Ex Animo represents the most complete and exhaustive collection of artist Faith XLVII’s works, both from the streets and her studio. The book contains critical texts by Kristin Farr (Deputy Editor at Juxtapoz Magazine), Carlo Mc Cormick (famous critic and curator from New York) and Jaqueline Flint. Ex Animo is a monograph exploring the artist’s greatest projects from The Psychic Power of Animals, in which Faith represents in full scale the strength and power of alpha animals, to The Long Wait, a series of murals representing Johannesburg men waiting. “I want to hear the voice that is silenced; the quieter but profound comments on living”, says the artist in an interview. “Turning a blind eye to injustice is not an option in a country like South Africa, whose cruel history still permeates the present.”

Following the publication of The Bundi Wall-Paintings in Rajasthan, Hilde Lauwaert photographed hundreds of wall-paintings, across Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh. In her new book, she introduces readers to the great stories of Hindu mythology, as depicted in refined artistic wall-paintings found in centuries-old temples, palaces, forts, cenotaphs and wells, as well as more popular examples in the havelis, the wealthy merchant houses from the 18th to the 20th centuries. These richly decorative wall-paintings, a unique form of cultural heritage in India, bring the principal Hindu myths vividly to life in visual form. Taking these paintings as her guide, the author aims to make the stories of Hindu mythology recognizable and understandable to a wide audience. She also explores the ways in which the gods are worshiped today, through rituals at home, in temples, and during festivals.

Using the formalist conventions of an ironic heritage, William Ludwig Lutgens attains the expression of something sincere. Like the philosophical idiot who did his utmost best to unlearn all the fallacies he was acquitted with since birth and now only knows he knows nothing, the artist made the world into his own theater wherein he can stomp around like a bull in a china shop with the grace of a prima ballerina. Forcing a pathway to possible exits by presenting us with the alloy of his observations, imagination and scattershot references. Not merely asking questions, which seems to be the hype in contemporary art nowadays, he is unraveling the framework wherein these questions originate. The image deconstructed by the story of its creation, alternating between the power and impotence of the theatrical madness at the end of the world as we know it. William Ludwig Lutgens presents with his Comedy of Humours the dysfunctional family of man.

Text in English and Dutch.

Stucco decorations have traditionally been studied considering their formal and artistic qualities. Although much research and numerous publications have explored the works of stucco artists and their cultural context, little attention has been paid to their professional role in relation to the other actors involved in the decorative process (architects, painters, sculptors, patrons), the technical skills of these artists, and how their know-how contributed to the great professional success they enjoyed. From the 16th to the 18th century, many of the stucco decorations in churches and palaces throughout Europe were made by masters from the border area between what is now Canton Ticino and Lombardy. This collection of essays aims to examine how these artists worked from Spain to Poland, from Denmark to Italy, via the Netherlands, France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Austria, adapting to the realities of the different contexts. The authors examine these issues with an interdisciplinary approach, considering art history and social history, the history of artistic techniques, and the science of materials. 

Text in English and Italian.

The jewelry department at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris comprises some 3,500 pieces and is the only national collection of its kind in France. This book presents bijouterie and joaillerie masterpieces from this high-profile collection which ranges from the Middle Ages to the contemporary period and shines a particular spotlight on the 18th century and the age of Art Nouveau.

Daytime or evening jewelry and art jewelry pieces in the form of tiaras, necklaces, bracelets, earrings, pendants, hair or tie pins, rings and stomacher brooches illustrate the boundless creativity of designers.

The greatest artists are represented: Sandoz, Vever, Falize, Boucheron, Lalique, Fouquet and Gaillard for Art Nouveau, Raymond Templier and Jean Després for Art Deco, Georges Braque, Jean Lurçat, Line Vautrin, Jean Schlumberger, Torun, Dinh Van, Jonemann and Claude Lalanne for the post-war period, and a number of contemporary designers. The collection also features pieces by the great jewellery houses: Cartier, Boucheron, Chanel, Van Cleef & Arpels and, more recently, JAR.

This richly illustrated book accompanies the display in the Galerie des Bijoux at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, which features the collection’s highlights.

From the Belle Époque to the 1960s, jewelry from the Parisian firm Lacloche Frères adorned over four generations of crowned heads, including Queen Victoria of Spain, the Duchess of Westminster, the kings of Greece and Siam, and Grace Kelly. Founded in Paris in 1901 by three brothers, Lacloche Frères sold jewelry created by the best Parisian workshops, including Strauss Allard Meyer, Verger, Helluin-Matlinger, and Langlois, and was renowned for its elegant designs and exquisite workmanship. Their tiaras, bracelets, pins, clocks, and ladies’ accessories (vanities, cigarette cases) embodied the spirit of Art Nouveau and Art Deco, and are some of their best-known pieces. This is the first monograph to trace the dazzling history of the Lacloche family business, and includes an extraordinary album of gouaches that recreates the 21 clocks and 63 pieces of jewelry from their award-winning booth at the 1925 Paris Exhibition des Arts Décoratifs.

Text in English and French.

Tadema Gallery was founded in 1978 by Sonya and David Newell-Smith in London’s famed Camden Passage in Islington. They were successful photo-journalists who ventured into the field of 20th century abstract art and the decorative arts of the 19th and 20th centuries. By 1982 they had discovered a passion for artist-designed jewelry and showed in the gallery an eclectic choice of jewels from significant designers of the Revivalist, Art Nouveau, Arts & Crafts, Jugendstil, Art Deco, and Modernist movements. With over 500 unique jewelry pieces from the 1860s to 1960s, the book reflects the 40-year history of the gallery and the superb eye of its inspirational founders.

A major figure in decorative arts during the inter-war period, René Buthaud (1886–1986) developed an interest in ceramics upon finishing his studies at the École des beaux-arts de Paris and the École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs, before being mobilized for the war. At times figurative and at other times geometrical or abstract, his vases met with great success at the Salon d’automne and the Salon des artistes décorateurs in 1920, where he exhibited works with his friends Jean Dunand and Alfred Janniot. From 1928 his works were distributed by the Rouard gallery, and he participated in most Salons as well as the major events of the time: the 1925 International Exhibition of Decorative Arts, the 1931 Colonial Exhibition, and the 1937 Exhibition of Art and Technology. Acting as technical director of the Sainte-Radegonde art pottery works for Primavera from 1923 to 1926, he was especially known and appreciated by the public for his great mastery of crackle enamel, a technique he reintroduced in France.  

Text in English and French.

From Brooklyn brownstones to Bauhaus blocks, Art Deco icons to towering skyscrapers – New York’s ever-evolving skyline spans all architectural styles, tracing the history of this modern metropolis. From famous icons like the Flatiron Building to hidden architectural gems, the guide features more than 50 must-see buildings spanning all architectural styles. Whether you’re a seasoned New Yorker or a curious visitor, this is your boldly opinionated guide to the most arresting buildings in The Big Apple. 

In this issue, FMR explores two strikingly different facets of the 20th century: the grand, austere rationalism of the Casa Madre dell’Associazione Nazionale fra Invalidi e Mutilati di Guerra, and the exquisite Art Deco elegance of Erté, whose refined line-work unfolds in graceful arabesques.

Additional features include a profile of contemporary sculptor Javier Marín—commissioned for the Fachada de la Gloria of the Sagrada Família—an intriguing modern Milanese Wunderkammer, and a medieval painted ceiling rich with narrative scenes reminiscent of an illuminated manuscript.

Miyamoto Musashi (c. 1584-1645) is the most revered and celebrated swordsman in Japanese history; in Japan alone close to a thousand works have taken the ancient warrior as its subject. Unfortunately, our modern portrait of this folk hero is derived mainly from popular books, comics, and film, with little heed paid to the early denki, chronicles recorded by men who, though they had not known Musashi in his lifetime, faithfully recorded what was passed down by those who had. The Bushû Denraiki is the earliest such record still in existence. Completed in 1727 by Tachibana Minehide, the fifth generation master of Musashi’s Niten Ichi school of fencing, it is the most reliable record of Musashi’s life and exploits outside those from the hand of the master swordsman himself. Now, after three centuries, Minehide’s insight into this enigmatic and solitary swordsman are available to the English reader. His text throws a new and refreshing light on many aspects of especially Musashi’s early life-his troubled relations with his father, his first battle experience during Japan’s period of unification, the sad death of his illegitimate child, and of course his legendary duel on Ganryû island.

In this second book in the Dummie the Mummy series, Dummie, Angus and Nick travel to Egypt. It’s Dummie’s great wish to return to his country to visit the grave of his father, Pharaoh Akhnetut. Unfortunately, Egypt has completely changed in four thousand years and Akhnetut’s grave seems untraceable. To make matters even worse, Nick falls ill and Angus and Dummie set off without him. Then something terrible happens – Dummie has to give everything he’s got to save his best friend. Yet he is also determined to find his father’s grave. Fortunately, he remembers more and more about his life long ago and this proves to be very handy!

Scotland has produced an astonishingly high number of men and women whose lives have inspired and changed the world. This book, illustrating just over forty portraits, represents only a few of them, but with Robert Burns and Walter Scott, Eric Liddell and Alex Ferguson, Bonnie Prince Charlie and Queen Victoria, it represents the flavour of the collection at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.

(Re)discover Art Nouveau at the heart of Brussels. At the end of the 19th century, the anti-academic movement pushed Brussels’ architects towards Art Nouveau. Both Victor Horta, in an organic style, and Paul Hankar, in a more geometrical tendency, created an architecture that quickly gained an international reputation. In a little more than a decade, from 1893 on, hundreds of Art Nouveau-fashioned buildings appeared in Brussels, elaborated first by the great pioneers and later by their students and imitators who are also influenced by the Vienna Secession and other trends of European Art Nouveau. At first, this style fulfilled industrial bourgeoisie’s dreams, yearning to assert itself in the city’s structure through this new, and sometimes exuberant, architecture. This book offers nine walks to discover – in different districts – the multiple aspects of architectural Art Nouveau in Brussels. Witness the personal style of the most important architects as well as decorative methods such as sgraffito. Through interviews with owners, custodians and restorers of Art Nouveau-styled buildings, Brussels Art Nouveau describes the fundamental guardians of this remarkable heritage.

Following a first volume devoted to secular and sacred objects and sculptures from the 12th to the 18th centuries, this second catalogue in the decorative arts collection of the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art focuses specifically on the art of living. Furniture, caskets, boxes, clocks, lamps, turned ivories and gold and silver cups from the dawn of the Renaissance to the end of the Age of Enlightenment provide a panoply of strictly decorative European creativeness.

Edited by Fabienne Fravalo, curator of the decorative arts collection at the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art, this catalogue is introduced by two essays, written respectively by Sophie Mouquin, lecturer at the University of Lille, and Caroline Heering, professor at the Catholic University of Leuven. It presents the major objects in the collection, studied and analyzed by curators and scholars working in German, American, English, Belgian, French and Swiss institutions.

From long lost paintings to ephemeral sculptures; from whimsical performances to iconic public murals; and from independent films to landmark design objects, the surprising and provocative contents of Moving Focus, India have been provided by a varied group of experts. A first of its kind, this book invited 54 artists, curators, historians and writers to each create a list of five works of art, made at any time since 1900, by artists living in India or identifying as part of its diaspora.  

With over 250 individual nominations, including artists whose works have been exhibited at venues as various as Houghton Hall (Anish Kapoor, 2020), the Asia Society Museum, New York (MF Husain, 2019) and the Piramal Museum of Art, Mumbai (SH Raza, 2018), the exercise produced thrilling and unexpected choices across many mediums. Drawing from a wide range of private and public collections, the selections reveal the diversity and inclusiveness of today’s art scene: an art scene that has embraced the progressive changes evident in society at large. In addition to these lists, the book includes reflections on collecting, curating and canon-formation from a range of important voices, by way of a roundtable discussion and a series of essays.  

Spread over two volumes and marked by an innovative and fresh design sensibility, whether you are familiar with modern and contemporary art from the subcontinent or looking for an introduction, Moving Focus, India contains a wealth of information. Lavishly illustrated with over 1,000 archival and freshly commissioned photographs, this book is an important and timely addition to the global art discourse and a key source of reference. 

Nominated artists include Ramkinkar Baij, Chittaprosad, VS Gaitonde, Amrita Sher Gil, Rummana Hussain, Bhupen Khakhar, Nasreen Mohamedi, Benode Behari Mukherjee, Meera Mukherjee, Mrinalini Mukherjee, Gieve Patel, Sudhir Patwardhan, Nilima Sheikh, Jangarh Singh Shyam, KG Subramanyan, Vivan Sundaram, Zarina and many more. 

The hidden art of London is for the ever-curious roamer of both the back streets and the familiar places you never quite see – churches, gardens, graveyards, pubs. What little garden finds the poet John Keats sitting in the corner of a bench? Which abandoned building tells the story of a great Roman Road?
There are always marvels hidden in plain view – the back corner of a museum containing great sculptures by Rodin or the naked, street-corner golden boy, who marks where the Great Fire of London finally petered out. A famous literary cat or a painting by Hogarth on the bend of a stairs in an ancient hospital.
This guidebook takes you exploring London beyond its most famous sights to find the art we have never quite noticed before: the hidden statues, paintings, and murals that have escaped from the official museums, and often live unnoticed lives in tucked away places.

Scenic Architecture Office always starts with responding to needs from body & mind, nature, and society, and tries to establish a balanced and dynamic relevance among them through ontological orders composed by space-time and tectonics. This collection includes 12 representative works in its 18 years of practice, and each work contains design concept, sketches, tectonic details, and photos. The works are categorized in “Courtyard Settlement”, “Extension of Homes”, and “Free Cell”. “Courtyard Settlement” refers to reconstruction of the spatial formtype of courtyard; “Extension of Homes”, expansion of the traditional house formtype; and “Free Cell” test of the new formtype. Through explorations of the formtype, they hope to bridge the past, present and future to make architecture a carrier of cultural memory and the times’ energy, and a balanced and dynamic connection between human, nature and society.

Muzharul Islam (1923–2012) has left behind an outstanding architectural legacy in Bangladesh, with a significance reaching far beyond the temporal and geographical horizons of its creation. Yet until now, his work has remained relatively unknown despite its relevance and singularity. This monograph presents numerous photographs and reproductions of detailed original drawings to introduce a series of unique buildings to an international audience, highlighting the Bengali architect’s way of thinking and actions, as well as his engagement in cross-cultural dialogue.

Contributions by practising architects from different continents present multifaceted perspectives on Islam’s work, placing him within a historical context and global interconnections. Muzharul Islam’s pioneering and timeless works address burning issues that are currently shaping the global architectural debate: climate-sensitive and self-sufficient construction, social engagement and overcoming colonial mindsets are all fields that the architect pursued relentlessly since the beginning of his career in the 1950s.  

What was the meaning of the extraordinary collection of texts, sketches and graphic prints that Edvard Munch called The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil? Get a glimpse into the artist’s world of ideas through one of the greatest mysteries he left behind. In this book you can experience The Tree of Knowledge as it was found in Munch’s home, with both loose, bound and blank pages. An essay by art historian Nora Ceciliedatter Nerdrum provides new perspectives on Munch’s most enigmatic project. No one knows why he created this album. Was it a book proposal? Or was it an attempt to organise his ideas?

What we do know is that he worked on the album for several decades, and that it was probably never completed. The most astonishing part of its content is perhaps Munch’s own texts about love, jealousy, life and death, composed in large, colorful lettering.

Books of Hours were the bestsellers of the late Middle Ages. Books of Hours, Books of Hope provides unambiguous and accessible answers to the most intriguing questions about the use and significance of these devotional books: what were they about, who were the makers and readers, where did people learn to read, did they use reading glasses or lamps, what do the humorous figures in the margins symbolize, and why do Books of Hours feature so frequently in portraits by, for example, the Flemish Primitives?

From sumptuous masterpieces embellished with gold leaf to modest, well-thumbed copies dotted with candle-wax stains or personal notes – each one has a story to tell. Books of Hours were popular among all levels of society, from dukes and countesses to bricklayers and maids. Not only as showpieces, but above all as their owners’ faithful companions, cherished and used intensively.

Lavishly illustrated with masterpieces from the collections of the Bruges Public Library and Musea Brugge, this publication is a must-have for those who wish to immerse themselves in the fascinating book culture of the medieval era.

Publication accompanying the exhibition Pride and Solace: medieval Books of Hours and their readers at the Groeningemuseum in Bruges from 4 April until 7 October 2025.

The catalog brings all the paintings in the Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze together for the first time. It is a straightforward, convenient tool, aimed at all types of users, particularly suitable for educational use, for a first approach to the museum’s paintings or for quick searches by experts or those who would like to become one.

Arranging the paintings in alphabetical order by the names of the artists seemed to us to be the simplest and most natural criterion for anyone who was not already an expert. The catalog includes the various names of the painters, and a brief biography introduces each artist. This is followed by the entry or, if there is more than one, the entries on the works by this artist in the museum collections, in alphabetical order by title. Each work is reproduced with a recent photograph.

This volume constitutes an invaluable collection of data, essential for future studies and discussions regarding the paintings. The book is introduced by an exhaustive essay by Cecilie Hollberg, the Director of the Galleria.