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A new concise history of modern painting, offering an indispensable reference to the complexities and characteristics of this medium.

While acknowledging the legacy of Herbert Read’s classic 1959 study A Concise History of Modern Painting in the World of Art series, academic and artist Simon Morley places the foundation of modern art much earlier than Read, at the emergence of Romanticism and the dawn of the industrial age. Structured loosely chronologically by period, the focus is as much on individual artists as well as movements, with works discussed within a broader context - stylistic, historical, geographical, and gender and ethnic frames - themes that recur throughout the chapters. Generously illustrated, the global and diverse range of artists featured include William Blake, Édouard Manet, Hilma af Klint, Kazimir Malevich, Willem de Kooning, Amrita Sher-Gil, Faith Ringgold and Kehinde Wiley.

This guide also includes an Appendix in the form of questions the reader might like to ask in relation to the artists and the ideas discussed - in order to reconsider the works from a contemporary perspective.

About the Author:

Simon Morley is a visual artist and Assistant Professor in the College of Arts, Dankook University, Republic of Korea. He has lectured at such museums as Tate, The National Gallery, Hayward Gallery, Serpentine Gallery, Whitechapel Gallery and Camden Arts Centre, and has contributed to numerous publications including Third Text, World Art, the TLS, The Burlington Magazine, Art Monthly, The Art Newspaper, Contemporary Art and the Independent on Sunday.

Discover the dramatic life and work of Amedeo Modigliani, a pioneer of modern figurative painting

Amedeo Modigliani experimented with sculpture and drawing, but is primarily known for his paintings of nudes and portraits characterized by elongated figures, faces, and necks. He began painting in his youth in Italy before moving to Paris in 1906, during the height of the avant-garde movement. Influenced by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Cezanne, Modigliani developed his own unique, uncharacterizable style. His nudes upended traditions at the time due to their immodesty, candid sexuality, and ability to convey the subject's personality. Because of the works' scandalous nature, Modigliani had very little success with his paintings while he was alive. This volume features stunning full-page illustrations of Modigliani's works, along with information about his life, including his bohemian, over-the-top lifestyle and his untimely, tragic death. Featuring some of Modigliani's best-known works, this book gives an insightful and comprehensive overview on the artist known for modernizing figurative painting.

About the Author:

Olaf Mextorf is an art historian currently working for museums. He already published books on Oscar Schlemmer, Vincent van Gogh and others.

A groundbreaking, new perspective on the painter’s scandalous nudes.

Among the most celebrated works of Modigliani’s brief but brilliant career are his large-format nudes. Drenched in color and glowing with the artist’s deep appreciation of women and the female form, these works ushered in a new era of nude portraiture, while also causing an enormous scandal. This stunning exhibition catalog offers a new perspective on this aspect of Modigliani’s work by examining for the first time his portraits of emancipated women sporting coupe garçonnes haircuts and wearing loin cloths. Modigliani was one of the first chroniclers of the femme moderne, which also influenced his nude painting and the scandal they caused.

Featuring lavish reproductions and astute texts by leading scholars, this volume also examines Modigliani’s cultural context in European Classicism, from Toulouse-Lautrec and Cezanne to the work of his contemporaries, including Paula Modersohn-Becker, Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Jeanne Mammen and Wilhelm Lehmbruck; and traces his impact on future European Modernism and New Objectivity.

About the Authors:

Christiane Lange is director of the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Germany.

Ortrud Westheider is director of the Museum Barberini in Potsdam, Germany.

This magnificent boxed-set features stunning, accordion-fold, color reproductions of Monet’s essential works, accompanied by a separate booklet with a background and descriptions of each painting.

Fans of Impressionism will delight in seeing some of their favorite works presented in generously sized accordion fold pages, which bring Monet’s representations of nature to exquisite life. Arranged chronologically, this volume helps readers appreciate the achievements of a long and fruitful career. Natural beauty, color and light were the object of Monet’s incessant research, and he never lost sight of what was essential to him — the truth of his sensations. From the faithful transcription of the landscape in his early days to the gestural drawing of the final water lilies at Giverny, this book allows us to follow and understand the evolution of his creativity. The themes of Monet’s work (the seashore, the Seine, gardens, the seasons) are discussed, as well as the techniques he used, such as the decomposition of light and color through the brushstroke; the use of repetition and series to better reflect atmospheric variations; and the progressive dissolution of forms, which led to him being considered the precursor of abstraction.

Packaged in an elegant slipcase, this volume reflects the beautiful artistry and timeless traditions that are embodied in the artworks themselves.

About the Author:

Anne Sefrioui is the author of numerous art books, including Hiroshige: Famous Views of the Sixty-odd Provinces (2017), Kingfisher with Lotus Flower: Birds of Japan (2022), and Van Gogh: The Bigger Picture (2024), all published by Prestel.

