Ifa Brand never felt satisfied as a model. The dissatisfaction stemmed from not being able to represent her true identity: ‘I fell “between styles”: alternative but not alternative enough; fetish but not in a typical sense. I also disliked photographers telling me how I should look, pose, behave; telling me no to red lips, no to precious lingerie and all the things I loved.’
In 2017, she decided to go her own way. She saw photography as an opportunity to be her own creative director, to follow her own storylines, and to explore her own vision of sensuality, eroticism and fetish.
Hers is a quest for personal empowerment through the art of self-portraiture: ‘I find it very important to present a strong, independent woman. There needs to be an element of being untouchable. The message to the viewer is: yes you can look but solely on my terms.’
“Absolutely essential for all the connoisseurs and Rolex lovers.” — Laura Astrologo Porché, celebremagazine world
Why do we collect? For some, it is a pursuit of pure passion – those who appreciate the wristwatch as an artform: the intricacy of its mechanics, the finesse of its form. Yet for others, collecting is an investment, and a watch’s value is of as much importance as its appearance. All collectors ought to have a guide to models and market value. Rolex: Investing in Wristwatches offers detailed insights into the world of authenticating and pricing high-value wristwatches, which will be of use to collectors from amateur to connoisseur.
This publication includes the vast majority of key Rolex models, along with their relevant auction results. The timepieces featured have been carefully selected by Senior Horological Expert, Osvaldo Patrizzi. These wristwatches excel for a diverse range of reasons, including technical excellence, auction records, design and anecdotal history. A description of each watch is accompanied by its picture, reference and sales values (rights included).
A comparative analysis of auction results, compiled through close collaboration with the Sotheby’s auction house, shows, by brand and timepiece, the evolution of prices over time, leading from the Eighties up to the present day. A system to calculate the currency exchange rate at the time of auction sales will also be included in this vital work of reference.
Belgium has all the assets to become a true whisky country. The knowledge required to make whisky is readily available, thanks in part to our centuries-old culture of beer and jenever. A number of Belgian jenever distilleries and breweries have been experimenting with whisky for quite some time, but the concept of ‘Belgian whisky’ only really took off in the recent past. Every year new initiatives arise and time after time the announced releases are sold out in no time. Belgian whisky is appreciated, has become a sought-after collector’s item and regularly wins gold and silver at international competitions. For the first time, an overview of Belgian whiskies and whisky houses is published in book form. An indispensable reference work for collectors and whisky lovers alike.
Text in English, Dutch and French.
In The 500 Hidden Secrets of Madrid, Anna-Carin Nordin presents 500 must-know addresses in the Spanish capital, such as the 5 trendiest but affordable restaurants, 5 shops with the coolest sunglasses, 5 places that are decorated by the new generation of Madrid’s designers, 5 buzzing after-work bars or the 5 most curious street names… Madrid has so much to offer, and this guide helps you to choose where to start discovering this beautiful city. It is the perfect book for those who wish to discover the city, but avoid all the usual tourist haunts, as well as for residents who are keen to track down the city’s best-kept secrets.
Jim Dearden’s latest book, A John Ruskin Collection, brings together a lifetime’s worth of articles on the lives of John Ruskin and those around him. In each, Dearden’s vast knowledge of Ruskin and exceptional capacity for recollection deftly and sensitively illuminate his subjects, moving through both their emotional, intellectual and artistic lives and their everyday domestic routines. We are guided through Ruskin’s portraits of Rose La Touche, asked to consider why he sold Turner’s The Slave Ship, invited to investigate how his father, John James Ruskin, traveled to his office, or provided with a window, onto the lives of the Severn family while at Brantwood, using their drawings and sketches. As Tim Hilton describes in his Preface, the result is like reading an incredibly elaborate family history. However, through his sensitive and precise investigations, and his tireless appetite for detail, Dearden not only helps us to understand the lives of Ruskin and his family, friends and servants, but also achieves an impressive evocation of the nature of 19th-century life. This book will captivate readers who enjoy the interweaving of a life well studied, whether they are new to Ruskin or already well immersed.
On Easter, 2014, Britain’s best-loved vicar, the Rev. Richard Coles, led a pilgrimage to all the major historic sites of the Holy Land: from Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee in the North, via Jericho and the Jordan River, to Bethlehem and, finally, Jerusalem. All of the pilgrims in his care were practising Christians, except one: the writer Kevin Jackson, a diffident and sympathetic atheist intrigued by the chance to take part in this modern-day version of an ancient act of piety, and to learn some more about his old friend, the media clergyman.
Coles to Jerusalem is Kevin Jackson’s light-hearted diary of that pilgrimage, and a close-up portrait of Richard Coles both as priest and as man. As the journey proceeds, Coles reminisces at length about his past life as a rock star and radical gay agitator, his new life as a spiritual leader and a popular broadcaster on BBC radio and television, and the strange, unpredictable path that led him from self-destructive debauchery to faith and vocation.
With a lively supporting cast of fellow pilgrims, Coles to Jerusalem ranges among the magnificence of ancient monuments and the banalities of the guided tour, the grim political background of contemporary Israel and the comedy of a group of idiosyncratic English folk abroad, the intensity of worship and the lightness of banter. It will be irresistible to all admirers of Richard Coles, who has contributed a foreword; and a revelation to those who have never encountered his wisdom and warmth.
A board of directors can contain people from various backgrounds, gender, sexual orientation, disabilities, and still make the same mistakes as a team of only white men. Why? From a “nice to have” to a “must-have”, Diversity & Inclusion is nowadays a fashionable topic. Although most leaders are convinced of its benefits, some may not yet comprehend its potential. If the focus is on including “minorities”, then what should we do about personality profiles? This profile is not revealed at first glance. You need to be open to other viewpoints, resolve difficulties with patience, feel empathy for your stakeholders, allow them just to be… natural.
Since 2010, Marcel Baumgartner has worked in his Zurich office on projects with a wide range of tasks and scales, including prolific competition participation. In 2020, Claudia Loewe joined him, co-founding the company Baumgartner Loewe Architekten in 2022. Their design stance is characterized by committed engagement with current building tasks and respect for existing architectural structures. For example, in the case of the extension to Röhrliberg School in Cham, they assumed the historical grid, while carefully selecting materials and colors to ensure an impressive, harmonious synthesis of old and new elements.
Text in English and German.
Buildings by the Aarau-based practice Frei Architekten AG, which was founded in 1988 by the brothers Peter and Christian Frei, do without extravagant designs and use a reduced range of materials to achieve a powerful building presence. For instance, the replacement building in Zurich’s Engelstrasse is subtly integrated into the historical row of houses. The wooden façade of the new storage depot for the Weinkellerei Aarau reflects the activities inside, while also adapting to the industrial character of its surroundings.
Text in English and German.
It wasn’t until the late 1950s that red wines became the foremost category in Bordeaux. While reds still dominate, since the 1990s there has been a revival of interest in the region’s whites. In The White Wines of Bordeaux, Mary Gorman-McAdams explores in depth all of the non-red wines of Bordeaux, examining the history and evolution of these less well-known wine styles. The permitted varieties are covered in depth and each appellation is explained in terms of its terroir, styles and significant wines. Key producers, and their vine growing and winemaking approaches, are profiled for each appellation. The challenges and catalysts for change, from shifts in wine buyer demographics to environmental issues, are analyzed. The book concludes with a chapter on vintage white Bordeaux.
This monograph edited by Ilaria Bernardi is the first comprehensive examination of the oeuvre of the Italian artist Loris Cecchini, from his debut in the mid-1990s to the present.
The publication coincides with the 30th anniversary of the artist’s first inclusion in an exhibition: in three group shows in 1995. The book reviews Cecchini’s solo and group exhibitions, providing information on awards, residencies and lectures, as well as extensive commentary on his most distinctive works.
Alternating between photography, sculpture, drawing, digital processing and environmental installations, Cecchini’s aim is to shape real space by means of innovative materials, focusing on how matter holds together and the aesthetic, architectural, organic, and structural processes associated with it. He has a particular interest in industrial materials such as rubber, resin and steel. His work explores the sense of the real, in a perspective suspended between the natural and the man-made that challenges the viewer’s perception.
This book reconstructs the trajectory of Cecchini’s personal and creative life by interweaving biographical information, historical background and an ample selection of works, thus providing a unique contribution to the literature devoted to the artist.
Text in English and French
Cars have a talismanic quality. No other manufactured object has the same disturbing allure. More emotions are involved in cars and car design than in any other product: vanity, cupidity, greed, social competitiveness and cultural modelling. But when all this perverse promise ends in catastrophe, these same talismanic qualities acquire an extra dimension.
The car crash is a defining phenomenon of popular culture. Death Drive is both an appreciative essay about the historic place of the automobile in the modern imagination and a detailed exploration of the circumstances of 24 celebrity car crashes, from Isadora Duncan in an Amilcar, in 1927, to Helmut Newton in a Cadillac, in 2004. The author concludes by confronting the imminent demise of the car itself.
From Nigel Grierson, (photographer/sleeve designer and joint creator of the 4AD visual identity), and with an essay by esteemed photography writer, Gerry Badger, comes the first volume of his street photography from the early 1980s – created while studying at The Royal College of Art in London. Here ‘the decisive moment’ combined with Grierson’s uniquely minimalist eye, are employed to create images of great power, humor and poignancy. Pioneering ‘flash in daylight’ within British documentary photography from the late 1970s, onward (‘a time when natural light was almost a creed’ – Badger), this award winning work, is finally published. In his brief introduction, Grierson speaks of his fascination for the ‘paradoxical’ nature of the medium, being both documentation and self expression simultaneously. He states, ‘It seemed to me, that through photography and observation, there was the possibility, for the two great arcs of life; one of the outer world of reality / documentation, and the other of the inner world of fiction and dream, to come together with the single click of a shutter’.
On regular visits to his sister in Kenya and Tanzania over many years, the British artist and Royal Academician Humphrey Ocean (b. 1951) has chanced upon and recorded in his deft, inimitable style a host of brightly colored birds, insects, lizards, shop signs, vibrant textile designs and amusing notices. A fitting and equally playful sequel to his hit sketchbook A Book of Birds, published by the Royal Academy in 2019 alongside Ben Thomas’s authoritative monograph on the artist, this delightful new collection taken from his many travelogs captures all Ocean’s wry enjoyment of the world.
For a large part of his life, Jackie Kurltjunyintja Giles Tjapaltjarri (ca 1935-2010) led a nomadic existence, traveling across large tracts of and later spending time in small communities in Australia’s vast Western Desert region.
Jackie Giles was renowned as a man of great erudition and a powerful healer, Maparnjarra in his native Ngaanyatjarra language. The powers of these traditional healers include the gift of seeing into the bodies and even the spirits of others. In the 1990s, Jackie Giles started painting with acrylic on canvas. Mr Giles, as he was often called, combined an intimate knowledge of his land with his own oneiric visions to build what became a significant personal oeuvre. These paintings celebrate the Tjukurpa (Dreaming), which pervades the land and is a cornerstone of its identity.
Built around labyrinthine patterns and monumental shapes, these dynamic, rhythmical compositions allude to the esoteric, sacred subject matter of the Dreaming. The intense, striking works that make up this awe-inspiring oeuvre manage to link two dimensions: Ngaanyatjarra cosmology and the rapidly changing modern world.
Text in English and French.
Ellora attempts the first systematic overview of the Ellora cave temples, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, excavated between 600 CE and 1000 CE and the only cave temple site that houses Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain caves.
This volume looks at each of these three groups of rock-cut temples and the stylistic influences they drew from each other and from surrounding regions.
Essays and analyzes by scholars bring a comprehensive understanding of the chronology and stylistic development of the 34 main caves and lesser caves of the site. Ellora also includes extensive photographic documentation, ground plans, and rarely seen early 19th-century etchings of the most significant caves.
With contributions by Stanislaw J. Czuma, Nicolas Morrissey, Lisa N. Owen, Vidya Dehejia, Pia Brancaccio and Arno Klein.
Racines | Roots is a vibrant art book reflecting the unique vision of a passionate collector and entrepreneur. Garance Primat unveils a selection of works drawn from the heart of her aesthetic and spiritual journey. For her, art is a life-sustaining force: deep roots nourish our being and link us to nature, allowing us to flourish like a tree.
Born into a family responsive to nature and art, she has honed her eye through contact with different cultures during her travels, particularly in Australia and the United States, where she became aware of how everything in the realm of nature was interconnected. This quest inspired her to acquire the Domaine des Étangs in Charente Limousine.
With its ability to question the world and shape the future, contemporary art occupies a special place in her eclectic collection, interacting with modern art from around the world, minerals and wisdom-bearing objects. Garance Primat invites us to trust her sensibility as we explore the universal, where words struggle to grasp the interconnectedness of living things. An original message emerges from the “root” of things, awakening a shared consciousness. This book, built around the etymology of seven key words linked to nature and the universe, is an invitation to let ourselves be carried away by the senses and discover the invisible links that unite us.
Text in English and French.
What sort of home would you create for yourself if you could build whatever you wanted—if money, as they say, were no object?
Over the course of his firm’s 30-year history, American architect Mark P. Finlay has been in the privileged position of helping clients answer that very question. This first reprint and revised edition of Country Houses: The Architecture of Mark P. Finlay, originally published in 2018, showcases the dream homes Finlay has designed for some of America’s wealthiest and most sophisticated families.
The renowned architect and interior designer works in the United States’ most storied pastoral locations, including the South Carolina lowlands, Virginia horse country, coastal New England, and the Rocky Mountains. Whether historic restorations or ground-up builds, Finlay’s attention to detail and focus on fine craftsmanship make the magnificent homes look and feel as if they’ve lived on their sites for centuries.
This beautifully presented monograph offers gorgeous photography of 12 superbly designed country residences. Each home is accompanied by an intimate, detailed architectural account that conveys Finlay’s skill and passion for creating residences that telegraph a distinct sense of place and a unique appreciation for their owners’ aspirations.
If we understand “transcendence” as a multidimensional experience, can light as a medium grant us access to invisible realms? The artist Fabian Gatermann uses light as the key material for his installations, objects, and multiples in order to investigate new dimensions. Over the course of his work, Gatermann disengages himself from the classic scientific engineering system of testing; instead his works can be seen as open-ended unconventional experiments. During this creative process, light oscillates between amorphous and crystalline states, taking the viewer on a transcendental voyage of discovery. The central reference throughout remains the human being: the works provoke active participation and invite the viewer to become part of a multi-perspective game of light and space.
Text in English and German.
Step into the enchanting realm of Dior, where fashion meets fantasy and elegance reigns supreme. In this captivating journey through the iconic house of Christian Dior, you’ll uncover the stories behind the legendary couturier and the glamorous figures who have graced his creations.
From the red carpets of Hollywood to the catwalks of Paris, Dior has captivated the hearts of celebrities and models alike. Dive into the dazzling world of stars like Elizabeth Taylor, Princess Margeret and Rihanna, who have all embraced the timeless allure of Dior with grace and style.
Explore the evolution of fashion through the lens of Dior’s visionary designers, from the revolutionary New Look of the 1950s to the modern elegance of today’s haute couture. With stunning imagery and exclusive insights, this book offers a front-row seat to the magic of Dior and the celebrities who have made it an enduring symbol of glamor and sophistication.
Step into the world of Louis Vuitton, where timeless elegance meets modern luxury. From the early days when trunks were the mainstay to the present, where the iconic LV handbags are recognized worldwide.
See how Louis Vuitton has captivated the world of fashion through the decades, adorning models and celebrities alike. Explore the red carpet moments and street style looks of stars such as Zendaya, Kirsten Dunst, Scarlett Johansson and Selena Gomez, who bring their unique flair to the brand’s timeless pieces.
Join us as we celebrate Louis Vuitton’s legacy and its impact on fashion and culture. Whether you’re a devoted fan or new to the brand, this book offers a comprehensive look at why Louis Vuitton remains at the forefront of luxury.
At birth you are completely your pure self. The ability you then have to let your essence shine through your outer form, gradually becomes overshadowed and buried under many layers as you become more and more influenced by your environment and distracted by many external things that demand your attention. This book encourages you to get back on track with your essence. Through real-life illustrations, you will learn to recognize countless expressions of life energy in nature, in your body – which is part of nature – and in the cosmos. These signposts can serve to expand your consciousness, from what is clearly observable to more subtle life processes. Through being present with yourself and others from your essence, you invite transformation and healing and can experience the full potential of being human. This exploration process begins with your feet on the ground. Treading a path of wonder, stillness and connection with who you are in the depth of your being, more direction and meaning gradually unfold. This book emphasizes personal development, offering realistic starting points for fundamental social change and a worldview that embraces differences.
“One of the world’s greatest authorities on wine.” – Raymond Blanc OBE
“The finest nose in Europe.” – Daily Telegraph
“A true wine legend who gave so much to so many, both personally and professionally.” – Decanter
“The godfather of British sommeliers … he was not just universally respected, but universally loved.” – Imbibe
Gérard Basset was one of the most influential and authoritative sommeliers of his, or any, generation. Tasting Victory charts Gérard’s astronomical career in his own words. It recounts in detail how he managed to earn his unprecedented sequence of qualifications. He was one of the first individuals to hold the famously difficult Master of Wine qualification simultaneously with Master Sommelier and an MBA in Wine Business. But it is his pursuit of the most important award of all that forms the core of this book – how, at his seventh attempt, Gérard Basset was crowned the Best Sommelier of the World. This memoir is also a record of how fine dining in England grew from stale and unexciting to world-leading. Above all, it’s about succeeding against great odds: when he was diagnosed with cancer, Gérard responded in typical fashion, by deciding to write Tasting Victory, which he completed shortly before his death in January 2019.
– Autobiography of a true legend and much-missed character in the world of wine.
– Inspirational life story of a rise to prominence from modest beginnings.
-Updated commemorative edition with chapters from Gérard’s widow, Nina, and son, Romané, exploring Gérard’s legacy in the six years since his death.
– Features memories of Gérard from major figures within the wine world.
International Realism: The 17th & 18th ARC International Salons celebrates the winners and finalists from two successive ARC International Salon competitions in one book. Both the 17th and 18th ARC International Salons are featured in detail with over 500 artworks from each, all beautifully reproduced in a reversible layout. Categories include Animals, Drawing, Figurative, Fully From Life, Imaginative Realism, Plein Air, Portraiture, Still Life, Sculpture, Landscape and a Teen Category for outstanding works by teenage entrants, as well as multiple special awards, magazine awards and more.
The Art Renewal Center (ARC) is a non-profit educational foundation, dedicated to encouraging rigorous skill-based training in the methods of the old masters. The ARC International Salon is the world’s largest and most prestigious realist art competition. Showcasing artists from across the globe, these pages represent an extraordinary example of humanity’s ability to come together and communicate through art.