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.
Through various thematic perspectives and a range of media, this book will shed new light on the history of Surrealism. With the idea of the unconscious as a turning point, The Savage Eye traces the roots of Surrealism in Symbolism and shows how the two art movements both reflect each other and overlap. Some of the most significant artists in modern art meet here in the murky depths of the human mind, where logic and morality give way to dreams, disturbing impulses, and unbridled desire. In this illuminating book you will become familiar with two radical art movements that both explored the psyche with the aim of establishing a new concept of humanity. Through artists such as Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Paul Gauguin, Dora Maar, René Magritte, Lee Miller, Joan Miró, Odilon Redon, and Auguste Rodin we will take you on a journey through the limitless world of the unconscious.
When African-American music broke out of the church in the early 1960s and singers such as Ray Charles and Sam Cooke added secular lyrics to gospel in order to tap into a new audience, the 7″ single was the medium of the hour. The early soul LPs were mostly compilations of successful singles, enriched with cover versions, but this was to change radically in 1971 when Marvin Gaye released “What’s Going On” against the resistance of his label Motown. After that, there was no stopping him.
Sly & The Family Stone, Stevie Wonder, Isaac Hayes, The Temptations, James Brown and countless criminally ignored groups used the medium to comment on grievances and experiment. Songs stretched over ten minutes and left the radio-friendly three-minute format. The music was also given a visual aesthetic, the musicians were given a face and told their story on the backs of the covers. Anyone who had previously raved about Al Green’s voice could now hold him in their hands as an LP, reclining on a wicker chair in a white suit.
Today, original LPs are traded for sometimes dizzying sums. Record shops and online exchanges are booming. The feel of the record, the crackling when the needle grips the groove, analogue playback and, last but not least, DJ culture have simply defied the logic of technological progress. They say that the dead live longer. This certainly applies to the LP. This calendar is dedicated to the aura that only an original pressing can have.
For more than four decades, jewelry artist and educator Laurie Hall has been making stories the subject of her work. Her playful, often whimsical jewelry made with found objects is about the places she lives, the landscapes that fill her imagination, her family history, and her ideas of what it is to be an American. As a jeweler, Hall never plays it safe, preferring to fly by the seat of her pants and push her skills and technical knowledge. Her work is part of numerous private and public collections including The Museum of Art and Design in NYC, The Tacoma Art Museum, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She is a product of the jewelry histories that make the Pacific Northwest unique within the larger story of American contemporary jewelry. Featuring 58 images of Hall’s jewelry spanning the period from 1974 to 2019, this book explores why she is an important maker whose practice deserves to be more widely known.
This two-volume set marks Jo Farb Hernández’s fifty years of scholarship on art environments and the capstone of her work on self-taught artists who have built art environments in Spain. Singular Spaces II evolved from her 2013 book, Singular Spaces. Together these works constitute an encyclopedic exploration of Spanish art environments and an epic narration of the stories of those who made them.
Singular Spaces II introduces and examines 99 artists and their intriguing and idiosyncratic sculptures, homes, and gardens, most of which have never been thoroughly documented or previously published. The author has cast a wide net to ensure all regions of Spain are represented, as are all kinds of spaces assembled with all kinds of materials.
These sites are developed organically, without formal architectural or engineering plans: they are at once evolving and complete. Often highly fanciful and quixotic, the work is frequently characterized by incongruous juxtapositions, the result of a dynamic approach to creation that may appear impulsive and spontaneous. But these artists and their works have much to teach us about the process of creation and also about the confidence to undertake a path radically different from the one they had followed during the prime of their working lives.
Hernández combines detailed case studies of the artists and their work with contextualized historical and theoretical references to a broad range of interlocking fields, including art, art history, anthropology, vernacular architecture, Spanish area studies, and folklore, complemented with compeling visuals of each of the artists and their artworks. Breaking down the standard compartmentalisation of genres, she reveals how most creators of art environments, building within their own personal spaces, fuse their creations with their daily life in a way generally unmatched in any other circumstances of making art, in the process providing an open self-reflection of their life and concerns. The universality of the need to create, and the issues that are confronted when one does so in a public and non-sanctioned way, are relevant to art and artists worldwide.
