Daniel Kruger (b. 1951), widely known as a jewellery artist, presents an overview of his ceramic works, featuring 230 pieces created over twenty years. Classic examples – tulip and lidded vases, delftware and dinner services – are familiar references, which Kruger decorates with images of footballers, homoerotic nudes or casts of twigs or bones. Worlds collide, revealing our preconceptions regarding conventions that provide a manipulated view of reality. There is less interest in the spectacular; Kruger’s choice of images however, leads to unexpected, provocative combinations of form with decoration. In a continual process of artistic acquisition, new interpretation and appropriation, Kruger explores the interstice between historical archetypes and kitsch within European ceramic history.

Text in English and German.

Justyna Koeke transforms children’s fantasies into wearable sculptures, morphs fashion shows into performances. As a child the artist, together with her sisters, painted her heroes “princesses and saints” which she now translates into reality as a collection of vibrantly colourful outfits full of whimsical detail. These tailored fantasies are brought to life on the bodies of ladies of advanced years. The publication presents the entire project: from the child-like naive drawings, via photographs of the dressed-up models before the sterile backdrop of their retirement home, to fun-loving fashion shows – an equally humorous and critical approach to the correlation of childhood dreams and the reality of getting older, in which the unsolved issues of an increasingly ageing society invariably resonate. The art project, which fluctuates between sculpture, performance and allusions to the fashion world, was presented, among other places, at the Alternative Berlin Fashion Week.

Text in English and German.

Ulla and Martin Kaufmann have developed their aesthetic agenda together. The techniques used by gold and silversmiths are the focal point of their work and represent the basic thematic focus of their tableware, jewellery and cutlery. It rests on their exploratory approach to materials and the diverse possibilities it provides for expression. Ulla and Martin Kaufmann have been working in their own studio in Hildesheim for nearly forty years. The two artists have thus acquired unique skills over years of experience especially the knowledge of the properties of silver and gold, their materials of choice. This profound knowledge is an essential part of the indissoluble union of design and execution. The connotations are always dual: the form of objects stems from practical considerations; is, therefore, close to ideas of functional design. At the same time, individual expression born of the artists’ mastery of their craft and their exacting aesthetic standards surrounds these pieces with the aura of works of art. This book reveals the secrets and beauty of the stunning pieces made by Ulla and Martin Kaufmann. In showcasing these objects, it establishes their aesthetic permanence as timelessly practical works. Text in English & German.

Throughout its history, the Ashmolean has evolved to meet changing needs and reflect new ideas. In the process, it has transformed from a cabinet of curiosities, representing the world in microcosm, to a museum of art and archaeology, illustrating connections between cultures over time. This book tells the story of that remarkable transformation. It shows what the Ashmolean was like at various points in the past and introduces the people who helped to make it the museum it is today. It looks at the buildings that have housed the Ashmolean and how they have been continually altered and adapted, as well as at the collections and how they have been interpreted and reinterpreted over the centuries.

Ancient Mesopotamia and Iran are usually treated separately or as part of a much broader ‘Ancient Near East’. However, the developments that lie at the root of our own world – farming, cities, writing, organised religion, warfare – were forged in the tensions and relations between the inhabitants of lowland Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq) and the highlands of Iran. Mountains and Lowlands explores this relationship providing a detailed but accessible account covering the period 6000 BC-AD 650, from the development of the first agricultural communities to the coming of Islam. The story is told through the superlative Ancient Near Eastern collections in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, supplemented by images of photographs of archaeological sites and of iconic pieces in other collections including the Louvre, Paris. The discussion is further supported by six maps commissioned especially for this publication. Contents: 1. Introduction 2. From Village to City: 6000-3000 BC 3. From City to Kingdom: 3000-1500 BC 4. From Kingdom to Empire: 1500-500 BC 5. From India to Egypt: 500 BC-AD 650

Surimono poetry prints are among the finest examples of Japanese woodblock printmaking of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Consisting of witty poetry combined with related images, surimono were often designed by leading print artists and were exquisitely produced using the best materials and most sophisticated printing techniques. Unlike the ukiyo-e prints of actors, courtesans and landscapes that were being commercially published around the same time, surimono were never intended for sale to the general public. Instead they were privately published in limited editions by members of poetry clubs, to present to friends and acquaintances on festive occasions, especially at the New Year.

