riversend to write a feature on the anniversary of the tragedy. But the stories he hears from the locals don't fit with the accepted vers...
This book is the first biography of Nikolay Punin (1888-1953). One of the most prominent art-critics of the avant-garde, in 1919 Punin was the Commissar of the Hermitage and Russian Museums, he was lecturing at the Academy of Arts and at the State University in Petrograd (and subsequently Leningrad). He was the right hand of Lunacharsky and the head of the Petrograd branch of the Visual Arts Department of Narkompross. From 1913 till 1938, Punin worked at the Russian Museum and organized several major exhibitions of Russian art. Yet his name is not widely known in the West, primarily because his file languished in the KGB archives since he died in 1953, partly because his grave in the Gulag w...