The Artbook Shelf
MWBOOKREVW
Portugese Palissy Ware
Marshall P. Katz
Hudson Hills Press
122 East 25th St., 5th Fl., NY NY 10010
0-933920-63-6 $75.00
Palissy created a genre of rustic ceramic ware reproducing natural objects and
started a school of Portugese artists around the turn of the century: this
surveys the modern revival workers, focussing on two major figures as well as
others who have fostered and enhanced the form. The full-page color photos are
particularly striking embellishment examples.
Joseph Csaky
Edith Balas
American Philosophical Society
PO Box 40098, Philadelphia, PA 19106
0-87169-230-9 $30.00 1-215-440-3427
Joseph Csaky (1888-1971) was a Hungarian who became a dedicated member of the
Parisian avant-garde. A neglected pioneer of early Modernism, he lived and
worked in the famous "La Ruche" enclave of Montparnasse, took part in the 1912
Section d'Or Exhibition (the high point of the Cubist movement), and was an
intimate friend of Picasso, Braque, and Lager. One of the first artists to
apply Cubist principles to sculpture, Csaky produced a substantial body of work
comparable in quality to that of Brancusi and Archipenko; yet he spent the last
thirty years of his live in obscurity and was virtually destitute at his death.
Edith Balas's Joseph Csaky: A Pioneer Of Modern Sculpture has produces the
first full-length monograph of Csaky to appear in English and includes a
detailed discussion of his career, over one hundred illustrations of his major
sculpture, and a translation of the artist's autobiography. Readers will
discover in Csaky an artist of rare skill and invention who remained faithful
to his ideals and used them to create beauty and expression. Joseph Csaky is a
highly recommended and much needed contribution to the history of Parisian
avant-garde art in general, and cubist sculpture in particular.
Maroon Arts
Sally Price & Richard Price
Beacon Press
25 Beacon St., Boston, MA 02108-2892
0-8070-8550-2 $37.50
Over 300 images are presented in this survey of the arts of the Maroons -
descendants of rebel slaves from African origins who established independent
societies in the South American rain forests. Anthropology blends with artistic
examination in this showcase of the works of individual artists and the
cultural impact of the Maroons.
North Light Books
1507 Dana Avenue, Cincinnati, OH 45207
Rachel Rubin Wolf's Painting The Many Moods Of Light (0-89134-879-4, $28.99)
provides an excellent presentation which blends vivid color examples with
step-by-step instructions on how to incorporate qualities of light in a
painting to capture its many moods. Use watercolors, pastels, oil and acrylics
to create a variety of moods after following the insights of these nine
artists, who reveal how they use light in different mediums. Newcomers to
watercolor will appreciate Catherine Anderson's Basic Water Color Answer Book
(877-8, $24.99), which informs beginners about how to choose paint, brushes and
papers and how to achieve fine results from beginning efforts. The most-asked
questions about watercolor are gathered in a quick reference packed with
questions and answers and many visual examples. Jason Mills and Daniel
Donnelly's Typography (1-56496-519-8, $45.00) blends graphic design with
computer savvy to explore the basics of the new digital fonts, new graphic text
and quicker uploading which are features of the latest Web designs. An
accompanying CD-ROM provides royalty-free type and links to typography-related
web sites while full-page color displays accompany text exploring cutting edge
typographic topics. Jerry McClish's A Gallery Of Marine Art (418-3, $29.99)
provides a fine collection of contemporary paintings by marine artists around
the world. Works in watercolor, pastel and oils display varied techniques and
results in this survey, which includes artistic insights into how the pieces
were created.
University of California Press
2120 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, CA 94720
Karen Tsujimoto and Jacquelynn Baas' Art Of Joan Brown (0-520-21469-2, $34.95)
creates an excellent catalog of Brown's unique artistic style, but it's
actually much more than a color display of her varied works. Chapters cover the
art scene of modern California communities and Brown's changing abstract
expressionist-inspired style in this excellent presentation. Thelma Golden's
Bob Thompson (21260-6, $34.95) provides a catalog of the abstract expressionist
artist's works and represents the first major book on his pieces, accompanying
a retrospective at the Whitney Museum of Art. The color reproductions are clear
and well done.
Princeton University Press
41 William St., Princeton, NJ 08540
Barthelemy Jobert's Delacroix (0-691-00418-8, $65.00) provides a visual tribute
to the artist's life and work, recreating the political and culture times of
this 1800s figure and providing a catalog of his works in watercolors,
engravings and canvases. 231 color plates blends with in-depth detail to
provide a fine tribute. Elaine Kilmurray and Richard Ormond's John Singer
Sargent (00434-X, $60.00) provides a very well-rounded presentation of
Sargent's works which include landscapes, watercolors, murals and figure
subjects. While Sargent is noted for his portraiture, this surveys the extent
of his artistic career and works, evaluating his pieces and reproducing over a
hundred paintings in color. A fine review of his many achievements.
The Uses of Images
E.H. Gombrich
Phaidon Press, Inc.
7195 Grayson Road, Harrisburg PA 17111
0-71483-655-9 $39.95 1-877-742-4366
In The Uses Of Images: Studies In The Social Function Of Art And Visual
Communication, Professor Gombrich offers a series of essays regarding the
functions of images and how these functions (and the images) change over time.
In wide-ranging studies of both 'high' and 'low' art, from fresco painting,
altar painting, the International Gothic Style, and outdoor sculpture to
doodles, pictorial instructions, caricature, and political propaganda, Gombrich
discusses the role of supply and demand, competition and display, the 'ecology'
of images and the idea of 'feedback' in the interplay of means and ends, as
developing skills in turn stimulate new demands. He also explores further
aspects of the uses of images in essays on the hanging of pictures and on the
use (or misuse) of images as historical evidence. Gombrich blends impeccable
scholarship with a natural communicator's talent for explanatory discourse as
Gombrich reveals a welcome ability to explore abstract and complex ideas
without jargon. The Uses Of Images is highly recommended for scholars,
students and the general reading public with an interest in art history, and
the impact of artforms upon the popular and political culture.
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