Книги по истории искусства

A comprehensive and sumptuous survey that celebrates the beauty and appeal of flowers throughout art, history, and culture

Take a journey across continents and cultures to discover the endless ways artists and image-makers have employed floral motifs throughout history. With 316 color illustrations showcasing the diversity of blooms from all over the world, Flower spans a wide range of styles and media - from art, botanical illustrations, and sculptures to floral arrangements, film stills, and textiles - and follows a visually stunning sequence with works, regardless of period, thoughtfully paired to allow interesting and revealing juxtapositions between them. Flower follows in the footsteps of Plant, Exploring the Botanical World, which Martha Stewart Living described as "breathtaking."

Featuring large-scale images and accessible texts Flower offers a comprehensive introduction to the subject and includes both much-loved works together with examples that may prove more surprising discoveries, even for specialists. Selected by an international panel of art historians, museum curators, botanists, florists, horticulturalists, and more, works by a diverse range of both lesser-known and iconic artists and image-makers are featured, including: Nobuyoshi Araki, Cecil Beaton, Georg Ehret, David Hockney, Horst P. Horst, Nick Knight, Yayoi Kusama, Leonardo da Vinci, Robert Mapplethorpe, Henri Matisse, Claude Monet, Cedric Morris, William Morris, Georgia O'Keeffe, Irving Penn, David Hockney, Pierre-Joseph Redouté, Rachel Ruysch, Constance Spry, and Flora Starkey.

Advisory panel: Lugene B. Bruno, Dr James Compton, Shane Connolly, Anne-Pierre d'Albis-Ganem, Celia Fisher, Susan M. Fraser, Victoria Gaiger, Elizabeth Hammer, Daisy Helman, Catherine Hess, Pascale Heurtel, Dr Lisa Hostetler, Lyndsey Ingram, Professor Dr Hans Walter Lack, Dr Fred G. Meijer, Colleen Morris, Polly Nicholson, Lynn Parker, Anna Pavord, Gill Saunders, Lindsey Taylor, Anatole Tchikine and Betsy Wieseman

Additional texts: Giovanni Aloi, Louise Bell, Lugene Bruno, Shane Connolly, Clare Coulson, Louisa Elderton, Celia Fisher, Diane Fortenberry, Victoria Gaiger, Daisy Helman, Pascale Heurtel, Lyndsey Ingram, Hans Walter Lack, Fred G. Meijer, Alison Morris, Colleen Morris, Polly Nicholson, Michele Robecchi, Rebecca Roke, Gill Saunders, James Smith, Lindsey Taylor, David Trigg and Martin Walters

About the Author:

Anna Pavord's books include her globally bestselling The Tulip and The Naming of Names, and more recently The Seasonal Gardener, published by Phaidon. Her gardening column in the Independent newspaper in the UK ran for thirty years from the paper's launch in 1986 until the last print edition. Today she writes for the Sunday Times and is an Associate Editor of Gardens Illustrated magazine. Pavord lives in West Dorset and was awarded the Gold Veitch medal from the Royal Horticultural Society in 2001.

Shane Connolly is the founder of Shane Connolly & Company Flowers, London and Royal Warrant holder to HM The Queen and HRH the Prince of Wales.

The perfect subject for a graphic novel, Frida Kahlo's brief life was dramatic and romantic, tragic and painful. In this illustrated 'biography', Vanna Vinci captures the spirit of Kahlo's world in boldly coloured, minutely detailed illustrations. Blending facts and history with dreamlike and surreal sequences, Vinci creates an intimate portrayal of an artist who incorporated her life experiences into her art. Burning love and crushing loss, incredible joy and deep despair - these were all part of Kahlo's life and part of the paintings that are some of the most celebrated art of all time. Filled with images that populated Kahlo's work - monkeys and parrots, traditional clothing and lush gardens - Vinci imbues her text and drawings with an artist's perception and sensitivity. The result is an evocative, fittingly passionate tribute to a legendary figure.

