Reviews (1)

Run away! Run away!
This book is basically unreadable. Impenetrable metaphysical terminology is used in dense, convoluted sentences to convey abstruse theories of meaning (at least I think that's what it is) in such a way as to be completely and utterly opaque. Half the time I didn't know what the guy was talking about, and I have a degree in this stuff and belong to Mensa. If you're interested in Turner, you'd do better to look elsewhere.

Some good reproductions though, and if you're just interested in the pictures, the price is right. Hence the two stars; the text would be zero, since it's useless. ... Read more

Book Description

One of Sherman’s most popular series - the Centerfolds were created in 1981 as a special project for Artforum at the invitation of Ingrid Sischy who was then the Editor. Composed by Sherman to utilize the "centerfold" format of the magazine, the 12 images feature self-portraits, which fill the frame. In the end Artforum chose not to run them, but they have since become both an integral point in the oeuvre of Sherman and a part of our contemporary visual iconography.The 12 images are featured in this handsome hardcover catalogue. Lisa Phillips, Director of The New Museum of Contemporary Art contributes the text. Issued in a relatively small print run this book should only increase in value over time.

Texts by Sylvia Wolf and Deirdre English. Clothbound, 12 x 6 in. / 44 pages / 12 color ... Read more

Book Description

A critical primer on artist Richard Serra's work. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

little treasure
A wonderful little book to get you looking at Serra's work in a critical fashion. I haven't read all the essays just yet, but so far they've been quite good. A priori art history knowledge required, but none about Serra's work. Serra is certainly one of the greatest artists working today, so to have a little companion like this makes his work all the more interesting.

an excellent compilation
The Library Journal review above makes this book sound terrifyingly difficult. In fact, if you're the kind of person interested in buying a critical work on Serra, you're probably "up" enough to read this with ease. It's a loose collection of interviews, criticism and essays, including what I think is the best piece I've read on Serra yet, by Krauss. Not too much prior knowledge of contemporary art history is assumed, and the book is thankfully light on defining genres and sub-sub-genres in which to put Serra's work. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Thoughtfully written
A very honest study of Honor Moore's grandmother Margarett Sargent. I was impressed by the amount of research that went into painting a portrait of a complex and intelligent woman and artist. A certain amount of sympathy is felt for Margarett, yet she was a proud independent woman whose strength inspires. For me, Margarett's life transcended the label of "wealthy society woman." She had great talent that she put to use. With all the advances in anti-depressives and the treatment of bi-polar illness one wonders if the mental illness that helped suck her into a vacuum of loss would have been able to do so in this decade. In the end, her loss became our loss. Honor Moore did a great thing by keeping her grandmother's memory alive so that we could revisit her colorful art and life. A great read

Excellent recreation of a misunderstood artist!
Honor Moore spent more than a decade researching the life of her grandmother, the painter Margarett Sargent, in an attempt to understand why she stopped painting in middle age. "It was too intense," was all her grandmother ever told the author, late in the ex-painter's long life. Ms. Moore attempts to show that the demands of Sargent's privileged Boston society lifestyle forced her to give up her art and contributed to her madness. A wonderful read, and a surprising insight into the creative process, especially in a woman. --Jack Sheed ... Read more

Book Description

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Britain's greatest and most mysterious artist, was the son of a Convent Garden barber and a woman who died in Bethlehem mental hospital. During his lifetime (1775-1851), Turner achieved fame and fortune for a range of work encompassing seascape and landscape, immensely powerful oil paintings and intimate watercolors. His friend and colleague C. R. Leslie remembered him thus: "Turner was short and stout, and had a sturdy, sailor-like walk. He might be taken for the captain of a steamboat at first glance; but a second would find more in his face than belongs in any ordinary mind. There was the peculiar keenness of expression in his eye that is only seen in men of constant habits of observation."

