With a freshness and breadth of approach that sets Italian Renaissance art in its context, this book explores why works were created and who commissioned the palaces, cathedrals, paintings and sculptures. It covers Rome, Florence, Venice and the Veneto, Assisi, Siena, Milan, Pavia, Genoa, Padua, Mantua, Verona, Ferrara, Urbino and Naples. Chapters are grouped into four chronological parts, allowing for sustained examination of individual cities in different periods. 'Contemporary Scene' boxes provide fascinating glimpses of daily life and 'Contemporary Voice' boxes quote from painters and writers of the time. Accessible and beautifully presented with over 700 mostly colour images, this book is a definitive work on a key period of western art and culture.

A vibrant celebration of the way in which perennially popular floral design has become the centre-stage art for interior decoration, public events and private spaces

Flowers are associated with all the important events in our lives, whether celebratory or commemorative, but they can also cheer our everyday existence and enliven the spaces around us. This book shows just how.

Through the work of thirty-eight floral designers, we see ideas for flowers for every occasion, whether public – decorations for weddings, arrangements for banquets, installations for shops and hotels, accessories for fashion shows, exhibits for art shows – or private, in the form of simple but special displays for the home. Organized in alphabetical order, each florist is introduced with a short biography, then in their own words they explain the stories behind their floral arrangements. Illustrations include portraits of the florists, shots of works in progress and full-colour images of glorious finished displays. As a visual refreshment for stylists, florists and design professionals, and an indulgent treat for anyone who loves flowers or decorating their own space, this book is an inspirational confection.
                        
About the Author:

Olivier Dupon is a 21st-century tastemaker and the author of six acclaimed books, all published by Thames & Hudson.

On the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's 95 Theses, this opulent book presents a colorful introduction to Renaissance art and history.

Featuring more than a hundred outstanding paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, and treasures of the Age of the Reformation, this publication comprises masterpieces by Albrecht Durer, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Lucas Cranach the Younger, Hans Holbein the Elder and Hans Holbein the Younger, Matthias Grunewald, and Tilman Riemenschneider, among others. By placing these works in their historical context, this beautifully illustrated book uses art as a prism through which to consider the religious, social and political upheavals of the time.

The volume includes insightful texts that discuss pivotal subjects such as traditional imagery and devotion, Reformation and polemics, court life and culture, humanism and reality, as well as portraiture and representation. Biographies of the artists, an extensive bibliography and a glossary of central terms concerning the German Reformation make this a comprehensive study of a fascinating period in European art history.

Art as we know it today would not exist without the Renaissance. Widely considered the most influential phenomenon in European art, architecture, literature, and science, the movement revolutionized the Western conception of reality and heralded the emergence of modernity out of the Middle Ages.

The Renaissance first gained momentum in Italy, at the end of the 14th century, spreading across Europe over the course of the next centuries, with dynamic epicenters in Florence, the Low Countries, and Germany. The movement found its intellectual basis in humanism, derived from classical Greek philosophy. Across art, science, literature, and politics, proponents of the Renaissance avowed that man was the “measure of all things” and determined to replace scholastic medieval confines with a revival of antiquity.

Under the influence of humanism, artists advanced anatomy and geometry to reach new feats of figurative accuracy and revolutionize renderings of perspective to reflect the human experience of place in space. In Flemish painting, artists such as Bruegel brought new techniques and an everyday sensibility to landscapes and still lifes while in Germany, Dürer and Cranach pioneered an unprecedented drama and psychology in woodcut and engraving.

From Florence to Nuremberg, Venice to Bruges, this essential introduction in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series provide a dependable foundation to the transformative reach and sweep of the Renaissance era. Through the movement’s famed luminaries and lesser-known proponents, its social and political circumstances, and its diversions and developments over time and geography, we take in an extraordinary phenomenon, transformative centuries of change that proffered individual genius, regional variety, and a wholesale reconfiguration of seeing and representing the world.

Featured artists include: Fra Angelico, Giovanni Bellini, Hieronymus Bosch, Sandro Botticelli, Pieter Brueghel, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Albrecht Dürer, El Greco, Matthias Grünewald, Hans Holbein the Younger, Fra Filippo Lippi, Masaccio, Michelangelo, Pontormo, Raphael, Tintoretto, Titian, Paolo Uccello, Veronese, and Leonardo da Vinci.

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

Surreptitious messages, concealed myths, and historical truths lie hidden in the great works of the Italian Renaissance, behind heavy gold leaf and religious symbology.

Although often obscured by the archaic language of historical painting, careful analysis and expert interpretation bring these images to life. Discover masterpieces of the most beloved creative epoch in this fascinating art historical inquiry. Images of war, romance, birth, and knowledge, works of the Italian Renaissance have much to say when given a voice. Rose-Marie and Rainer Hagen do just that-pulling apart each of the 12 featured paintings with all the talent of true detectives to offer an illuminating portal to the past.

From Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam to Ucello's The Battle of San Romano, from Antonello da Messina's St. Jerome in His Study to Pinturicchio's Penelope with the Suitors, the artworks under investigation are a diverse representation of the period's innovation and brilliance, sourced directly from some of the most impressive collections in the world, including the Uffizi, Prado, and National Gallery London.

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

It seems that ever since ancient times, the basis for the great success of portraiture as a genre has been that entirely human aspiration to leave a tangible sign of one's life on earth, the desire to immortalise an image of oneself in an attempt to defeat the inevitable passage of time.

This fascinating and complex subject acquired status as an art form during the 15th century as the concept of Humanism became more diffuse and greater importance was given to the dignity of a person and his capacity to be in control of his own destiny.

The selection of portraits by great European artists contained in this book begins with those of an official nature in which the subject is shown in profile — a deliberate reminder of the classic world — and continues with those offering a realistic image of the subject and an extremely detailed landscape. It ends with portraits from the late Renaissance when it was a psychological characterisation of the subject that prevailed.

Architect and engraver Paul Letarouilly dedicated more than 30 years of his life to creating the most complete collection of plans, elevations, and details of the buildings and monuments of Renaissance Rome.

This student's edition of his achievement features highlights from five massive volumes, originally published between 1825 and 1882. Its systematic overview illustrates the principles of design behind the works of Michelangelo, Sangallo, Peruzzi, Vignola, Bramante, Bernini, Fontana, dalla Porta, Maderno, Borromini, and other great builders of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Letarouilly's engravings, which illustrate the translation of the principles behind classical architecture into the new age of the Renaissance, served as a major source of inspiration from the moment of their publication, and they remain standard references to this day. This edition includes informative text by classical architect and scholar John Barrington Bayley that offers insights into the architecture of Rome's palaces, villas, and squares as well as St. Peter's and the Vatican.

Ideal for students of classical, Renaissance, and Roman architecture, this affordable volume also constitutes a useful guide for visitors to Rome.

Hieronymus Cock (1518-1570) was an Antwerp painter and printmaker. Together with his wife, he was one of the first to establish a publishing house for prints.

From 1548 their firm "At the Sign of the Four Winds" issued hundreds of important etchings and engravings. Prints after frescoes and paintings by Italian artists Raphael and Bronzino, the first series of classical ruins, antique sculpture, as well as designs by such Northern artists as Maarten van Heemskerck and Frans Floris were distributed all over Europe and helped to spread Renaissance ideals of beauty.

It was Cock who spotted the talent of Pieter Bruegel, an artist who would eventually supply Cock with more than sixty designs for prints.

A little-known and rediscovered illuminated manuscript from the Renaissance is the focal point of this enthralling exploration of Umbrian painting, the role of the Franciscan order, and the artists Bartolomeo and Giacepo Caporali.

The Caporali Missal, a sumptuous and important Renaissance missal—or service book for the priest at the altar—was illuminated by the Caporali brothers for the Franciscan community in the hillside town of Montone, near Perugia, in 1469. This exhibition catalog celebrates this important manuscript, recently acquired by the Cleveland Museum of Art, with exquisite reproductions that bring the illuminated pages to life.

Additional works by the Caporali brothers and relevant art from the museum’s and other collections elucidate the history, style, content, function, and authorship of the missal. Illustrations of a chalice and a paten, a chasuble, and a processional cross enhance the religious and aesthetic context of the manuscript.

A series of essays by eminent scholars examine the influence of Florentine artists on the Caporali brothers and explore the spiritual life of the Franciscan community and the history of the friary at Montone.

Italian ironwork from Roman times, through Medieval centuries, and up to Neo Classical designs of the early nineteenth century comprise this collection of 100 photographs from Italian sources. They depict trellises, grilles, gates, fencing, household lighting, fireplace accoutrements, and door hardware that will inspire today's designers. Their origins in hill towns of Ialy are recorded for many images. This is authentic ironwork for contractors, decorators, and homeowners to enjoy.

The lofty painted ceilings of Europe's palaces and churches rank among the greatest treasures of the Renaissance and Baroque eras. This unique assemblage features brilliant full-color reproductions of some of the finest examples of such art. Drawn from two rare French and German portfolios of the nineteenth century, this unique volume re-creates more than 60 magnificent ceilings from Parisian drawing rooms, German castles, and Italian galleries.

Richly depicting scenes from nature and mythology, this collection abounds in chubby cherubs, ethereal goddesses, heroes in full battle armor, and all manner of animals, both legendary and realistic. In addition, a generous assortment of floral ornaments includes rosettes, garlands, and clusters of acanthus and other decorative leaves and vines. Whether used in their entirety or as individual motifs, these designs will add beauty and sophistication to any art or craft project.

The volume is divided into three chapters: Early Renaissance, High Renaissance and Mannerism. It includes palaces, buildings, villas, churches, hospitals, monasteries, squares, streets, fountains and flights of steps.

The book is completed with drawings and maps.