Showing titles in History & Criticism

Sontag's most important critical writings from 1972 to 1980 are collected in Under the Sign of Saturn. One of America's leading essayists, Sontag's writings are commentaries on the relation between moral and aesthetic ideas, discussing the works of Antonin Artaud, Leni Riefenstahl, Elias Canetti, Walter Benjamin, and others. The collection includes a variety of her well-known essays. Sontag's writings are famously full of intellectual range and depth, and are at turns exhilarating, ominous, disturbing, and beautiful.

In a secret meeting in 1981, a master thief named Louis Royce gave career gangster Ralph Rossetti the tip of a lifetime. As a kid, Royce had visited the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and made a habit of sneaking in at night to find a good place to sleep. He knew the Museum's security was lax, and he gave this information to a boss of the Boston criminal underworld. It took years before the Museum was hit. But when it finally happened, it quickly became one of the most infamous art heists in history.

Tarea es la de pintar a Don Quijote hasta más difícil que la de hinchar un perro. No ya ilustrar la obra imperecedera de Cervantes, sino vestir de carne visible y concreta un espíritu individual y vivo, no mera idea abstracta. Con escrupuloso cuidado me he entretenido en entresacar de las páginas vivas de El Ingenioso Hidalgo, cuantos pasajes se refieren más o menos directamente a los caracteres físicos de Don Quijote. Invito al lector a que divaguemos un poco acerca de la expresión pictórica de este símbolo vivo.

Al final la lectura deviene la música de un río ancho y calmo que nos arrastra junto con los objetos que expresan la cultura del mundo hacia un océano apacible de remansadas sensaciones y conocimientos. Un acierto pleno y una obra que, estoy seguro, va a ocupar un lugar importante en la bibliografía del tema.

When Dave Hickey was 12, he rode the surfer's dream: the perfect wave. And, like so many things in life we long for, it didn't quite turn out - he shot the pier and dashed himself against the rocks of Sunset Cliffs in Ocean Beach, which just about killed him. Fortunately, for Hickey and for us, he survived, and continues to battle, decades into a career as one of America's foremost critical iconoclasts, a trusted, even cherished no-nonsense voice commenting on the all-too-often nonsensical worlds of art and culture.

Michael Peppiatt met Francis Bacon in June 1963 in Soho's French House to request an interview for a student magazine he was editing. Bacon invited him to lunch, and over oysters and Chablis they began a friendship and a no-holds-barred conversation that would continue until Bacon's death 30 years later. Fascinated by the artist's brilliance and charisma, Peppiatt accompanied him on his nightly round of prodigious drinking from grand hotel to louche club and casino, seeing all aspects of Bacon's 'gilded gutter life' and meeting everybody around him.

This is the beautifully told story of charismatic and unconventional pop artist Martin Sharp, from his lonely privileged childhood to the heady days of the underground magazine Oz to Swinging London and beyond. Sharp blurred the boundaries of high art and low; he drew rock stars and reprobates into his world, collaborated with Eric Clapton, obsessively championed eccentric singer Tiny Tim, was haunted by Sydney's Luna Park and, paradoxically, became a recluse whose phone never stopped ringing.

In The Language of Things, Deyan Sudjic, director of the Design Museum, decodes the things around us: their hidden meanings, our relationships with them, how they shape our lives and why we desire them. Design is everywhere. It seduces, pleases and inspires us. It makes us part with our money. It defines who we think we are. An iPhone, an anglepoise lamp, a Picasso, a banknote, an Armani suit, a William Morris textile, a Lucky Strike packet, a spacecraft - every object tells a story.

Had Hitler succeeded in conquering Europe, he would have crowned himself Holy Roman Emperor. The Nazis had in their possession priceless artifacts that would give Hitler legitimacy in his subjects' eyes: the Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire including the Spear of Destiny, alleged to have pierced Christ's side at the Crucifixion. Looted from the royal treasury in Vienna, Austria, the Crown Jewels were hidden in a secret bunker deep beneath Nrnberg castle, known to few.

In dit multidisciplinaire college kijkt Kitty Zijlmans naar de vele aspecten van kunstgeschiedenis, waaronder esthetica en kunstkritiek. Maar ook naar de rol van de kunst in de maatschappij en de veranderingen daarin als gevolg van de opkomst van moderne kunst en de mondialisering.