The Saint Louis Art Museum has assembled one of North America’s largest and most comprehensive collections of German Expressionist paintings. Rediscover a defining movement of modern art through this original study of works by 25 artists who span its famously wide arc.

This is the first publication on the Saint Louis Art Museum’s internationally renowned collection of German Expressionist art, which includes major works by the movement’s leading artists and lesser-known figures rarely seen outside of Germany. Engaging entries delve into the paintings’ histories, from their production to their arrival in St. Louis. An introduction traces the collection’s origins to the flood of Expressionist art that entered the United States during World War II. What emerges is a new account of a pivotal era in modern art.

About the Author:

Melissa Venator is assistant curator of modern art at the Saint Louis Art Museum.

Sarah Symmons' fascinating account locates Goya in the context of his Spanish heritage, traces the immense influence of his work throughout Europe and considers the continued relevance of his art in the twentieth century. Drawings, oil paintings, frescos, tapestry designs and prints all convey the full range of Goya's work. Symmons draws on the most recent scholarship and on rediscovered works to create a comprehensive portrait of this complex artist that is perfectly up-to-date and highly absorbing.

About the Author:

Sarah Symmons is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Art History and Theory at the University of Essex.

Art is for Everybody. The artist as activist

One of the key figures in the New York art world of the 1980s, Keith Haring (1958-1990) created a signature style that blended street art, graffiti, Pop, and cartoon elements to unique, memorable effect. With thick black outlines, bright colours, and kinetic figures, his public (and occasionally illegal) interventions, sculptures, and works on canvas and paper have become instantly recognizable icons of 20th-century visual culture.

From his first chalk drawings in the New York City subway stations, to his renowned Radiant Baby symbol, and his commissions for Swatch Watch and Absolut Vodka, Haring s work was both emblematic of the manic work ethic of 1980s New York, yet distinctive for its social-awareness. Belying their bright, playful aesthetics, his pieces often tackled intensely controversial socio-political issues, including racism, capitalism, religious fundamentalism, and the increasing impact of AIDS on New York's gay community, the latter foreshadowing his own death from the disease in 1990.

In this vivid introduction to Haring's work, we explore the dynamic life and innovative spirit of this singular artist, who spent little more than a decade in the spotlight, but through the accessibility of his visual vocabulary and the strength of his political commitment became one of the most significant artists to emerge from New York's vibrant, downtown community.

About the series:

Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features:

- a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
- a concise biography
- approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions

Following the success of The Empire of Death, which has attracted a global cult following, Heavenly Bodies brings the 'catacomb saints' out of the darkness for the first time

In 1578 a labyrinth of underground burials was discovered in Rome that contained the remains of thousands of individuals assumed to be early Christian martyrs. The bones were disinterred and sent to many Catholic churches and religious houses in German-speaking Europe to replace holy relics that had been destroyed during the Protestant Reformation.

Reassembled by skilled artisans, encrusted with gold and jewels and richly dressed in fantastic costumes, the skeletons were displayed in elaborate public shrines as reminders of the spiritual treasures that awaited the faithful after death. For nearly three centuries these ‘Heavenly Bodies’ were venerated as miracle-workers and protectors of their communities until doubts about their authenticity surfaced in the modern era. They then became a source of embarrassment for the Church and most were destroyed or hidden away.

The book includes arresting images of more than seventy spectacular jeweled skeletons and the fascinating stories of dozens more, accompanied by rare archive material. This is the first time that some of these incredible relics – both intriguing historical artifacts and masterpieces of artistic craftsmanship in their own right – have appeared in a publication, with Koudounaris gaining unprecedented access to photograph in some of the most secretive religious establishments in Europe.

Meticulously researched and beautifully written, this is a tour de force of original cultural history with deepest resonances for a modern audience fascinated by visual representations of death.

About the Author:

Paul Koudounaris lives in Los Angeles, where he took his doctorate in the art history department of UCLA. His first book, The Empire of Death: A Cultural History of Ossuaries and Charnel Houses, was published by Thames & Hudson in 2011.