For this new biography, thefirst comprehensive narrative of Turner's life in a generation, Anthony Bailey has searched through the archives, studied the scholarly literature, made use of much research done in the last thirty years, and looked at almost all of Turner's sketchbooks as well as many of his paintings and watercolors. He has uncovered fresh material and put together other facts, previously known, to shed new light on those complicated and secretive man.

Anthony Bailey has set out to write a biography ofthe man, not a book about his paintings, and J.M.W. Turner comes vividly to life in theses pages. Both reclusive and gregarious, private and vainglorious, tough and vulnerable, a long-tern bachelor who fathered two daughters, Turner was full of contradictions, and Anthony Bailey rises masterfully to the challenge of describing them here. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

If you enjoy reading about eccentrics...
This very well written biography works well on two levels - a portrait of Turner the man, an endearing eccentric, and Turner, the painter, an artist who painted in both an extremely academic style and a visionary and expressive one. Anthony Bailey artfully weaves in and out of the contradictions in Turner's work and his character. Highly recommended.

Fine Portrait of a Great Landscape Painter
Avid readers of biographies often note that great men and women in their fields exhibit striking contradictions in their personalities. Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851), England's greatest landscape painter, is no exception and those contradictions are highlighted in Anthony Bailey's excellent 1997 biography. Notoriously tight-fisted in his dealings in the art world, Turner was equally capable of striking magnanimity towards his few friends. Jealously protective of his paintings, he left dozens of his masterpieces rotting in his gallery at the time of his death, virtually uncared for. Indifferent towards his two, illegitimate daughters, Turner was reported to have burst into tears at the death of a patron. All these characteristics are illuminated in Bailey's fine study. Organized on thematic, rather than on strictly chronological lines, Bailey's portrait emphasizes the man instead of his work, although Turner's major works are not neglected. Like all good biographers, Bailey is also careful to describe his subject in the context of his times, a tumultuous period in western European history. At bottom, though, Turner was a man devoted to his craft and his political awareness appears rarely to have extended beyond the infighting and maneuvering accompanying his long membership in the Royal Academy. There are many specialist studies of Turner's work, but this may be the best portrait yet of Turner. Still, Bailey has not fully penetrated the sources of Turner's unique vision, (perhaps an impossible task),a vision that baffled many contemporaries and placed Turner "out of his time" in much the same way that Blake appears of a different time, out of synch with the poets of his age. This biography is highly recommended to anyone having more than a passing interest in art or art history.

Brilliant account of one of England's best painters
Anthony Bailey provides the modern reader with a most readable and interesting account of the painter, Turner, and his life. Mr. Bailey, captures the essence of Turner's character and brilliance as a landscape painter. He leads the reader down a path of vivid description and imagery that encourages and entices one to go on and read more. Turner was a creator of illusion and mystique in paintings. He captured the mood and climate of his country in the mist, storms, clouds, sunsets, and sunrises created with his brush. I had the opportunity to buy Standing in the Sun recently in England, and I found it to be an excellent tribute to a fine English painter by a truly gifted English writer, Anthony Bailey.

A fine biography of a great painter by a fine writer
J.M.W. Turner was a great painter and a very strange man. His genius was recognized early,and he lived well and died rich. He was secretive exhibitionistic,miserly and generous by turns. His works are not too easy to see in the U.S. because he sold well in England and left his paintings to the nation. Bailey has written a superb biography of a man on whom it is difficult to understand. It compares well to his previous biography Rembrandt's House and displays tthe same graceful and lucid prose of his books on sailing,walking,and groeing up in England and America. I read the English edition and recommend this book unreservedly to anyone who likes great art and fine writing. Roger Marz ... Read more

Book Description

This volume comprises a social history of Robert Smithson's earthworks and their critical reception. In his analysis of the artist's personal writings and art works, Ron Graziani demonstrates how the earthworks were part of an aesthetic and civic fault line that ruptured in the 1960s. Moreover, Graziani reveals how Smithson's earthworks formed part of the "new conservationism" in the late 1960s and how it gave material form to the contradictions of a sociological issue, inseparable from its economic legacy. ... Read more

Book Description

Nancy Newhall wrote some of the most incisive work ever published on the inner lives of the photographers who shaped the medium. Her friendship with photographers such as Paul Strand, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Weston, Ansel Adams, and Helen Levitt, to name a few, lends her writing a vibrancy rarely found in essays on photography.

