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This generously illustrated volume displays Vasily Kandinsky’s brilliant use of color, shape, and composition through approximately 250 full-color illustrations. Essays by the world’s leading Kandinsky experts focus on the evolution of his work throughout all periods of his career: his exploration of his Russian roots and his emigration to Munich; his attraction to the Art Nouveau and fauvist movements; the formation of the Blue Rider group; the influence of music on his painting; his years at the Bauhaus; and his late work in Paris.

The book’s design allows for a thorough examination of Kandinsky’s most important works in all their extraordinary detail. Accessible, impeccably researched, and wide-ranging, this important volume offers an indispensable overview of the artist’s seminal works and a tribute to the beauty and power of Kandinsky’s vision.

About the Authors:

Helmut Friedel is an art historian and director of the Museum Frieder Burda in Baden-Baden. He was director of the Lenbachhaus in Munich from 1990 to 2013 and has published numerous books on art, including Gerhard Richter: Red, Yellow, Blue, Franz Marc: The Retrospective and Kandinsky – Absolute. Abstract.
Annegret Hoberg is Head of Collections for the Blue Rider and the Kubin-Archiv at the Lenbachhaus in Munich.

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

Art inflation. The king of blow-ups, puppies, and pop

The creations of Jeff Koons (born 1955) are at once immediately accessible and eloquently art historical. From basketball tanks to flower puppies, his instantly recognizable work frolics with banal imagery as much as it integrates cultural references such as Surrealism and Pop Art. 

Koons art revels in visual pleasure, but also in the power to affront. He has made his name as much for stainless-steel rabbits as he has with his sinister sculpture of Michael Jackson, or his sexually explicit photographic series with then-wife Cicciolina. The result is mega-artist status. An indisputable king of contemporary visual culture, Koons is lauded by collectors, institutions, and the public alike.

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

This sumptuously produced monograph showcases the work of Utagawa Kuniyoshi, one of the last great Japanese masters of ukiyo-e prints, illustrations, and paintings.

Best known for his depictions of fierce samurai warriors in battle, Utagawa Kuniyoshi also produced landscapes, portraits of Kabuki actors, and images of mythical animals. His dynamic action scenes and fantastic creatures are recognized today as precursors of manga and anime. This dazzling volume by Matthi Forrer, one of the leading experts on ukiyo-e art, traces Kuniyoshi’s entire career. Chapters look at the major aspects of Kuniyoshi’s oeuvre; his book illustrations and portraits of fashionable women; his enormously popular series featuring actors, warriors, and landscapes; and the influence of Western art on his career. Meticulous, large-scale reproductions highlight the work’s clear outlines, elegantly muted palette, and precise details — from electrifying depictions of a tiger, mid-pounce, and light-hearted interpretations of Chinese folktales, to the terrifying figures of samurai swordsmen and romantic winter landscapes. A Japanese-style binding and box complete this luxurious package that promises an endlessly absorbing journey into the life of Kuniyoshi during the latter days of Japan’s Edo period.

About the Author:

Matthi Forrer is an independent curator and former Curator for Japanese Arts at the National Museum of Ethnology in Leiden, Netherlands. He is the author of numerous books on Japanese art, including Hokusai, Hiroshige, and Hiroshige: Prints and Drawings (all by Prestel).

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

Leonardo da Vinci was the epitome of the Renaissance humanist ideal, a logical polymath of epic proportions who excelled and had interests not just in art but in invention, anatomy, architecture, engineering, literature, mathematics, music, science, astronomy and more. His oeuvre is astounding and he is rightly famed for his masterpieces of painting such as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, and his astonishingly technical and graceful drawings. The phenomenon that was Leonardo would not of course have flourished to such an extent had it not been for the patronage and sponsorship of the Medici family, who commissioned a large proportion of the art and architecture of the era and fostered a fertile climate for creativity.

This sumptuous new book offers a broader view of this master artist in the context of this environment, alongside the work of other key artists who benefited from the Medicis, from Brunelleschi through Donatello to Michelangelo and Raphael.

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

A major new survey that offers fresh insights on Pablo Picasso's artworks, written by a leading authority on the master.

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) was one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. This important new monograph, released to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the artist's death, presents Picasso's unparalleled achievements in all media: painting, sculpture, drawing and prints. Art historian and curator Pepe Karmel offers fresh analysis of this great master for a 21st-century audience, considering Picasso's work through the lens of art rather than biography. He demonstrates how Picasso's style, evolving over the course of seven decades, introduced visual languages and narratives that transformed modern art.