This book introduces over forty surimono in the collection of the Ashmolean Museum and provides readers with an insight into the refined and cultivated Japanese literati culture of the early nineteenth century. As well as exploring the customs, legends, figures and objects depicted, it presents new translations of the humorous poems (kyoka) that lie at the heart of surimono, and highlights the intricate relationship that existed between the poetry and accompanying images. This will be the first time that the Ashmolean’s collection of surimono, mostly from the Jennings-Spalding Gift and containing a number of rare and previously unpublished prints, has ever been catalogued.

The Wilshere Collection offers a remarkable insight into one Englishman’s enthusiasm for the early Christian church. A wealthy landowner travelling frequently to Italy, Charles Wilshere (1814-1906) saw it as his mission to acquaint the British with the then brand-new subject of early Christian archaeology and art. Newly discovered documentation, including correspondence held at the Vatican Library and the Biblioteca San Luigi, Posilippo, recount Wilshere’s acquisition of a remarkable collection of early Christian, Jewish and pagan gold-glass, sarcophagi and inscriptions, shipped to England for public display.

Previously unpublished evidence presents the reader with intriguing new information about the provenance of the collection. In addition to this, recent scientific analysis of the objects, now in the collections of the Ashmolean Museum, allows major new insights, notably into the origin of gold-glass and its use in fourth-century Rome.

“It is a rare species, but it exists,” as ’60s art critic Pascal Renous pointed out on the subject of artistic couples. This designer-decorator duo of Janine Abraham and Dirk-Jan Rol met at Jacques Dumond’s studio in 1955. The couple shares the same love of precision, line and plain colours. Their earliest joint creations were first exhibited at the Salon des artistes décorateurs, in Paris. Their furniture, made of wicker, wood and aluminium, twice won prizes at the Salon des artistes décorateurs (a sideboard in 1956 and an armchair in 1958), garnering notice from the public and professionals alike. Jean Royère did not hesitate to use their emblematic Soleil armchair (gold medal at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair) in the decoration of the palace of the Shah of Iran, in Teheran. Their light and functional designs are available today, re-edited by Yota Design. Abraham & Rol were also interior designers and intervened in this capacity for both individual clients and large corporate clients, such as Yves Rocher and Saint-Gobain, with the same precision and sense of composition that define their furniture pieces. Finally, the couple also expressed their creativity through architecture, their mastery of this discipline enabling them to design some twenty houses from the 1960s through the 2000s in the Île-de-France region. Their homes are genuine inhabited sculptures, of which certain have become truly emblematic. Text in English and French

At the turn of the twentieth century, in particular Gauguin, Picasso, Matisse, and later the Surrealists, then others right up till the present day, Western artists have drawn on the arts of Africa for inspiration. How can this constant impact ever be measured? The same is true for the arts in Africa. Every sculpture carries within it the heritage of a people, culture, and artistic tradition in the originality of its forms. West Africa, Central Africa, and East Africa each has its own set of characteristics, within which the variety of the sculptures – always similar yet also always different – demonstrates the creativity of the ethnic group that created it. This book presents a remarkable collection amassed by a knowledgeable and impassioned art lover that combines sensitivity with quality – a quality of forms meticulously selected among different African cultures. It includes masks and reliquaries carved in Gabon, effigies and statuettes from Congo-Brazzaville and Congo-Kinshasa, and astonishing objects from West Africa, from Mali to Cameroon, the Koro and Mossi peoples, the Ejagham and Ekoi in Nigeria, and the Gouro in the Ivory Coast. An extraordinary collection of artistic forms that well merits its place in the universal patrimony of art.

Contents: Introduction; Le Gabon; Le royaume Kongo; Les Teke | Les Bembe | Les Zombo; Les Songye; Les Luba | Les Hemba | Les Bembe/Boyo; Les Chowke | Les Pende | Les Zande/Mangbetu; L’Afrique de l’Ouest: Les Guro | Les Senufo | Les Mossi | Les Koro | Les Fon | Les Bamileke | Les Oku | Les Mendakwe; Conclusion; English text.

Text in English and French

The Fondation Baur, Musée des Arts d Extrême-Orient, Geneva, Switzerland, houses one of the most important collections of Asian art in the world: some 9,000 works from China and Japan. This new book celebrates the 50th anniversary of the museum and the 150th birthday of Alfred Baur (1865-1951), whose collections are housed in the museum’s elegant nineteenth-century townhouse. Lavishly illustrated with stunning new photographs, most full page, the book showcases the diversity and quality of Baur’s collections, which span netsuke, lacquerware, saber fittings, prints, jades, imperial ceramics, textiles, and much more. Precious Japanese objects, meticulously worked and technically perfect, reveal the outstanding skills of Japanese craftsmen; the simplicity of the forms of Chinese monochrome ceramics displays the contemporaneity of the visionary master ceramists of the Song dynasty.