Holbein at the Tudor Court focuses on the internationally significant collection of portraits by Hans Holbein the Younger in the Royal Collection.

This richly illustrated publication has essays on the artist, his sitters and on the history of his work in the Royal Collection.

Holbein at the Tudor Court focuses on the internationally significant collection of portraits by Hans Holbein the Younger in the Royal Collection. These portraits, in drawing, miniature and painting, date almost exclusively from Holbein's period as the pre-eminent artist at the court of Henry VIII.

This richly illustrated publication has essays on the artist, his sitters and on the history of his work in the Royal Collection, and a series of entries on individual works - looking at both on the work of art and on the identity of the sitter featured, and uses, where possible voices from the period (as found in letters, poems, administrative records and diplomatic accounts) to bring alive the world of the sixteenth-century English court.

About the Author:

Kate Heard is Senior Curator of Prints and Drawings, Royal Collection Trust. Her previous publications include George IV: Art and Spectacle (2019), The First Georgians: Art & Monarchy (2014) and High Spirits: The Comic Art of Thomas Rowlandson (2013).

Now available in a compact and attractively priced edition, this lavishly illustrated, multi- faceted examination of Impressionism traces the movement’s birth, development, and global impact.

One of the art world’s most recognizable and popular styles, Impressionism is also one of the most complexes. In this sumptuous overview Norbert Wolf lends his attention to all aspects of Impressionism: its historical precursors, contemporary rivals, and the movements it inspired. Over 200 large-format reproductions of entire works and highlighted details introduce readers to the Impressionists’ aesthetics and techniques. Wolf draws insightful parallels between these paintings and other contemporary works of music, photography, and literature. Tracing the movement’s expansion from France to the rest of Europe and North America, this volume shines a spotlight on the main protagonists who were key in the development of Impressionism. It highlights not only the French pioneers — Claude Monet, Gustave Caillebotte, Édouard Manet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, and others — but also Max Liebermann, Lovis Corinth, John Singer Sargent, Mary Cassatt, William Merritt Chase, and James McNeill Whistler, to name a few. As luxurious as it is authoritative, this wide-ranging investigation of a moment in art history reveals works and ideas that will surprise even the most seasoned aficionado.

About the Author:

Norbert Wolf is an art historian and author based in Munich. He has published several books with Prestel, including Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Impressionism, and "The Golden Age of Dutch and Flemish Painting", as well as monographs on Albrecht Dürer and Titian.

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Пролистать книгу Impressionism. Reimagining Art на сайте издательства.

Abstract Beginnings. A pivotal portfolio in the history of art

Throughout his artistic career, Wassily Kandinsky transformed not only his own practice, but the course of art history itself. This essential guide traces Kandinsky’s rich repertoire to present the painter, engraver, teacher, and theorist credited with the first modern abstract painting and with one of the keenest theoretical minds of 20th-century art.

Over the course of his artistic career, Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) transformed not only his own style, but the course of art history. From early figurative and landscape painting, he went on to pioneer a spiritual, emotive, rhythmic use of color and line and is today credited with creating the first purely abstract work.

As much a teacher and theorist as he was a practicing artist, Kandinsky’s interests in music, theater, poetry, philosophy, ethnology, myth, and the occult, were all essential components to his painting and engraving. He was involved with both the influential Blaue Reiter and Bauhaus groups and left a legacy not only of dazzling visual work, but also of highly influential treatises such as Concerning the Spiritual in Art. Key tenets included the connections between painting, music and mystical experience, and the purification of art away from material realism and towards an emotional expression, condensed in particular by color.

This book presents key Kandinsky works to introduce his repertoire of vivid colors, forms, and feelings. Tracing the artist’s radical stylistic development, it shows how one painter’s progression paved the way for generations of abstract expression to come.