Newhall was one of the few people to gain access to the inner circle--and thoughts--of the imposing Alfred Stieglitz, and her intimate portrait of him, previously unpublished, reveals a man of genius, humor, and kindness.
... Read more

Reviews (1)

Great collection of Mid 20th Century Photography Writing
Nancy Newhall was (and continues to be some 29 years after her accidental death) one of the best writers on photography I have read. She was a confidant of such luminaries as Alfred Stieglitz and Ansel Adams (she was his first biographer), the acting curator of the Department of Photography at New York's Museum of Modern Art in the 1940's, a driving force in the influential magazine and publishing concern Aperture, and an avid writer of photography books.

The writings collected in "From Adams to Stieglitz: Pioneers of Modern Photography" represent a wonderful cross-section of her work. Her knowledge of the history of photography is amazing as she writes about the motivation driving the development of the medium. Two of the pieces are remarkable:

"Controversy and the Creative Concepts," written in 1953, compares and contrasts the photographic style of the "Parisian School" as represented by Cartier-Bresson and the "Western School" represented by Group f/64, Alfred Eisenstaedt, and Helen Bourke-White. Worlds diametrically opposed, each equally valid. The article presents an important overview of 20th century photography.

"The Caption: The Mutual Relation of Words/Photographs," written in 1952 for the first issue of Aperture, looks at the different types of captions that can be attached to a photograph (if any: Stieglitz refused to put caption on his work) and how one should write them. This essay provides nice insight into the practice of photographic writing.

Anyone with an interest in 20th century photography will find this book an essential part of their library. Her writing style is unique and wonderful, an absolute joy to read. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

simply works great
I am not so valid to give my review on this great piece of wonder.But after having a glance at it really i had recognised that i had done a great job. ... Read more

Book Description

Gilbert Stuart was probably the most gifted American portraitist of the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. He is best known for his "Athenaeum" portrait of George Washington, which is today a national icon. In this book, Dorinda Evans combines a wealth of original insights with revealing new documentation to present a long-needed, scholarly treatment of Stuart's life and influential work.

Evans begins by tracing Stuart's early years and artistic beginnings in Rhode Island. She follows him to London, where he rose to prominence among such artistic luminaries as Sir Joshua Reynolds and Benjamin West. She then examines his career in the United States, where he became the favored portraitist for the country's leading citizens. In assessing Stuart's artistic importance, Evans argues that his 1796 "Athenaeum" portrait of Washington--the most recognized likeness of the president--was a landmark in the expression of contemporary ideas about moral strength. More generally, she shows that Stuart's painting reflected a genius for interpreting the sitter's personality and a growing awareness of painting's public role in conveying uplifting messages about social dignity and virtue. She challenges the view that his later paintings show a decline, revealing many as concerned with expressing the human soul in a fresh and naturalistic way.

Evans also explores Stuart's private life, discounting recent portrayals of him as an outcast and a confidence trickster. She concludes that his notoriously erratic behavior, which veered from prolonged lethargy to reckless activity and extravagance, was a sign of manic-depressive illness. Evans gathered information about Stuart from a wide variety of previously untapped sources, including unpublished interviews with the artist that shed new light on controversies over his portraits of Washington and Thomas Jefferson. The book presents not only Stuart's most famous pictures--including The Skater and his portraits of early American presidents--but also many paintings never before published. Meticulously researched, elegantly written, and richly illustrated, The Genius of Gilbert Stuart will become the standard account of one of America's most important early artists. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

A good book on a great artist
Gilbert Stuart is a difficult artist to write upon for a variety of reasons. The first of which is that he has such an incredible body of work (well over one thousand portraits), yet seldom signed or dated them. Secondly, there is little written documentation by the artist himself, which leads to the "novelization" of his history. However, Dr. Evans provides a wonderfully written biography of the artist's life and a through examination of the evolution of his artistic style. Scholastically, this book covers all the bases, and Dr. Evans' footnotes prove to be extremely valuable for the Gilbert Stuart scholar. Finally, the color reproductions are splendid, which makes The Genius of Gilbert Stuart a wonderful coffee table book if you're not interested in Stuart in an academic sense. ... Read more

Book Description

In December 1968, the American artist Robert Smithson embarked on a field trip to the huge industrial complex in the Ruhr district of Germany. His local guides were the Düsseldorf-based artist duo of Bernd and Hilla Becher, and Konrad Fischer, in whose Düsseldorf gallery Smithson was scheduled to exhibit. The Bechers had begun their own project of photographing the vernacular industrial architecture of Northern Europe in the early 1960s, and had already spent several months photographing at Oberhausen as well as at adjacent industrial sites. The different series of photographs made by Smithson and the Bechers of the same site foreground their respective preoccupations with the industrial landscape and the process of production and entropy, with systems and their inevitable dissolution. Their contrasting bodies of work embody alternate perspectives on time: the Bechers' sense of historical time and Smithson's of the geological. Though formally divergent, each artist's work comprises a radical rethinking of classical notions of beauty and landscape. Neither the Bechers' typologies nor Smithson's projects were possible without prospecting in neglected parts of the landscape, whose distressed state refuted the relationship between history and progress.

Essay by James Lingwood.
Introduction by Vicente Todolí.

Hardcover, 168 pages, 53 color and 105 b&w images. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An Introduction, by fermed
Duncan Robinson is a professor at Yale, and his book on Stanley Spencer is a fine introduction to this mad eccentric from Cookham-on-Thames. Not long ago (1998) there was an exhibit of Spencer's work that traveled the United States, and so his name in this country is not as unknown as it used to be. Whether one is familiar with his work or not, this is a well balanced and nicely printed book, with over 100 reproductions, of which at least half are in color. I keep the book handy and have given copies of it to unsuspecting friends and relatives, who then (usually) become addicts of Mr. Spencer.

For those who have never seen Spencer's work, I certainly recommend using the internet as a first step in getting a feel for what he biographical and bibliographical information (although Robinson's book is not mentioned). The main drawback about looking at pictures on the internet is that many are so small and distorted that they dishonor the works they are trying to show; still, a visual approach is more effective than trying to describe the work of this extraordinary painter verbally. The pictures in Robinson's book, in contrast, are excellent reproductions and quite adequate as a means of presenting Spencer's work. I took a copy of this book to his exhibit and was satisfied with the quality of the reproductions one of England's most important painters of the 20th century. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Leaves out some of his best nudes
Egon Schiele remains one of my favorite artists. "Nudes" does have some excellent pieces included but should have been far more inclusive, since Schiele has such an extensive portfolio to draw from. Too many sketches that are only interesting because of the artist who drew them. This book is worth having if you're a true Schiele fan. However, I would strongly recommend "Schiele" by Wolfgang Georg Fisher if you want a more rounded perspective and those other nudes that should have been included here.

The human body
I felt that this book displayed an amazing collection of Scheile's life paintings. I was extremely moved by the expressive style in which he painted. ... Read more

Book Description

Book Description

Stanley Spencer is recognized as a British artist of singular vision, but he was also a prolific and highly individual writer. In moments between painting, Spencer wrote thousands of letters. He filled notebooks, diaries, and scraps of paper, recording his daily thoughts and future plans in a distinctly Spencerian manner. This book brings together for the first time an extensive selection of Spencer's key letters, notes, and theoretical writings, including important sections of Spencer's autobigraphy which remained unfinished at the time of his death. Spencer always believed that his writings were as important as his paintings, and this volume offers a unique insight into Spencer as writer, thinker, and artist. ... Read more