“This exhaustive study will be an invaluable tool in identifying not only where a piece was made and when, but in understanding the processes of its manufacture” The Regional Furniture Society
“Cataloguers now have an impressive volume of new information to draw on when describing anything from a simple tea tray to those suites of papier mâché furniture which remain as impressive today as when they dazzled visitors at the great international exhibitions of the 19th century” Antiques Trade Gazette
As one of the few decorative arts about which little has been written, japanning is today fraught with misunderstandings. And yet, in its heyday, the japanning industry attracted important commissions from prestigious designers such as Robert Adam, and orders from fashionable society across Europe and beyond. This book is a long overdue history of the industry which centered on three towns in the English midlands: Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Bilston. It is as much about the workers, their skills, and the factories and workshops in which they labored, as it is about the goods they made. It tells of matters of taste and criticism, and of how an industry which continued to rely so heavily upon hand labor in the machine age reached its natural end in the 1880s with a few factories lingering into the late 1930s. Richly illustrated, it includes photographs of mostly marked, or well-documented, examples of japanned tin and papier mâché against which readers may compare – and perhaps identify – unmarked specimens. Japanned Papier Mâché and Tinware draws predominantly upon contemporary sources: printed, manuscript and typescript documents, and, for the period leading up to the closure of the last factories in the 1930s, the author was able to draw on verbal accounts of eyewitnesses. With a chapter on japanners in London, other European centers, and in the United States, together with a directory of japan artists and decorators, this closely researched and comprehensive book is the reference work for collectors, dealers and enthusiasts alike. Contents: From Imitation to Innovation; Enter the Dragon!; The Lion of the District; Japanning & Decorating; Not a Bed of Roses!; Clever Accidents?; Decline of the Midlands Japanning Industry; The Birmingham Japanners; The Wolverhampton Japanners; The Bilston Japanners; Japanners in London and Oxford; Products; Other Western Japanning Centres; Appendices.
This book is dedicated to Godai, an installation by Japanese artist Tanabe Chikuunsai IV, who represents the fourth generation of a prestigious line of kagoshi (master wickerwork weavers) in Japan. Godai is a homage to nature and to a tradition of handcraftsmanship. This monumental work, six meters high and nearly as broad at its base, was installed in 2016 in the Rotunda of the Musée des Arts Asiatiques Guimet in Paris and presented to the public from April 12th through September 19th, when the artist still presented himself under the name of Tanabe Shouchiku III. The structure, composed of 8,000 small pieces of bamboo prepared in Japan, was extremely well received. It represents a world in which the five elements, godoi, that make up our world (wind, water, earth, void and fire, according to Japanese tradition) intertwine. Tanabe couldn’t find a more suitable material. Tough yet flexible, bamboo has been part of the lives of people in Asia since ancient times and used for numerous purposes. Because of its great significance (it represents ‘principles, integrity and constancy’), it has also been represented in many historic paintings and used as a design motif in stationery and furniture. Tanabe’s works are both historic and modern and invite a response from the viewer. His bamboo installations, presented in a form adapted to the space in which they are displayed, induce viewers to be aware of and appreciate that space. Each work is dismantled at the end of the exhibition to leave just its memory. And the same bamboo is used for new installations, giving a tangible sense to the concepts of ‘continuity’ and ‘rebirth’ and providing a sense of connection with space that transcends time. Godai is no exception: a monumental and ephemeral work, like a piece of organic architecture, it transmits positive energy. Text in English and French.
Structural Packaging Art has it all wrapped up, literally! Presenting the most innovative and imaginative graphic designs and technical constructions using paper and cardboard to promote a range of products from snacks to stationery, to teabags and truffles. All are designed to create a unique identity and brand within a highly competitive consumer market, colorful and eye-catching, quirky and desirable these wrappings are about first impressions with the focus on presenting each item as a ‘gift’ to be purchased, then savoured and enjoyed as an essential feature of the whole product experience.
More than 130 works from the collection assembled by Drs Nicole and John Dintenfass over fifty years. The Dintenfass Collection serves as a model and a source of inspiration for new and seasoned collectors alike. A different slant on collecting which is not actually just buying from dealers. A lavishly illustrated book that traces the origin of a collector’s interest in African art and analyzes the psychological aspects driving the passions for collecting. The Nicole and John Dintenfass Collection is well known and based on aesthetics, and the works have been reproduced in many publications. They have collected with passion, diligence, depth and rigor monumental sculptures and wooden miniatures, from most regions of Africa. Focusing on pieces of the highest artistic quality, this book shares the collectors’ personal point of view about collecting and offers to readers anecdotes that provide an additional insight into this world to future and present collectors in their search for African art. Collecting is a passion that often leads to intimate inner conversations or to emotional experiences with the objects themselves. Moreover many collectors share their unique experience of joy and appreciation with twentieth-century artists who also collected African art and who generously imparted advice, suggestions and support in responding to the collectors’ enthusiasm. Thanks to the multiple beautiful and sensitive photographs of each object, the viewer has a chance to form an intimate conversation that creates a connection with those African master carvers that have strongly influenced modern realism, cubism and expressionism.