The author

Hajo Düchting studied art history, philosophy, and archaeology in Munich, where he gained his doctorate in 1981 with a thesis on Robert Delaunay’s Windows series. After working in museum and adult education, he moved on to teaching posts and guest professorships at the universities of Munich, Kassel, Leipzig, Saarbrücken, and Mainz. Düchting has published numerous articles on the art of the modern era, color theory, and the teaching of art, and has authored a number of TASCHEN titles, including Paul Cézanne, Wassily Kandinsky, Robert and Sonia Delaunay, and Georges Seurat.

About the series:

Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features:

- a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
- a concise biography
- approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions

The Boy King’s Journey through the Underworld. Tutankhamun’s royal voyage into paradise, as told by ancient Egyptian treasures

Since the ’90s, Sandro Vannini has created complete photographic reproductions that reveal murals and artifacts in unprecedented detail. Marking the centenary of Howard Carter’s first expedition and a series of international exhibitions, this comprehensive guide combines contemporary understanding of ancient Egyptian afterlife with Vannini’s super high-resolution photography to cast an enthralling light on the voyage the pharaoh was thought to make after death.

Buried in the 14th century BC but unearthed by Howard Carter in 1922, the objects entombed with Tutankhamun are an invaluable window into a long-extinct belief system. Seen today, they create an intricate picture of how the ancient Egyptian people viewed the perilous journey to paradise, a utopian Egypt that could only be entered following the final judgment.

When acclaimed photographer Sandro Vannini started his work in Egypt in the late ’90s, a technological revolution was about to unfold. Emerging technologies enabled him to document murals, tombs, and artifacts in unprecedented detail. Using the time-consuming and strenuous multi-shot technique, Vannini produced complete photographic reproductions that revealed colours in their original tones with vivid intensity. Through these extraordinary images, we discover the objects’ quintessential features alongside the sophisticated and cleverly hidden details.

This comprehensive guide marks the centenary of Carter’s first excavations in the Valley of the Kings. These inestimable works endure through Vannini's photographs in their full, timeless splendour. From offerings and rituals to Osiris and eternal life, Vannini’s portfolio covers all facets of ancient Egyptian culture — but it is Tutankhamun’s unique legacy that dominates these images. With texts by the photographer, captions by specialist Mohamed Megahed, and chapter introductions from scholars in the field, King Tut. The Journey through the Underworld puts much-debated mysteries to rest. The learned yet accessible forewords come from distinguished Egyptologists including Salima Ikram and David P. Silverman. Insightful narratives, resplendent images, and a contemporary standpoint make this title a fitting tribute to the Boy King’s odyssey, illuminating an epoch that spanned an unimaginable 4,000 years.

The photographer

Sandro Vannini started his career as a photographer in 1982, and today lives and works between Italy and Egypt. Active in the latter since 1997, and with special permission to access sites forbidden to the public, he has compiled an extensive visual archive of ancient Egyptian culture. Along the way, he first pioneered techniques that enable the use of leading digital photography in the extreme temperatures in the Valley of the Kings. Vannini’s photographs are among those assisting the work of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo in the restoration of artifacts. Since 2016, he has been directing and producing television programs and documentary series in collaboration with Zahi Hawass, and is also the author of several books.

About the series:

TASCHEN is 40! Since we started our work as cultural archaeologists in 1980, TASCHEN has become synonymous with accessible publishing, helping bookworms around the world curate their own library of art, anthropology, and aphrodisia at an unbeatable price. Today we celebrate 40 years of incredible books by staying true to our company credo. The 40 series presents new editions of some of the stars of our program — now more compact, friendly in price, and still realized with the same commitment to impeccable production.

Gustav Klimt (1862–1918) is world famous for his golden, ornamental works, his flowing colours and his sensuous portrayal of women. But where did he find the inspiration for his multi-faceted oeuvre? How well did he know Vincent van Gogh? Did he ever see a picture by Henri Matisse? Large-format comparisons reveal Klimt’s artistic sources.