Arranged chronologically by themes and movements, Looking at Picasso is profusely illustrated with renowned paintings, such as the provocative Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and his monumental Guernica, protesting the horror of war; these are accompanied by numerous lesser-known works, including Picasso's daring sculptures and his animated reinterpretation of Velazquez's 17th-century masterpiece Las Meninas.

This engaging book will appeal to museum-goers curious to learn more about Picasso's career and anyone interested in modern art.

About the Author:

Pepe Karmel is Associate Professor at the department of Art History, New York University. He is the author of Picasso and the Invention of Cubism (2003) and Abstract Art: A Global History (2020), and has written widely on art for museum catalogues, as well as the New York Times, Art in America and other publications. He has also curated and co-curated numerous exhibitions, including 'Jackson Pollock' (MoMA, 1998) and 'Dialogues with Picasso' (Museo Picasso Malaga, 2020). Karmel is the Associate Curator of Museo Picasso Malaga.

Contents List:

Preface
1. Life
2. Symbolism
3. Cubism
4. Surrealism
5. War and Peace
Notes

Painter Prince of the Renaissance

Lucas Cranach the Elder created around 500 works during his lifetime. With his portraits of Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchton and as court painter to Frederick the Wise, he became one of the most sought-after painters of the Reformation. At the same time, Cranach was the first to translate the Italian Renaissance tradition of the life-size nude into art north of the Alps; his lascivious, barely veiled depiction of Venus, the goddess of love, bears witness to this. On the occasion of the large Cranach exhibition at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, the Austrian writer Teresa Präauer explores the work of this busy prince of painters from A to Z. She focuses not only on Cranach's art, but also on the society that surrounded him, the subjects he painted, and the events that shaped his development.

Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553) was one of the most prolific painters, graphic artists and letterpress printers of the German Renaissance. Court painter at the court of the Elector of Saxony since 1505, he devoted himself not only to religious works but also to mythological themes and numerous portraits.

The writer  Teresa Präauer (*1979) studied German literature in Salzburg and Berlin as well as art at Mozarteum Salzburg. She writes novels, essays, and columns. In her tragic-comical artist novel Johnny und Jean (Wallstein, 2016), the painter Cranach played a crucial role.

A significant publication of original writing on Lucian Freud, including interviews with leading contemporary artists, marking the 100th anniversary of his birth

Lucian Freud (1922–2011) was one of the greatest figurative painters of the twentieth century. With an unflinching eye and an uncompromising commitment to his work, he created masterpieces that continue to inspire contemporary artists to the present day.

Spanning nearly 70 years, Freud’s career has often been overshadowed by his biography and celebrity. This book re-examines his paintings through a broad series of original approaches. Texts by a variety of rising and established international writers explore topics ranging from the compositional echoes of old master paintings in Freud’s works, to the contextualization of his practice within the class struggles of 1980s Britain. Throughout the book, leading contemporary painters such as Tracey Emin and Chantal Joffe give insightful testimony to the relevance of Freud today.

Marking the 100th anniversary of Freud’s birth, this publication accompanies the first major exhibition of his work in 10 years. Presenting fresh perspectives on his paintings, it introduces Freud to a new generation of scholars and enthusiasts – demonstrating his lasting international importance.

Published by National Gallery Global/Distributed by Yale University Press 

Exhibition Schedule:

The National Gallery, London
October 1, 2022–January 22, 2023

Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
February 14–June 18, 2023

About the Author:

Daniel F. Herrmann is Curator of Modern & Contemporary Projects at the National Gallery, London.

About Color. August Macke’s vivid shades still resonate a century after his death

August Macke is today considered a lead figure in Weimar-era art and a pioneer of Expressionist painting. With his color-led interpretations of beauty, Macke combined facets of Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and Fauvism into a style at once kaleidoscopic and uniquely his own. From cheerful scenes of parks to his final major work Farewell, discover the life of “Mister Color.”

August Macke (1887–1914) quickly ascended to notoriety, only to be killed at the tender age of 27 at the start of World War I. Despite his brief career, the artist left a remarkable oeuvre in his wake, his obsessions with color reflecting aspects of Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Fauvism, and Expressionism.

Through his engagement with these diverse schools of art, Macke assimilated disparate influences and approaches into a style entirely his own. Grouped with the Blaue Reiter movement, but eschewing the mysticism that often pervaded the works of its artists, Macke returned time and again to color-led interpretations of beauty, whether the kaleidoscopic watercolor Bright Women in front of the Hat Shop (1913), or the shimmering hues of Lady in a Green Jacket (1913). These colors reached their zenith in 1914 when Macke traveled with Klee and Moilliet to Tunis and became acquainted with North African light.