“…it’s the colorful photographs (over 500!) of one-of-a-kind Hopi and Moroccan-inspired mosaic pieces featured in her memoir, out in October, that truly command attention, from ammonite fossils and ivory animal renderings to stunning lapis, coral, and turquoise designs.” — Natural Diamonds
North African-born Eveli Sabatie had a long-time fascination with Native American culture and history. As a young woman, she left her home in Paris in 1968 to move to San Francisco, hoping to learn more. A chance encounter with a Hopi traditionalist led to an invitation to Arizona, where she apprenticed with a master Native American jewelry-maker. For her, this was the beginning of a new world.
Art can never be fully divided from the artist’s voice, nor the natural world. When Eveli encountered red jasper while roaming the Arizona mountains, she knew she had to incorporate her local geology into her work. Yet raw materials are just one of many ways in which the world around Eveli shapes her art. This book is a direct and personal exploration of Eveli’s work, following her arc of growth, challenges and internal workings.
Eveli’s jewelry is entirely created by her, from gathering material to fabricating the body of the piece, doing the lapidary work and finally adding stone settings and finishings. She works in a rustic, ancient environment, often choosing to use rudimentary and home-made tools over commercial techniques. This book explores her creative process through five sections: THE JOURNEY, a biographical overview of her time at the Hopi reservation in Northern Arizona, where she apprenticed under Charles Loloma; CLOUDS AND RAIN, exploring the influence of the Hopi and the desert on her work; BEING HOME, which talks in greater detail about Eveli’s relationship with the environment; BEING HUMAN, a philosophical study of humanity through jewelry; and BRANCHING OUT, which features Eveli’s other artworks, which are sought after by collectors from around the world.
This is a profound reflection on the earth, through the medium of jewelry.
Despite its trademark transparency, the Corum Golden Bridge is a wristwatch full of mystery. This new book describes the iconic linear timepiece’s fascinating history including the innovative mechanical invention conceived by a nonconformist autodidact and the difficult technical breakthroughs by two like-minded personalities needed to achieve the dream wristwatch. This story, chock-full of narrative substance, begins in Switzerland of the late 1970s, at a time when electronic timekeeping was threatening to overtake the magical mastery of mechanical ticks and tocks. The Golden Bridge, spanning the gap between mechanics and art, is an integral part of this era as luxury watchmaking teetered on the brink of extinction. The Golden Bridge additionally helped usher in the era of the independent watchmaker, as its very creation was rooted in shedding light on the work of the watchmaker in a way that no other timepiece before or after it ever would.
Designed for both layman and scholar, its simplified approach allows users to find and identify over 11,000 names of Japanese artists and craftspeople, from all periods and in all media. Includes a sections on reading dates, a list of 300 modified and debased characters, and an index of provinces and place names, plus reproductions of date and censor seals on woodblock prints, publishers’ trademarks and seals, and actors’ and Genji mon. Indispensable for the scholar or collector of Japanese art. In English and Japanese.
The jarring emptiness following the loss of a loved one, the expansive out-of-body sensation of sensual touch, the lassitude of melancholy and the ecstatic receptivity to sunshine. His ability to capture and convey sensation and feelings through the materials of art, places the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch (1863–1944) at the forefront of European art at the turn of the last century.
Interestingly, Munch’s artistic exploration of perception, and his persistent questioning of the objectivity of vision, intersect with ideas that matured within the fields of psychology and experimental optics at the time.
Edvard Munch: Inner Fire examines these connections, demonstrating his continuing exploration of the conditions of sight. The essays in this catalogue examine this phenomenon while also probing a lesser-known aspect of the artist’s work: Munch’s relationship to Italy.
The first essay, Lasse Jacobsen’s ‘Edvard Munch. Italian Impressions’, explores this connection explicitly, as part of a general overview of Munch’s life and work.
The second text, ‘Reflections in Munch’s Inner Eye’ by Patricia G. Berman, charts the art historical context of Munch’s exploration of experience’s subjective dimension. Emil Leth Meilvang’s ‘Seeing without Sight. Munch’s Vision’, on its part, explores the relationship between Munch’s artistic development and simultaneous developments within the perceptual sciences. Edvard Munch. Inner Fire includes essayistic pieces by authors Melania G. Mazzucco and Hanne Ørstavik: ‘I am a Romantic’ and ‘Who Am I’. Each demonstrates Munch’s continuing ability to light the inner fires of other artists.
“I am the unit of measurement.” Fiete Stolte divides the day into twenty-one hours to create a week with eight days, and thereby centres his works on himself as an object of observation and experimentation. A specially designed clock lends visual expression to his alternate way of calculating time; live projections of Stolte’s showing shifted sleeping cycles serve as time sculptures that portray the artist’s parallel world. For Drawing Your Mirror, Stolte cast his own hand in graphite, making a “pencil” of his index finger; in Eye, the pupil of an eye contains a reflection of the self instead of the outside world. Text in English and German.
Kerry James Marshall: The Histories is the most extensive publication on the artist to date, celebrating half a century of his work. It reveals the complex ways in which he has transformed histories of Western painting, centering Black bodies in ambitious compositions set in barber shops, public housing projects, parks, and beauty salons. It charts his use of portraiture to memorialize individuals such as Nat Turner, Harriet Tubman, and Olaudah Equiano. A new series, illustrated here for the first time, looks at under-acknowledged aspects of the history of Africa. With lavish illustrations of all the works in the accompanying exhibition, it also includes chapters on Marshall’s Rythm Mastr project and his various public commissions including his stained glass windows for the cathedral in Washington D.C.. A survey by Mark Godfrey is accompanied by shorter essays by Aria Dean, Darby English, Madeleine Grynsztejn, Cathérine Hug, Nikita Sena Quarshie, Rebecca Zorach, and an interview between Kerry James Marshall and Benjamin H.D. Buchloh.
No compromises! The new edition of the cult calendar now with 100% finest and pure punk!
After the success of Volume 1, it’s back – more radical, more raw and consistently punk orientated. This daily tear-off calendar presents 365 iconic punk vinyl covers from all over the world! But this time without a detour into the new wave scene. A piece of music history every day, with information on bands, labels and releases.
Perfect for punk fans, vinyl lovers and anyone who wants to live the rebellious spirit in every-day life. An indispensable highlight for your desk or wall!
This book brings together striking botanical art of Indian origin spanning a period of 300 years, focussing on the 18th and 19th centuries. Drawn mostly from original works held in the collections of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, some of the paintings have never been published before. They showcase the richness and variety of art commissioned from talented, mostly unknown, Indian artists who made a substantial contribution to the documentation of the flora of the Indian subcontinent. A foreword written by Sita Reddy places the collections in contemporary context. The book concludes with works from a new generation of botanical artists in India, who excite interest today.
This daily tear-off calendar presents 365 iconic reggae covers that reflect the diversity and spirit of reggae culture. From legends like Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and Jimmy Cliff to small indie pressings straight from Jamaica, this daily tear-off calendar presents a visual journey through the history and diversity of reggae culture.
The colorful designs and powerful images of the record covers tell of freedom, resistance and joie de vivre. A must-have for all fans of Jamaican music, vinyl lovers and culture enthusiasts!
In The Thousands, an 18-year-old RJ Rushmore curates an extensive collection of some of the biggest names in Street Art including Faile, Banksy, KAWS, Shepard Fairey, Swoon, Herakut, Jenny Holzer, Blek le Rat, Futura 2000 and Barry McGee. As the founder and editor-in-chief of Vandalog, Rushmore has achieved a reputation for “genuine reporting, insight and analysis” (Papermag). This quality and attention to detail shines through the compelling writing in his book. Many of the works featured have come from private collections and several pieces have been provided directly by the artists participating in the show and the book. Each artist or group of artists is explored in an immersive two-page spread with an insightful biography and intricate analysis of their work. This fascinating anthology is a must-have for Street Art followers and those simply interested in the movement.
The Caravane Earth Foundation presents The Majlis book, a rich and colourful documentation of the creation of the “Majlis” exhibition, a multi-layered nomadic project at the 17th annual Biennale di Venezia. The book tracks the multifaceted nature of the exhibition itself, which comprised an architectural object, an exhibition, and a garden, all three hosted by the Abbazia di San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, Italy. Additionally, the book tells the broader story of Caravane Earth, chronicling research conducted by the foundation and the key ideas that form its philosophy and agenda. The Majlis highlights the main elements of the project in Venice while giving an introduction to key members of Caravane’s community of experts.
With a narrative structure broken into four sections – Exhibition, Architecture, Craft, and Earth – The Majlis book features interviews with important figures and institutions from these fields, stunning visual documentation of the creation process and featured artefacts, and critical writings on permaculture, architecture, and craft. Featuring discussions with the Smithsonian Foundation, landscape architect Todd Longstaffe-Gowan, The International Network for Traditional Building, Architecture & Urbanism (INTBAU), director and curators of the Sheikh Faisal Museum, and many more, the collection provides a deep look and education into the many causes championed by Caravane Earth.