Modern European art was omnipresent in Vienna in around 1900 – in the Vienna Secession, in galleries, art magazines and private collections. The Viennese artist Gustav Klimt was receptive for the pictorial language of his contemporaries like Alma-Tadema, Minne, Rodin, Toorop, Hodler, Van Gogh, Monet, Khnopff, Toulouse-Lautrec, Whistler and Matisse, and adapted elements from a variety of artistic styles. The encounter between his works and those of the artists with whom he was associated reveals significant and often surprising parallels.

Artists:
Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema | Aubrey Beardsley | Ferdinand Hodler | Akseli Gallen-Kallela | Gustav Klimt | Lord Frederic Leighton |  Margaret MacDonald-Mackintosh | Edouard Manet | Henri Matisse | Claude Monet | Edvard Munch | Auguste Rodin | Giovanni Segantini | Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec | Kees van Dongen | Vincent van Gogh | Theo Van Rysselberghe | Franz von Stuck | James Abbott MacNeill Whistler et. al.

About the Author:

The Belvedere, Vienna is one of the leading museums worldwide. Its famous art collection includes works ranging from the Middle Ages to the present day. The Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam is an art museum dedicated to the works of Vincent van Gogh and his contemporaries. The museum contains the largest collection of Van Gogh's paintings and drawings in the world.

Enigmatic and ambiguous in its role as both setting and subject, the landscape has been one of the most important genres in painting for centuries. This dedicated survey spans the late Middle Ages to modern times to bring the evolution of the landscape genre to life through its most critical works, executed by groundbreaking artists as diverse as Titian and Warhol.

As a form, landscapes represent the topography of the natural world as much as our own; reflecting the diversity of earth’s vistas, but also keen indications of developments in representational aesthetics, religious and political history, notions of the sublime and the romantic, as well as the arrival of modernity and the vast changes wrought on the environment by industrialization and urbanization.

Opening this insightful volume is an introductory essay offering a meticulous overview of the genre and its most crucial developments. Luscious double-page spreads on each of the 34 featured artworks include a crisp painting reproduction and an extensive art historical analysis on the masters of the form — including such greats as Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, El Greco, John Constable, Claude Monet, and David Hockney.

About the series:

- Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Genre series features:
- approximately 100 colour illustrations with explanatory captions
- a detailed illustrated introduction plus a timeline of the most important political, cultural, and social events that took place during that period
- a selection of the most important works of the epoch, each presented on a 2-page spread with a full-page image and accompanying interpretation, as well as a portrait and brief biography of the artist

Lee Miller not only Man Ray’s muse, but above all a professional in her own right

Model, photographer, muse, the first female war correspondent to report the horrors of the concentration camps liberated by American troops, and 20th-century icon. Lee Miller was all this and much more. She went through life with passion and determination and life repaid her with love and friends, but also with pain and posthumous, or at least tardy, acknowledgement.

Through approximately 140 photographs by Lee Miller and Man Ray, some objects d’art, and video documents loaned by Lee Miller Archives and Fondazi one Marconi, this book intends to do justice to this woman as beautiful as she was clever and talented, taking her out of Man Ray’s overpowering shadow. It will reveal a deep but complicated relationship more objectively (Man Ray was first her teacher, then lover, and in the end friend), and document the effect they both had on each other and how it inspired their work.

Published on the occasion of the exhibition in Venice, the volume features texts by the curator, Ami Bouhassane (Miller’s grand-daughter), and Anthony Pen rose (Miller’s son). Moreover it includes portraits by Man Ray of friends and important protagonists of the period (Max Ernst, Pablo Picasso, Giorgio de Chirico, Jean Cocteau, Salvador Dalí), as well as surrealist shots of Lee Miller in which she seeks to investigate and reveal her soul and torments.

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The exhibition offers a portrait of Surrealism through two of its greatest exponents, with more than 100 photographs, art works and new relevant documentation.