Se davanti a una tela di Jackson Pollock la tua reazione è "Vabbè, con una latta da cinque litri nel garage di zio Franco questo lo facevo pure io", questo audiolibro è per te. Perché tutti pensano che per apprezzare l'arte siano necessari paroloni incomprensibili o libri pallosissimi? Daniela Collu vuole dimostrarci che non è così. Storica dell'arte per formazione e conduttrice radiotelevisiva per professione, ci invita a una passeggiata tra 60 opere, artisti e monumenti fondamentali, facendoci scoprire che si può godere della bellezza senza soggezione.

Kim była najbardziej grzeszna Madonna średniowiecza? Kto malował lubieżne służące? Czyje oczy hipnotyzowały Wiedeń? Kolejna książka z bestsellerowej serii biografii historycznych wydawnictwa Lira zabiera czytelników w krainę światowego malarstwa. Dlaczego artysta zdecydował się uwiecznić rysy tej a nie innej damy? Czy były to przypadkowe modelki? A może portretowane były żony, córki lub kochanki bogatych sponsorów zamawiających owe obrazy?

La mattina del 10 ottobre 1517 il cardinale Luigi d'Aragona e il suo segretario Antonio de Beatis salirono su una collina sulle rive della Loira verso il castello di Cloux. Non andavano a rendere omaggio a un membro della famiglia reale ma a un principe dell'arte, e per di più italiano. In quella giornata, Leonardo mostra al cardinale e al suo seguito tre quadri ai quali stava lavorando e che saranno gli ultimi che dipingerà prima di morire: la Sant'Anna, il San Giovannino e la Gioconda.

"Rebel Artists" ist ein Buch über 15 Frauen aus aller Welt, die sich als Künstlerinnen Respekt verschafften. Sie mussten gegen Vorurteile und für ihre Rechte kämpfen. Aber sie ließen sich durch nichts und niemanden von ihrer Kunst abbringen. Frida Kahlo kennen alle als starke, mutige Malerin. Doch auch viele weitere Frauen verdienen Beachtung: Emily Kame Kngwarreye, die erst mit 80 Jahren anfing, unermüdlich zu malen, um dann mit über 3000 Bildern zur berühmtesten Aborigines-Künstlerin zu werden.

L'histoire de la comtesse Matilde et de son territoire : L'histoire, les Canossa (les origines, la famille, les biens), les personnages, Mathilde de Canossa, Henri IV, Grégoire VII, Henri V, les châteaux, les paroisses rurales (pievi), les bourgs de l'Apennin, le paysage, l'axe directeur de Mathilde, l'artisanat artistique/l'ars canusina et les produits œnogastronomiques.

La storia della Contessa Matilde e del suo territorio: La Storia, I Canossa (le origini, la famiglia, i possedimenti), I personaggi, Matilde di Canossa, Enrico IV, Gregorio VII, I castelli, Il sistema fortificato canossano, Le Pievi, La direttrice matildica, Il Circuito dei Castelli matildici e delle corti reggiane, L'attualità di Canossa, L'artigianato artistico: l'ars canusina, I prodotti enogastronomici e Le strade dei vini e dei sapori.

Contemporary art has never been so popular - but the art world is changing. In a landscape of increasing globalization, there is growing interest in questions over the nature of contemporary art today and the identity of who is controlling its future. In the midst of this, contemporary art continues to be a realm of freedom where artists shock, break taboos, flout generally received ideas, and switch between confronting viewers with works of great emotional profundity and jaw-dropping triviality. 

Conceived over 30 years of painting and creating in his studio, this book is Makoto Fujimura's broad and deep exploration of creativity and the spiritual aspects of "making". What he does in the studio is theological work as much as it is aesthetic work. In between pouring precious, pulverized minerals onto handmade paper to create the prismatic, refractive surfaces of his art, he comes into the quiet space in the studio, in a discipline of awareness, waiting, prayer, and praise.

Art critic and broadcaster Alastair Sooke, accompanied by some of the world's leading creative thinkers, takes an in-depth look at the outstanding exhibits in New York's MoMA, exploring how the way we 'see' art is shaped by our experiences and perspectives. His guests include some of the sharpest minds of our time - artists, writers, designers, comedians, musicians and scientists, among them Steve Martin, Margaret Cho, John Waters, Roxane Gay, Fiona Shaw, Orhan Pamuk and Stanley Tucci.

Clive Bell is perhaps more well-known today for being a Bloomsbury socialite and the husband of Vanessa Bell, sister to Virginia Woolf. Yet Bell was a highly important figure in his own right: an internationally renowned art critic who championed young artists, he defended daring new forms of expression at a time when Britain was closed off to all things foreign. For decades Bell has been a shadowy figure, refracted through the wealth of writing on Bloomsbury, but here Mark Hussey brings Bell to the forefront.