Charlotte Perriand (1903-1999) was one of the most innovative furniture and interior designers of the twentieth century, long renowned for the tubular-steel chairs she created with le Corbusier. Her career spanned nearly seventy-five years and included work in her native France as well as in Africa, South America, Asia, and Europe, and today her designs are highly collectable. Recently, several hundred photographic negatives were uncovered in her archives, revealing for the first time the scope of her work as a photographer. In the late 1920s, French interior and furniture designer Charlotte Perriand was at the cusp of her career, just beginning her work as an architect, designer, town planner, and political militant. Starting in 1927, she turned to photography, which was to play a pivotal role in her development as a designer through the pioneering years of the modern movement. Her photographic venture ended in Japan in 1941, when the hope of a better world was shattered by World War II. For Charlotte Perriand, photography was a machine for thinking, taking notes, and stirring emotions, but it was also an instrument of political engagement. Today, her photographs are a revelation, offering unseen glimpses into her creative process and intellectual development. Her photographs express the important themes and questions explored by modern artists of the day, and are part of the vast stream of avant-garde movements in which painters, architects, and photographers – and sometimes all three combined – worked together in a common spirit.

Along with 150 full-colour glossy illustrations of the terracotta, earthenware, stone, silver, and copper objects, a Pre-Columbian art lover and prestigious curator journey into a fine art collection, describing the rich cultural context and artistic merits of each work. On his part, the acclaimed author, explorer, and filmmaker Hugh Thomson gives a detailed, exciting narrative – based upon extensive research – of the role art played in the conquest of Mexico by Hernán Cortés and of Peru by Francisco Pizarro. It is rare that a collector takes such a personal, descriptive part in publishing his treasure trove, but in this lavishly illustrated book, Stuart Handler describes why he gathered Pre-Columbian art, what attracted him to the individual pieces, and what artistic attributes make these objects outstanding works. Contents: The Collection and Patrimony by Stewart Handler; Introduction: Beginning the Journey, by Stewart Handler; Traveling with Cortés, by Hugh Thomson; Traveling with Pizarro, by Hugh Thomson; The Stuart Handler Collection; Index.

This eloquent examination of Innes’s most important paintings illuminates the artist’s philosophical and religious preoccupations. It provides an overview of his life and situates Inness within the contexts of key issues in American history, such as the Hudson River School, Transcendentalism, Swedenborgianism, and the work of William James. It explains for the first time how Inness treated landscape painting as a form of philosophical inquiry that could communicate his holistic belief in the unity of nature and spirit. “Bell’s handsomely illustrated, eloquently written, and well-documented text considerably expands previous scholarship. ..[A] first-rate study. Highly recommended.” Choice

“It is wonderful, an instant classic and certainly the most comprehensive and useful single volume on the subject ever written.” – Donald J. La Rocca, Curator, Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Arms & Armour Of India, Nepal & Sri Lanka is a very visually-driven and broad-based introduction to the unique world of arms and armour of the Indian region, encompassing India, Pakistan, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, areas with strong martial traditions. It provides an overview of types of arms and armour, with extensive geographical and historical context with many illustrated maps, their decoration and methods of adornment, as well as the iconographic and religious symbology. A unique and valuable feature of the book is an illustrated glossary. It is specifically designed to suit the needs of anyone wanting to familiarise themselves with this topic and the region. It can serve as a reference for the novice collector, and as an image resource for experts. This would include anyone interested in arms and armour in general, antique dealers, museums, general art market, educators, and of course, collectors. There has been increased interest in both collecting and scholarship regarding Indic arms and armour. Nearly every major auction on Indian and Islamic material tends to include arms and armour. Contents: Introduction; Terra Indica; Warfare In The Early Centuries; History: The Essentials; Steel, Trade And Distant Influences; Arms; Armour; Tribal Arms And Armour; Nepal; Sri Lanka; Decoration; Symbolism; Extraordinary Exemplars; Illustrated Glossary; Resources; Tips On Collecting; Museums/Collections; Further Reading; Index.

Modern family healthcare is under a lot of pressure, from insecurity when it comes to diagnosis and prescription behaviour, to delivering quality assistance while balancing a large number of patients, There is need for reform – but before reform, there must be a vision. Not only for daily healthcare, but also for education – because in education lays the roots for social change. By means of real patient testimonies and examples of daily consultations, this book focuses on family medicine. It pays special attention to the practical side of social determinants, diagnostics and therapy, and surrounding factors. Family Medicine and Primary Care emphasises the importance of qualitative work by general practitioners, correct education, and informed policies. It is a practical guide for high-level family medicine, with input from international experts.

Beauty and drama come together in a true and compelling story set in the colourful, turbulent world of late-15th-century Florence. The talented son of a successful banker and the beautiful daughter of an influential patrician: their marriage seemed made in heaven, but they were both to meet untimely and tragic ends. This book tells the story of two forgotten protagonists of the Florentine Renaissance: Lorenzo Tornabuoni (1468-97) and his wife, Giovanna degli Albizzi (1468-88). Unpublished documents from family archives allow us to glimpse their daily lives, while poems and works of art offer insight into their notions of love, marriage, birth, death and hopes of eternal life. The contradictions of Italian Renaissance culture clearly emerge, such as the tendency to combine a highly principled intellectual life and aesthetic refinement with self-glorification and political ruthlessness. The author shows how life and art were completely interwoven in this period, and explains the significance of works of art by the likes of Botticelli and Ghirlandaio and their place in the lives of Lorenzo and Giovanna.

Published to accompany an exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, this catalogue presents a broad selection of works by Picasso, the great master of modern art, in an effort to stimulate a reflection on his influence and interaction with such leading Spanish artists as Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí, Juan Gris, María Blanchard and Julio González: art reflecting on art and on the relationship between the real and the surreal, the artist’s heartfelt involvement in the tragedy of unfolding history, the emergence of the monster with a human face, and the metaphor of erotic desire as a primary source of inspiration for the artist’s creativity and world vision. Picasso and Spanish Modernity showcases works by Picasso and other artists, ranging from painting to sculpture, drawing, engraving from the collection of the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid. The works of art include such celebrated masterpieces as the Portrait of Dora Maar, Horse’s Head and The Painter and the Model by Picasso, Siurana, the Path by Miró, along with Picasso’s drawings, engravings and preparatory paintings for his huge masterpiece Guernica.. Included are the biographies of all the artists featured: Pablo Picasso; Aurelio Arteta; Rafael Barradas; María Blanchard; Francisco Bores; Eduardo Chillida; Martín Chirino; Pancho Cossío; Leandre Cristòfol; Salvador Dalí; Óscar Domínguez; Equipo 57; Ángel Ferrant; Pablo Gargallo; Julio González; Juan Gris; José Guerrero; Antonio López; Maruja Mallo; Manuel Millares; Joan Miró; Manuel Ángeles Ortiz; Jorge Oteiza; Pablo Palazuelo; Benjamín Palencia; Alfonso Ponce de León; Alberto Sánchez; Antonio Saura; José Gutiérrez Solana; Joaquim Sunyer; Antoni Tàpies; Josep de Togores; Joaquín Torres-García; José Val del Omar; Daniel Vázquez Díaz; Esteban Vicente.

Benjamin West’s The Death of a Stag, a tour de force of pictorial theatre and his own unique Scottish masterpiece, has been the focus of high drama for over two centuries. Painted for the Clan Mackenzie in 1786, the gigantic canvas, measuring twelve by seventeen feet, is still the largest in the collection of the National Galleries of Scotland. The painting almost left these shores for America, but after a successful campaign, it was purchased in 1987. In 2004, the work was conserved in situ in the National Gallery of Scotland and this book tells the story of the picture, both in terms of its history and the conservation process.

Known today for his atmospheric views of the river Oise, Charles François Daubigny was a pioneer of modern landscape painting and an important precursor of French Impressionism. Although commercially highly successful he was often criticised for his broad, sketch-like handling and unembellished view of nature, and was dubbed the leader of ‘the school of the impression’. As a result he drew the attention of the next generation of artists, among them Claude Monet and Vincent van Gogh, who were inspired by Daubigny’s frank naturalism, bold compositions and technical innovations. Theirs was an artistic dialogue which spanned thirty years, from the early 1860s to the end of Van Gogh’s short life.

With vivid memories of his first visit to the Scottish National Gallery in the 1970s and his initial encounter with Hugo van der Goes’ The Trinity Altarpiece, Rembrandt’s A Woman in Bed, Velázquez’s An Old Woman Cooking Eggs and Degas’ Diego Martelli, Robert Storr discusses the shifting balance of museum collections from historically ‘certified’ classics to art whose status and significance remains in active contention and from singular ‘treasures’ to ensembles that speak to the larger scope of an artist’s endeavour.

Also available: Unfinished Paintings: Narratives of the Non-Finito Watson Gordon Lecture 2014 ISBN 9781906270919 ‘The Hardest Kind of Archetype’: Reflections on Roy Lichtenstein The Watson Gordon Lecture 2010 ISBN 9781906270384 Picasso’s ‘Toys for Adults’ Cubism as Surrealism: The Watson Gordon Lecture 2008 ISBN 9781906270261 Sound, Silence, and Modernity in Dutch Pictures of Manners The Watson Gordon Lecture 2007 ISBN 9781906270254 Roger Fry’s Journey From the Primitives to the Post-Impressionists: Watson Gordon Lecture 2006 ISBN 9781906270117

In the last twenty-five years contemporary art in Scotland has grown from a tiny and tightly knit scene to a globally recognised centre of artistic innovation and experiment. Generation Reader provides the first collection of key documents from the period including essays, interviews, critical writing and artists’ own texts. This publication will fill a significant gap in the scholarship of the period and provide a resource for the future, an illustrated guide to the ideas, events and debates that shaped a generation. The selected archive texts from the period will sit alongside some newly-commissioned writing which includes essays by the novelist Louise Welch and by Nicola White, Dr Sarah Lowndes, Francis McKee, Professor Andrew Patrizio and Julianna Engberg. GENERATION is a landmark series of exhibitions tracing the remarkable development of contemporary art in Scotland over the last twenty-five years. It is an ambitious and extensive programme of works of art by more than 100 artists at over 60 galleries, exhibition spaces and venues the length and breadth of Scotland between March and November 2014.

Pioneering Edinburgh photographers David Octavius Hill (1802-1870) and Robert Adamson (1821-1848) together formed one of the most famous partnerships in the history of photography. Producing highly skilled photographs just four years after the new medium was announced to the world in 1839, their images of people, buildings and scenes in and around Edinburgh offer a fascinating glimpse into 1840s Scotland. Their much-loved prints of the Newhaven fisherfolk are among the first images of social documentary photography. In the space of four and a half years Hill and Adamson produced several thousand prints encompassing landscapes, architectural views, tableaux vivants from Scottish literature and an impressive suite of portraits featuring key members of Edinburgh society. Anne M. Lyden, International Photography Curator at the National Galleries of Scotland, discusses the dynamic dispute that brought these two men together and reveals their perfect chemistry as the first professional partnership in Scottish photography. Illustrated with around 100 masterpieces from the Galleries’ unique, vast collection of the duo’s groundbreaking work.

Angry, outrageous, defiant, and courageous are some of the words that describe the American Abstract Expressionist artist Lee Krasner (1908-1984) – the subject of this very personal memoir inspired by Ruth Appelhof’s 1974 summer with her in East Hampton, Long Island. Best remembered by many as Jackson Pollock’s widow, she is regarded more by ‘art-world insiders’ as the producer of a major body of work that influenced the evolution of contemporary art – in particular, that made by women in the 20th and 21st centuries. As a scholar and a friend, Appelhof re-examines Krasner’s contributions in light of the intellectual and emotional experiences that she so candidly shared with her in weeks of interviews. In addition,  Appelhof explores Lee Krasner’s relationships with others – friends, art-world luminaries, artists, and other ‘summer sitters’ allowed into her private sanctuary – through interviews. Those recollections will offer a window into the artist’s intense and idiosyncratic personal life as well as into her contributions through the groundbreaking work she produced over the course of more than six decades.

Contents: Prefaces by Helen Harrison, Director of the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center, and Barbara Rose, Art Historian and Critic; Chapter 1: Driving Ms. Krasner; Chapter 2: The Tapes: Fact or Fiction; Chapter 3: Cards on the Table; Chapter 4: Swing of the Pendulum; Chapter 5: Summer Sitters; Chapter 6: In Spite of Herself.

Published to accompany the Lee Krasner Retrospective at the Barbican Art Gallery, London, fromThursday 30 May-Sunday 1 September 2019, and at Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, from Thursday 10 October 2019-Sunday 12 January 2020, and at Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern, from Friday 7 February-Sunday 10 May 2020, and at the Guggenheim Bilbao, from Friday 29 May-Sunday 6 September 2020.