In 1929, Elizabeth “Lee” Miller, a young American model often seen in Vogue magazine, arrived in Paris with the intention of becoming a photographer. Uninvited and with no prior introduction, she presented herself at the studio of Man Ray, a noted Surrealist artist and photographer specializing in portraits of contemporary society, insisting that she become his apprentice. The encounter marked the beginning of a life-long relationship. The years 1929-1932 were a time of particularly fertile collaboration, during which the fiercely independent, highly-motivated Lee was soon alternating in the roles of apprentice, photography assistant, lover and muse. After that period, Lee opened and successfully managed her own studio. As prominent figures in avant-garde society (Paris, New York and London) and close friends of such leading artists as Picasso, Jean Cocteau, Max Ernst, and Paul Eluard, Ray and Miller formed part of the early liberal surrealist milieu of the 20s and 30s.

The book, published to complement the Milan exhibition, aims to establish Miller’s remarkable talent as a photographer, setting her on a par with Man Ray, whose work has tended to overshadow hers, and to re-examine the couple’s professional and personal relationship. It also reveals the crucial ways in which Lee Miller inspired Man Ray’s work at that time as well as later, including the discovery of the photographic technique of solarization, which quickly became Ray’s most widely-recognized style. Through a wide selection of their portraits of famous people, their relationship is used as a lens through which to critically re-evaluate and re-interpret the relationship between the two within the Surrealist movement and the broader avant-garde society of Paris between the mid-20s and the late 30s.

About the Author:

Victoria Noel-Johnson is an independent British art historian and curator, specialising in early 20th century European art.

Leonardo da Vinci and Anatomy: all the power and relevance of this great Renaissance mind.

This exhibition catalogue on Leonardo da Vinci the anatomist highlights the mystery of a thought that was both anchored in its time and, combined with a totally new practice (dissection), leading to a new understanding of the nature of life. Da Vinci was not content with a passive description of the human body; he sought to penetrate the secrets of its functioning by first studying the mechanics of humans (bones, muscles, tendons), then the logic of the senses, and finally all the bodily functions (digestion, respiration, blood circulation, reproduction), which made him to use qualitative reasoning.

Contrary to popular belief, Leonardo did not carry out his dissections in secret, but in complete agreement with the political and religious authorities, until his materialistic ideas came into conflict with the pontifical authorities, particularly with regard to embryology.

The originality of the book is to show how Leonardo’s work as an anatomist and his work as a painter are inseparable. The book thus links a work such as the Last Supper in Milan with the knowledge gathered in the medical field.

The book brings together originals or copies of Leonardo’s sheets with objects (anatomical waxes, facsimiles of dissecting instruments), books studied by the artist, interviews with specialists and animated 3D reconstructions.

About the Authors:

Dominique Le Nen is professor at the University of Nantes and orthopedic surgeon.

Pascal Brioist is professor at the University of Tours, historian specialized in Leonardo da Vinci, in la Renaissance and sciences and techniques of the modern era.

The Popstar: When art went Whaam!

American painter Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) pioneered a new epoch in American art, bursting onto a scene dominated by Abstract Expressionism in late 1950s New York and defining a new art vocabulary for a new era.

With his groundbreaking use of industrial production techniques and trivial, quotidian imagery such as cartoons, comic strips, and advertising, Lichtenstein joined contemporaries such as Andy Warhol and James Rosenquist to reflect and satirize American mass media and consumer culture. Works such as Look, Mickey! (1961), Drowning Girl (1963), and Whaam! (1963), deployed mass production techniques, particularly Ben-Day dots printing, to create a blow-up effect and pixelated dot style, with which Lichtenstein has become synonymous.

This book provides an essential overview of Lichtenstein s career, tracing his earliest Pop statements through to later brushstroke retorts to Abstract Expressionism and reinterpretations of modern masterpieces. We look at his leading position in mid-century modernism, and the ways in which his works both critique and chronicle 20th-century America.

About the series:

Born back in 1985, the Basic Art Series has evolved into the best-selling art book collection ever published. 

Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series features:
- a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
- a concise biography
- approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions