In 2019, it will be 450 years since the death of Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1526/28-1569). To mark this anniversary, the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna is organising the first ever retrospective of Bruegel’s work, while The World of Bruegel will be shown in the Bokrijk Open-Air Museum. The two institutions are joining forces to bring Bruegel’s masterpiece The Fight Between Carnival and Lent (1559) to life. An important key in this respect are the numerous everyday objects that are depicted in the painting. In collaboration with the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam) and the Rijksmuseum (Amsterdam), the props that Bruegel depicted have been examined and interpreted from a contemporary perspective. The authors allow the objects to speak for themselves, preceded by an introductory essay by curator Sabine Pénot of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Just as Bruegel’s paintings were ‘conversation pieces’ in their day, intended to trigger a discussion between guests during dinners, this book presents a three-way conversation about The Fight Between Carnival and Lent through Bruegel realia, in which art history (Katrien Lichtert), historical design (Alexandra van Dongen and Lucinda Timmermans) and literature (Abdelkader Benali) enter into a dialogue. In A Conversation Piece, the authors reveal the humour, symbolism, imagery and hidden stories behind the everyday objects in the painting. The exhibition Pieter Bruegel the Elder will run from 2 October 2018 to 13 January 2019 in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, and the exhibition The World of Bruegel will be on display in the Bokrijk Open-Air Museum from 6 April to 20 October 2019.

These essays by Hahn and West will deal respectively with the formation of the collection and the figure of Bent Juel-Jensen, the seminal Aksumite coin collector in Oxford (as well as a medical doctor, academic, and traveller). They will also discuss recent problems that have emerged regarding the study of this coinage. In its entirety, this publication will make a fundamental contribution to this area of research and be an indispensable acquisition for many institutions and individuals.

The collections of twentieth-century paintings in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, have developed largely through the generosity of individuals. Notable among these in the early decades of the century were Frank Hindley Smith and Mrs W F R Weldon, while since the Second World War the Museum’s collections have been enriched through gifts and requests from Thomas Balston, R A P Bevan, Molly Freeman, Christopher Hewett and others. This book gives the reader a taste of the wide range of the collection, with its representative group of Camden Town and Euston Road School pictures, and important early works by Bonnard, Picasso and Matisse.

The Royal Museum for Central Africa, in Tervuren, Belgium, was founded in 1898, but its current building was inaugurated in 1910 and is characterised by many symbols reflecting the colonial propaganda of the time. The grand rotunda, designed to serve as the museum entrance, plays host to a series of statues that are strong examples of such imagery, reflecting fundamentally racist stereotypes.

Between 2013 and 2018, the RMCA underwent a major renovation that saw a substantial redesign of the permanent exhibition, with the involvement of members of the African diaspora in Belgium. A major challenge of the renovation was to demonstrate the will to decolonise a listed building that is legally protected against changes. As removal of the colonial statues was not allowed, the museum was forced to find innovative solutions, notably by inviting contemporary African artists to create installations to dialogue, contrast, and discuss with colonial messages.

Congolese artist Aimé Mpané was chosen to make such an installation in the rotunda in 2018 with New breath, or Burgeoning Congo. Public reaction helped the AfricaMuseum realise that it needed to go further. Along with the creation of a second sculpture, Aimé Mpané, in co-creation with Belgian artist Jean Pierre Müller, proposed the RE/STORE project: a permanent installation of transparent veils, each bearing a contemporary message, hung in front of every statue in the rotunda. The themes addressed in this collection of veils interact with the viewer in a powerful and eloquent manner.

This richly illustrated book is a compilation of texts written by renowned experts about the history of the rotunda and its statues, as well as the semantic and artistic analysis of RE/STORE, providing a full catalogue of the installations, sculptures, and veils.

Design models are an integral part of the design process, as prototypes and providers of ideas for those products that are later launched on the market as serial and mass goods. However, working with models is an interdisciplinary undertaking: The book reflects the design model as the basis for future concepts, as a collector’s item in a museum and in its actual function as a planning and work tool for designers and model builders.

Text in English and German.

Innovation, exclusivity, and elegance define Patek Philippe, a family-owned company with a single and passionate calling: to perfect the watch. These lavishly illustrated books present some of the most important timepieces from the more than 3,000 watches exhibited at the Patek Philippe Museum in Geneva. These precious timepieces have been passionately assembled over more than 40 years by Philippe Stern, Honorary President of the company, and include some of the most valuable pieces in watchmaking history. The books allow you to take the Patek Philippe Museum’s exhibition home with you, or, alternatively, to get a preview of its treasures before you visit.

From the collection of historic watches featuring the first portable timepieces dating back to the 16th century to innovative milestones in Patek Philippe’s portfolio since its founding in 1839, each watch is reproduced with such beauty and precision that you can almost hear it ticking. With expert curatorial insight and context from Peter Friess, Conservateur of the Patek Philippe Museum, these intricate mechanisms are not only presented for themselves; they also offer a unique perspective into the cultural history of the last 500 years. True to the trust and excellence of the Patek Philippe brand, the presentation, the extraordinary book design by Birgit Binner, and content of these sumptuous publications meet the highest professional standards. They are the perfect books for the “perfect watch.”

The close relationship between Edvard Munch and the National Gallery of Oslo, today part of the National Museum, is a subject well worthy of a detailed publication.

The first Munch painting acquired by the museum was Night in Nice, purchased in 1891. Today the collection encompasses 57 paintings and 186 works on paper. The paintings include masterpieces such as The Sick Child, The Scream, Madonna, The Girls on the Bridge, and Man in the Cabbage Field. How did the museum come by all these works? And what is the story behind the famous ‘Munch Room’? Answers to these and many other questions can be found in this book, which contains reproductions of all the works in the collection.

The book contains texts by Karin Hindsbo, Nils Messel, Sidsel Helliesen, Gerd Woll, Thierry Ford, Mai Britt Guleng, Øystein Ustvedt, Wenche Volle and Vibeke Waallann Hansen.

Text in English and Norwegian.

This book presents the richness, diversity and strength of the work of the most famous street art artist in the world… and yet nobody knows his identity. We are invited to follow the evolution of the artist from England to the United States, France, Israel and the Ukraine, and through more than a hundred emblematic works, all explained. This is the original Catalog Raisonné of the Banksy Museum, in which all these works are reproduced in their urban contexts, allowing the general public to discover them in a realistic way and to grasp their strength, including those that have been stolen or defaced and no longer exist.

This elegant exhibition catalogue is presented by The San Diego Museum of Art to accompany the 2023 major exhibition O’Keeffe and Moore, which explores the evolution of Modernism through the work of Georgia O’Keeffe and Henry Moore. Featuring essays from prominent scholars, including representatives of both the Henry Moore Foundation and the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, the catalogue’s richly illustrated text delves into each artist’s motivation and methodology, and the parallels between them, in particular, the inspiration both took from nature and organic forms, such as bones and seashells. The publication serves as an essential companion to the exhibition. In addition to explorations of the artists’ studios that provide further insight into their working methods, the catalogue presents drawings, paintings, and sculpture that illustrate the organic roots of Modernism developed independently, yet concurrently, by O’Keeffe and Moore. Thematic sections of the catalogue include the Real and the Surreal; The Artists’ Studios; Bones; Stones; Seashells, Flowers, and Internal/External Forms; and Landscapes of Forms. Essay topics include Henry Moore: Modernism, Nature, and National Identity; “A Revelation of the Perfect Relation”: The Influence of D.H. Lawrence on the work of Henry Moore and Georgia O’Keeffe; and Finding the Form, and the publication will also include a comparative chronology of the lives and careers of the two artists.

From Louise Bourgeois to Yoko Ono presents around 60 jewellery works by some 40 internationally renowned female visual artists from the 1920s to the present day. Their jewellery pieces open up new, often surprising perspectives on their artistic production. Some pieces captivate with minimalist elegance, others with their expressive, sculptural presence or playful humour, with each unique work consolidating an artistic vision into a small personal statement. With its exhibition of the same name, the Museum für Angewandte Kunst Köln (MAKK; Museum of Applied Arts, Cologne) deliberately focuses on female standpoints, thus breaking with the male-dominated perception of avant-garde art jewellery.

Artists featured include: Lynda Benglis; Pierrette Bloch; Barbara Bloom; Katinka Bock; Louise Bourgeois; Helen Britton; Barbara Chase-Riboud; Claudia Comte; Sheila Concari; Sonia Delaunay; Nathalia Edenmont; Aube Elléouët; Claire von Falkenstein; Ruth Francken; Marcia Grostein; Jenny Holzer; Rebecca Horn; Annabelle d’Huart; Leiko Ikemura; Jacqueline de Jong; Yayoi Kusama; Alicja Kwade; Claude Lalanne; Liliane Lijn; Rita McBride; Blanca Muños; Brigitte Nahon; Eva Renée Nele [E. R. Nele]; Louise Nevelson; Michele Oka Doner; Yoko Ono; Meret Oppenheim; Françoise Pétrovitch; Niki de Saint Phalle; Armelle de Sainte Marie; Elodie Seguin; Maïlys Seydoux-Dumas; Kiki Smith; Sophie Taeuber-Arp; Dorothea Tanning; Sissel Tolaas; Rosemarie Trockel; Paloma Varga Weisz; Sophia Vari; Joana Vasconcelos; Zhou Yiyan.

Text in English and German.

The Swiss artist Otto Künzli has revolutionised modern art jewellery. In the 45-odd years in which he has been addressing the topic of jewellery, Künzli has carved out for himself a unique position of far-reaching international influence, not only as an artist and a pioneer but also as an author and mentor. Otto Künzli’s works are based on complex reflection, conceptual and visual imagination. The result: objects with a clear, minimalist appearance, captivatingly crafted to perfection and highly visible – jewellery that adorns and at the same time possesses an autonomous aesthetic status of its own. The publication presents for the first time Otto Künzli’s highly diverse oeuvre. It includes hundreds of jewellery objects as well as interdisciplinary conceptual works from the artist’s various creative phases. An extraordinary artist’s book designed in close collaboration with Otto Künzli and Die Neue Sammlung – The International Design Museum Munich.

Otto Künzli was born in 1948 in Zurich, Switzerland. Since 1991 Künzli has held the Chair of Art Jewellery at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich – as the successor of Prof. Hermann Jünger. Otto Künzli’s work is represented in numerous international museums and collections. Alongside numerous awards, in 2010 Otto Künzli was awarded the Swiss Grand Prix Design, and in 2011 the Goldener Ehrenring der Gesellschaft für Goldschmiedekunst, the golden ring of honour conferred by the German Association for Goldsmiths’ Art.

Balloon Museum surfaces as a sublime theatre of innovation in contemporary art, where inflatable works delineate new aesthetic and interactive horizons. This first volume is a visual and narrative tribute to the genius of the artists involved up until January 2023, offering a rich overview of images and texts that capture the innovative essence and revolutionary allure of the museum.

The Leipziger Schule and the subsequent Neue Leipziger Schule represent a highly influential movement within contemporary figurative art. Originating at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig, this artistic tradition places strong emphasis on craftsmanship and realism. Artists such as Werner Tübke, Bernhard Heisig, and Wolfgang Mattheuer laid the foundation with their technically refined and socially engaged works. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Neue Leipziger Schule emerged, with artists like Neo Rauch, Rosa Loy, and Matthias Weischer blending realism with dreamlike and surreal elements.

Since 2009, the Drents Museum has devoted considerable attention to these movements. Exhibitions such as Realism from Leipzig and solo presentations by Rosa Loy, Kristina Schuldt, Mirjam Völker and Tilo Baumgärtel reflect the museum’s long-standing commitment to these artists. The museum has also built an extensive collection of works from both the original and the new Leipzig schools, including recent acquisitions like Baboom by Tilo Baumgärtel. The book includes essays by leading authors and a comprehensive selection of works.

Text in English and Dutch.

The collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, encompasses more than 450,000 works of art, from ancient coins, gems, and mummies to work by some of today’s most celebrated contemporary artists, and everything in between. This attractive little volume illustrates a selection of these remarkable holdings, including highlights of the museum’s famous Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings, its unrivaled collection of Asian art, and spectacular works from all eras of American history. The perfect memento of the MFA, this best-selling Tiny FolioTM has been updated throughout and features all-new color photography.

Art of the Americas • Art of Europe • Contemporary Art • Prints, Drawings, and Photographs • Art of the Ancient World • Art of Asia, Africa, and Oceania • Textile and Fashion Arts • Musical Instruments

The review of this book in Apollo Magazine speaks for itself: it describes it as ‘essential’ and ‘hard to put down’, declaring that ‘the reader will be given an education in how to look at and write about works of art’.

The Ashmolean’s collection of European sculpture is among the finest of its kind in the world. The collection accumulated over four centuries, from the dawn of English Art Collecting through to the Victorian period, which saw the arrival of one of the world’s great collections of Renaissance bronzes and other sculpture assembled by the scholar-connoisseur C.D.E. Fortnum, as well as further gifts and occassional purchases leading up to the present day. The catalogue covers the Ashmolean’s collection dating from 1200 to around 1540. From Romanesque bronzes and Gothic ivories to High Renaissance sculpture, this three-volume set is a meticulous and comprehensive record of over 500 pieces, each one fully illustrated.

The aristocratic families of Europe once used to indulge in luxurious banquets with exquisite table accessories to demonstrate their power and extravagantly while away the hours. Well into the 18th century, it was not unusual for people to bring their own cutlery—quite often peculiar, valuable one-of-a-kind pieces. In the Baroque period, matching dinner services came into vogue and, in the wake of industrialisation, became mass-produced commodities. Trading with faraway countries, conquests, and migration augmented people’s menus with “exotic” fruit and spices and contributed to a change in customs and traditions.

In an exceptional exhibition on the mores of dining, the Jewellery Museum in Pforzheim presents historical goldsmithing and contemporary design, jewellery “to eat,” and treasures from across the globe. In addition, the accompanying publication will entice you with its special aspects of food culture—after all, the way to one’s cultural heart is also through the stomach.

Text in German.

This book, edited by the designer of Shanghai Astronomy Museum, Ennead Architects LLP, is an all-round record of the design and construction process of Shanghai Astronomy Museum, with a foreword written by Ye Shuhua — an astronomer and academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and a preface by Shanghai Science and Technology Museum. The main part of the book unfolds from four perspectives: site, concept, realisation, and engineering and construction, which describes the process of generating the core form of the Shanghai Astronomy Museum, as well as the design ingenuity of the main functional areas inside. The book presents many beautiful images of the museum, and includes texts by the chief designer, Thomas J. Wong. The designers’ love for the universe and their great enthusiasm for the project contribute to the essence of this book.

Text in English and Chinese.

In a former shipyard of 8,000 square metres at the ultra-hip NDSM Wharf in Amsterdam, you will find Europe’s largest street art museum: STRAAT. Yearly an impressive 200,000 visitors admire their collection of over 180 works by around 170 artists, many of which were specially created for this location. As STRAAT’s collection is constantly refreshed and expanded, it’s time for a second catalogue featuring only new works by about 80 artists. Divided into chapters by genre—muralism, art and activism, native/nature, abstract graffiti, and installations—and interspersed with essays by experts like Steven P. Harrington, Carlo McCormick, Charlotte Pyatt and Christian Omodeo, this book is a wonderful anthology of the key figures in the contemporary street art scene.