A complete overview of the Giorgio Morandi exhibition in NY and Bologna.

Giorgio Morandi is an undisputed master of twentieth-century painting. His greatness lies in the balance between an outlook typical of the Age of Enlightenment and the formal synthesis of Cézanne and modernism.

Often remembered as a reserved and reclusive man, inclined toward a “cloistered” lifestyle, Morandi, in reality, was a highly sensitive interpreter of the spirit of his times. Through constant attention to differing artistic and cultural movements, he succeeded in translating the aspirations they embodied into the variants of an unfailingly autonomous approach to painting.

This volume provides a complete overview of the major exhibition of masterpieces by Giorgio Morandi at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Museo d’Arte Moderna in Bologna (MAMbo). Over one hundred paintings, watercolors, drawings, and etchings illustrate the artist’s entire creative and poetic course from the landscapes and still lifes of 1913–1914 to his final works of 1963–1964. Particular attention is focused on the masterpieces of the 1920s and 1930s, in which Morandi perfected his extraordinary approach to image-making through in-depth investigation of the world and of human existence as filtered through the metaphor of the still life.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art New York, New York
16 settembre – 14 dicembre 2008
MAMbo – Museo d’Arte Moderna di Bologna
22 gennaio – 12 aprile 2009

New Surrealism: The Uncanny in Contemporary Painting by Robert Zeller offers a sweeping exposition of both historical Surrealism and its legacy in the world of contemporary art. It demonstrates the many ways in which the most significant art movement of the last century continues to be relevant today, featuring an international selection of contemporary artists whose compositions and studio practice reveal its influence.

There are many modalities of historical Surrealism that still maintain contemporary currency: presenting the familiar as unfamiliar and uncanny, the juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated imagery, the use of absurdity to critique political or social issues, and the use of erotic imagery in an irrational, non-linear context. Not all the artists brought together in this book self-identify as Surrealist, per se, but each uses some variation of Surrealism in a personal manner.

The book begins with a study of the origins, leadership, participating artists, and major milestones of historical Surrealism. Zeller chronicles the movement starting at the end of World War I and the birth of Dada. The most important players and events emerge throughout the timeline of events — including World War II, and such notable artists as Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp, Leonora Carrington, and many others — up until the death of its leader Andre Breton in 1966.

Zeller then explores how elements of New Surrealism are being put into practice in the contemporary art world. Section Two offers a survey of 29 contemporary artists who engage in New Surrealism's seemingly unlimited variations of the movement's original themes, including Rosa Loy, Glenn Brown, and Arghavan Khosravi. Section Three features 14 artists, including important contemporary artists such as Inka Essenhigh, Ginny Casey and Anna Weyant, who speak to Surrealism's influence on their studio practice, detailing in their own words how they create a composition from start to finish.

About the Author:

Robert Zeller is a visual artist and writer who received a BFA from a joint program of the Boston Museum School and Tufts University and an MFA from the New York Academy of Art. Following his bestselling The Figurative Artist's Handbook (2017), New Surrealism: The Uncanny in Contemporary Painting is his second book published by Monacelli Studio. He contributed a chapter about Surrealist photography to the exhibition catalog Photography: Real and Imagined (2024), profiling the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, and has also written for The Brooklyn Rail and other influential art periodicals and blogs. In 2009, he founded The Teaching Studios of Art, an in-person and online art school devoted to instruction in figurative art. Zeller maintains a studio practice in Brooklyn, New York, and is the recipient of two Posey Fellowships and a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant. He has curated group exhibitions and shown his own work at galleries in the United States and Europe.

Mighty nature: The pioneering forms of Georgia O'Keeffe

Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986) was a major figure in modern American art for some seven decades. Importantly, her fame was not associated with shifting art styles and trends, but rather with her own unique vision, based on finding essential and abstract forms in nature.

O'Keeffe s primary subjects were landscapes, flowers, and bones, each explored in successive series over several years. Certain works went on for decades, producing 12 or more variations of an original image. Among these, O'Keeffe s magnified pictures of calla lilies and irises are her most famous. Enlarging the tiniest petals to fill an entire canvas, O'Keeffe created a proto-abstract vocabulary of shapes and lines, earning her the moniker mother of American modernism. In 1946, O'Keeffe became the first female artist to be given a solo show at the MoMA in New York.

This introductory book from TASCHEN Basic Art 2.0 traces O'Keeffe s long and luminous career through key paintings, contemporary photographs, and portraits taken by Alfred Stieglitz, to whom O'Keeffe was married. We follow the artist through her pioneering innovations, major breakthroughs, and her travels and inspirations in Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East, and, above all, New Mexico, where she was particularly inspired by the majestic landscapes, vivid colours and exotic vegetation.