With leading examples from his vivid painterly world, this book introduces us to Macke’s short but influential career as a pioneering Expressionist. From cheerful scenes of parks, zoos, and promenades to his final major work, ominously titled Farewell (1914), we explore a remarkable talent for visual impact and an intense pursuit of the emotional possibilities of color.

The author:

Anna Meseure, born in Hamme, Belgium, studied interior design at the NHIBS of the University of Antwerp, as well as art history, history and German philology at the University of Stuttgart. She received her doctorate in 1982 for a work on the history of the Antwerp stock exchange and 19th-century European stock-exchange architecture. From 1982 to 1990 she was an assistant at the Museum Ostwall in Dortmund, then she worked at the Deutsche Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt am Main until 2002. Meseure has published numerous works on art and architecture. Today she lives and works as a freelance art historian in Frankfurt am Main.

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

This Is Not a Book. Everyday enigma from Belgium's leading Surrealist

Meet the Belgian Surrealist forever on the hunt for magic and mystery. This introduction to Magritte presents key works from the artist's vast repertoire of visual humour, paradox, and surprise which makes us look and look again, not only at the painting but at our sense of self and the world.

From men in bowler hats, floating in the sky, to a painting of a pipe above the caption "this is not a pipe", René Magritte (1898–1967) created an echo chamber of object and image, name and thing, reality and representation.

Like other Surrealist works, Magritte’s paintings combine a precise, mimetic technique with abnormal, alienating configurations which defy the laws of scale, logic, and science: a comb the size of a wardrobe, rocks that float in the sky, clouds that drift through an open door. The result is a direct yet disorientating realm, often witty, often unsettling, and always prompting us to look beyond the visible, to “what is hidden by what we see.”

This introductory book explores Magritte's vast repertoire of visual humour, paradox, and surprise which to this day makes us look and look again, not only at the painting but at our sense of self and the world.

About the author:

Marcel Paquet (1947–2014) obtained his doctorate in 1978 from the Free University of Brussels with a thesis entitled La différence des penseés de Kant et de Hegel dans la question de l’essence de l’art. He published a number of books on such subjects as Paul Delvaux, Fernando Botero, and Hans Bellmer.

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

Published in conjunction with a major exhibition organized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York, in collaboration with the Menil Collection, Houston, and the Art Institute of Chicago, Magritte: The Mystery of the Ordinary, 1926-1938 focuses on the breakthrough surrealist years of René Magritte, creator of some of the 20th century's most extraordinary images. 

Bringing together nearly 80 paintings, periodicals and early commercial work, it offers fresh insight into Magritte's identity as a revolutionary painter and surrealist artist. Beginning in 1926, when Magritte first aimed to create paintings that would, in his words, challenge the real world and concluding in 1938 a historically and biographically significant moment just before the outbreak of World War II the publication traces central strategies and themes from this seminal period, particularly those of displacement, transformation, metamorphosis, the misnaming of objects, and the representation of visions seen in half-waking states. 

The publication also presents new conservation research on Magritte's materials and techniques, and an illustrated chronology outlining significant moments in the artist's life during this significant period, including travel, connections with other surrealist artists and writers, contributions to journals, and important exhibitions and reviews.

Christian Rex van Minnen’s art is challenging, intriguing, and disturbing. His provocative paintings depict the dynamic attraction and repulsion of mankind, often leaving the viewer deep in contemplative euphoria. Since his first solo exhibition in 2009, his work has been shown extensively around the world, garnering a cult following of admirers who are deeply moved by his honest paintings, that often reflect the artist’s own thoughts about the fragile male ego and what it means to identify as a white American man.

Van Minnen’s first foray into showcasing his delightfully complex work, Massa Confusa: The Art of Christian Rex van Minnen is a deluxe art book filled with beautiful paintings that raise questions around our identity while also bringing out the grotesque from within all of us.

This generously illustrated volume on the work of Botticelli makes the world’s greatest art accessible to readers of every level of appreciation

The Florentine painter Botticelli personifies the Golden Age of the early Renaissance. Best known for The Birth of Venus and Primavera, Botticelli painted with an expressive poeticism that eschewed formal realism. He used line and colour to gorgeous effect, creating some of the most beloved and familiar images of all time. Overflowing with impeccably reproduced images, this book offers full-page spreads of masterpieces as well as highlights of smaller details-allowing the viewer to appreciate every aspect of the artist's technique and oeuvre. Chronologically arranged, the book covers important biographical and historic events that reflect the latest scholarship. Additional information includes a list of works, timeline and suggestions for further reading.