With her unmistakable signature and exuberant imagination, Beate Kuhn (1927-2015) is one of the most significant German ceramicists of the post-war era. She turned to the liberal arts as early as the end of the 1950s. In linking sculptural reasoning with the possibilities of the material and inherent pottery techniques, the internationally renowned artist conquered the frontiers of ceramics and created virtuosic works that went on to form their own contribution to the history of modern sculpture.

With around 190 works from all her periods of creativity, the Mannheim architect Klaus Freiberger was able to compile a collection unmatched anywhere else in the world. In honour of its foundation at the Neue Sammlung, the impressive oeuvre of Beate Kuhn is now being presented for the first time in this comprehensive publication.

This book accompanies an exhibition at Die Neue Sammlung – The Design Museum, Munich (DE), 13.7.-19.11.2017.

Text in English and German.

Weimin He’s 324 ink drawings, pen sketches and woodblock prints comprise an intimate record of the progress of construction in the newly designed Ashmolean Museum that opened late last year. An unusual approach to documentation in the age of digital photography, the catalogue provides a delightful art experience for readers who will never set foot in the Ashmolean, which is the museum for the University of Oxford.

Weimin has drawn workers lifting roof beams, welding metal rods and pouring cement into the mixer. He gives us behind-the-scenes portraits of museum personnel, making each individual come alive, for example, an objects conservator at her work and a researcher in the prints room at his. An artist-in-residence at the museum and an art scholar, Weimin employed Chinese drawing and woodblock printmaking methods. His portraits were drawn on pi, xuan papers or album leaves, with Chinese brushes and inks that have been used for over a millennium. Seven of the prints and the catalogue were presented to Queen Elizabeth for the museum’s opening.

This catalogue describes what is probably the most encyclopaedic collection of early coloured Worcester porcelain in existence. Henry Marshall assembled the collection between the two World Wars. In the years that followed, he sought to represent as comprehensive a range of patterns as possible, with minimal duplication, so that his collection would become a true reference work in itself. Every piece was acquired for specific purpose, many of them either to further his knowledge or because they were so rare. He was one of a small group of ceramic collectors who sought to document sources and influences, creating comprehensive hypotheses for the objects’ histories.

In this case specifically, Marshall’s records reveal the Far Eastern influence on Worcester porcelain, alongside the many other prototypes used by decorators of these fine ceramics. This catalogue, like the collection itself, seeks to present early Worcester porcelain to collectors and a wider public in a systematic way. It describes, classifies, and reproduces every item in the Marshall Collection. It does not seek to present detailed new research, but to record the state of knowledge about the subject at the time of writing.

The Wellby Bequest, received by the Ashmolean Museum in 2013, consists of some 500 precious and exotic objects, mainly from Continental Europe, from the late medieval to the rococo, and is the most remarkable accession of this kind of material to any museum in the UK since the bequest of Ferdinand de Rothschild to the British Museum in 1898 (the Waddesdon Bequest). The collection was assembled by three generations of the Wellby family with an intention that it should reflect the great princely treasure chambers (Kunstkammer) preserved in Dresden, Vienna, Innsbruck, and elsewhere. Many of these objects have never been previously published. This beautiful and accessible book introduces over sixty of the prime pieces from this astonishing addition to the Ashmolean, presenting material of the type incomparably superior to anything in other UK museums outside London. Both authors are specialists in European decorative arts of the Renaissance and later periods.

Published to coincide with the opening of the new Wellby Bequest Gallery in the Ashmolean Museum September 2015

Contents: Preface and Acknowledgements; Introduction to the Michael Wellby Bequest (by Timothy Wilson); Introductory essay on the Kunstkammer tradition (by Matthew Winterbottom); 50 catalogue entries on highlights of the Wellby Collection; Glossary, Bibliography; Index