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 dazzling life story of the quintessential painter of the Art Deco twenties - as she told it to her own daughter

Illustrated with vibrant colour reproductions of Lempicka's finest works, and exclusive family photos. Out of print for ten years, now back in print in a handsome yet affordable hardcover edition. This edition includes a new chapter about Lempicka's legacy by her granddaughter and great-granddaughter. We've entered the centennial of the 1920s, and interest in Lempicka is high: her paintings continue to smash auction records, and her life is the subject of a new musical.

An attractive new hardcover edition of the classic biography of Tamara de Lempicka, whose paintings defined Art Deco and whose life epitomised the Jazz Age.

As F. Scott Fitzgerald portrayed the mad glories of the 1920s on the printed page, Tamara de Lempicka (1898-1980) captured them on canvas. A seductive Garbo-esque beauty with an irresistible force of personality, this refugee of the Russian Revolution successively conquered Paris, Hollywood, and New York with coruscating portraits of the world's rich and famous. Her Art Deco paintings earned for her a life more fabulously excessive than anything Fitzgerald dreamed of.

Passion by Design, authored by Tamara de Lempicka's own daughter, is an intimate look at a fascinating personality, and remains the best account of her life and work. This new edition is illustrated with vibrant colour reproductions of her finest paintings, as well as exclusive photographs from family albums. An additional chapter by Victoria de Lempicka, the artist's granddaughter, explores the ever-evolving legacy of Tamara de Lempicka, from the record eight-figure price fetched by her painting La Tunique Rose in November 2019 to the new musical based on her life.

About the Author:

Baroness Kizette de Lempicka-Foxhall, the daughter of Tamara de Lempicka, enjoyed an unequalled firsthand knowledge of her mother's life and exclusive access to her papers.

Portrait of an Artist in the Early Days of Modernism

The incomparable play of light and color in Paul Cezanne’s work was the foundation of his reputation as a forerunner of modernism. From the start he went his own way, and his paintings initially evoked a lack of understanding in art critics of the time, as well as ridicule. Despite his Romantic, Baroque, Impressionist, and finally Classical influences, it is still difficult to ascribe Cezanne to any particular art movement. Still, which specific places left lasting impressions on the scion of a provincial banker’s family? What and who were major influences supporting and advancing his innovative oeuvre? James H. Rubin traces Cezanne’s life and work from A to Z in this brief volume, creating an image of a painter who wanted to transform painting itself. The author—and established connoisseur — succeeds in closely approaching the artist while at the same time maintaining the necessary distance to his inimitable paintings.

Paul Cezanne (1839–1906) was one of the most influential painters in the early days of modernism and has often been described as a pioneer of Neues Sehen, or New Vision. His work still exercises undiminished influence to this day.
James H. Rubin (*1944) is an art historian and professor at the State University of New York in Stony Brook. His research focuses on nineteenth-century European art, especially the history, theory, and critique of French Modernism.

New insights into Picasso’s Blue Period, through innovative technology that reveals hidden compositions, motifs and alterations, plus hitherto unknown information on the artist's materials and process

This lavishly illustrated volume reexamines Pablo Picasso’s famous Blue Period (1901–04) in paintings, works on paper and sculpture. Relying on new information gleaned from technical studies performed on The Blue Room (Le Tub) (1901), Crouching Beggarwoman (La Miséreuse accroupie) (1902) and The Soup (La Soupe) (1903), this multidisciplinary volume combines art history and advanced conservation science in order to show how the young Picasso fashioned a distinct style and a pronounced artistic identity as he adapted the artistic lessons of fin-de-siècle Paris to the social and political climate of an economically struggling Barcelona.

Essays, a chronology and a summary of conservation findings contextualize Picasso’s experimental approach to painting during the Blue Period. A major contribution to the burgeoning field of technical art history, Picasso: Painting the Blue Period advances new scholarship on one of the most critical episodes in 20th-century modernism.

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Picasso’s death, this spectacular volume of the artist’s early paintings and sculptures is being reissued.

The paintings from his so-called Blue and Rose periods to early Cubism, created between 1901 and 1907, are milestones on Picasso’s path to becoming the most famous artist of the twentieth century. In 2019, the Fondation Beyeler presented some 80 masterpieces from renowned museums and private collections in its most prestigious exhibition to this date. They are not only among the most valuable works of art ever to exist, but are widely viewed as some of modernism’s most beautiful and emotive artworks. This volume brings the early work of this exceptional artist to life in a unique way.

About the Artist:

Pablo Picasso is regarded as the epitome of the twentieth-century artist. In addition to his paintings and sculptures, his graphic works also enjoy special fame.

The first book dedicated to Picasso’s self-portraits, many held in private collections and published here for the first time

Much has been said and written about Picasso’s life and art, but until now his self-portraits have never been studied and presented in a single book, perhaps because the artist always left many doubts about his work. However, there is no doubt that Picasso represented himself ceaselessly, whether in a dashed-off pencil sketch, as a flourish at the bottom of a letter, or on a giant canvas.

At the suggestion of Picasso’s widow Jacqueline, the distinguished art historian Pascal Bonafoux began researching Picasso’s self-portraits more than forty years ago. This meticulously researched book presents the fruits of his decades-long project. From the first attributed painting in 1894 as a thirteen-year-old boy, until Picasso's final self-portrait in 1972, a year before his death, Bonafoux charts the evolution of the artist's life and art. Here is Picasso as a student; as a young bohemian; an impetuous artist in Paris; as harlequin; as lover, husband and father; and finally, as an old man confronting his mortality. The book comprises about 170 drawings, paintings and photographs, some from private collections and previously unpublished, bringing together for the first time the attributed self-portraits of this genius of 20th-century art.

About the Author:

Pascal Bonafoux is a French writer, novelist, art critic and art historian, specializing in self-portraiture. He is the author of many books, including Rodin & Eros, also published by Thames & Hudson.

These pages are intended as a compact up-to-date guide for readers wishing to find out more about one of the greatest artistic geniuses of all time, an artist epitomising the highest ideals of the age of Humanism whose complex personality challenges even the experts in this field of studies.

This monograph is dedicated to one of the greatest Italian masters, Piero della Francesca (San Sepolcro 1416/1417 approx. - 1492), whose towering multifaceted genius dominates the entire artistic and cultural panorama of the early Italian Renaissance.

Each work, from the Baptism of Christ to the Nativity at National Gallery in London, is presented with full-page images and is analysed in depth from the historical point of view, as well as for its style and considering its critical fortune during the centuries.

A specific focus is on the magnificent cycle of frescoes of the Legend of the True Cross, in the Basilica of San Francesco in Arezzo, which is considered as Piero's masterpiece.

The author of the book, in charge of a conservation and restoration project of the Chapel, presents in her study the results of the conservation work on half of the painting surface, completed with the images of the frescoes after their cleaning.

This book is intended as a compact up-to-date guide for readers wishing to find out more about one of the greatest artistic geniuses of all times, who was numbered among the greatest artists of his time and highly praised by his contemporaries, beginning with Vasari in the Life that he dedicated to the artist of excellence from Sansepolcro.

Windmills, Foxtrot and Yves Saint-Laurent

Pivotal in modern art’s move towards abstraction, Piet Mondrian’s oeuvre is extraordinarily versatile and complex. Not only did he paint and draw, he also wrote extensively about his thoughts and theories on art and life. Moving from traditional Dutch landscape painting to a pronounced rhythmic framework focusing on compositional structure rather than naturalistic representation, Mondrian was profoundly impressed by contemporary culture. Thus, he was not only inspired by the pattern of the extensive Dutch canal system, but also by the rhythm of jazz and the foxtrot. Demonstrating the impact of his oeuvre, Yves Saint-Laurent's famous "Mondrian Dress" even made him a fashion icon posthumously.

Celebrating the 150th anniversary of his birth, Ulf Küster entertainingly leads through well- and lesser-known aspects of Mondrian's life and work offering inspiring impulses for reflection and further engagement with the fascinating artist.

Piet Mondrian’s (1872–1944) early work was influenced by the Dutch landscape painting of the 19th century. However, it was his strictly abstract geometric compositions that gained the artist world fame. He worked in Paris, London and New York, where he was active in the avant-garde circles of his time.

The art historian Ulf Küster (*1966, Stuttgart) has been working at the Fondation Beyeler in Riehen | Basel since 2004, where he curates internationally acclaimed exhibitions. He has written numerous publications, among them his text on Louise Bourgeois in the series Art to Read and Edward Hopper A-Z, published by Hatje Cantz.

The world’s most famous portraits and the hidden stories behind their subjects are explored in this fascinating and highly entertaining book.

Portraiture is one of the oldest and most studied genres of art. While most scholars will look at a painting’s composition, style, and themes, often questions remain unanswered—who were these people and why were they painted? This entertaining book reveals the identities and lives of some of the most famous characters that populate art history — from the Renaissance to the 21st century. Readers will learn how the fifteen-year-old subject of da Vinci’s Lady with an Ermine nearly destroyed a marriage; that van Dyck’s depiction of Prudence in wild clothes is actually one of the most controversial aristocrats of the seventeenth century; and that Francis Bacon’s character George Dyer was a man he met in a Soho nightclub.

These and other stories behind works by Picasso, Klimt, Rubens, Warhol, and dozens of other artists show how portraiture remains one of the most enthralling genres.

Based on art scholarship and conveyed in an accessible tone, these fascinating tales of power, lust, intrigue, jealousy, vengeance, and romance will help readers understand masterpieces of art history in an entirely new light.