The Oxford History of Western Art
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • A step beyond the usual
  • Wonderful images, but a shame about the writing
  • Oxford History of Western Art a must have reference book
The Oxford History of Western Art

Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192804154

Book Description

The Oxford History of Western Art is a unique and authoritative account of the development of visual culture in the West over the last 2700 years, from the classical period to the end of the twentieth century. OHWA takes a fresh look at how the history of art is presented and understood. It uses a carefully devised modular structure to offer readers powerful insights into how and why works of art were created. This is not a simple, linear 'story' of art, but a rich series of stories, told from varying viewpoints. Carefully selected groups of pictures give readers a sense of the visual 'texture' of the periods and movements covered. The 167 illustration groups, supported by explanatory text and captions, create a sequence of 'visual tours' - juxtapositions of significant images that convey a sense of the visual environments in which works of art were produced and viewed. The reader is invited to become an active participant in the process of interpretation. Another key feature is the redefinition of traditional period boundaries. Rather than relying on conventional labels such as Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, etc., five major phases of significant historical change are established that unlock longer and more meaningful continuities: The foundations: Greece and Rome c.600 BC-AD 410 Church and state: The establishing of visual culture 410-1527 The art of nations: European visual regimes 1528-1770 The era of revolutions 1770-1914 Modernism and after 1914-2000 This framework shows how the major religious and secular functions of art have been forged, sustained, transformed, revived, and revolutionized over the ages; how the institutions of church and state have consistently aspired to make art in their own image; and how the rise of art history itself has come to provide the dominant conceptual framework within which artists create, patrons patronize, collectors collect, galleries exhibit, dealers deal, and art historians write. The text has been written by a team of 50 specialist authors working under the direction of Professor Martin Kemp, one of the UK's most distinguished art historians. While bringing their own expertise and vision to their sections, each author has also related their text to a number of unifying themes and issues, including written evidence, physical contexts, patronage, viewing and reception, techniques, gender and race, centres and peripheries, media and condition, the notion of 'art', and current presentations. Though the coverage of topics focuses on European notions of art and their transplantation and transformation in North America, space is also given to cross-fertilizations with other traditions - including the art of Latin America, the Soviet Union, India, Africa, Australia, and Canada. The applied arts and reproductive media such as photography and prints are also covered. The result is a fresh and vibrant account of Western art, which serves both as an inspirational introduction for the general reader and an authoritative source of reference and guidance for students.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars A step beyond the usual.......2002-09-14

Why should any art afficiando purchase yet another "History of Western Art" book? Answer: Because this one is thoughtful and user friendly. Yes, electing to present the entire history of Western Art is daunting and often borders on stuffy: Martin Kemp has wisely recodified the presentation to maintain the flow of chronolgy but to this flow he adds the refreshing idea of grouping paintings into similar examples of each period, the effect of which provides entertaining and eye-opening disclosures that have not been readily available prior to this volume. Example: In a section on the Era of Revolution 1770 - 1914 he groups paintings into categories such as 'Romantic Quandries' showing Goya's "Third of May, 1808" with Turner's "Snow Storm: Hannibal Crossing the Alps" and Gericault's "The Raft of Medusa" - combining a study not only of politial content but also of variations in landscape and figure painting. 'Disquieting Images' pairs Goya's "Fire" with Gericault's "Severed Limbs". At the end of this section of the book Kemp gifts us with photographic visions through the stereoptican and progresses through Julia Margaret Cameron's "Lancelot and Guinevere" to Alfred Stieglitz. He ends this beautifully and generously illustrated volume with a fine Chronology pairing artistic events with concurrent events in that time's contemporary world. The book is thorough enough to accompany any art student's passage through the academy, but more important this History is a quick reference, elegantly detailed, to refresh each of us when we encounter that newly uncovered masterpiece in the museums and magazines. Excellent.

3 out of 5 stars Wonderful images, but a shame about the writing.......2000-11-08

I have the highest regard for Kemp and a number of the contributors to this volume; this is especially due to the fact that I was once a student of his, and the source of much of my excitement derives itself directly from having listened to his wonderful lectures. This book, however, was a major disappointment in many respects.

Espousing a new approach to art history which is image based, Kemp has provided us with a text that is filled with glorious reproductions. Alongside the old favourites are many new discoveries, and the inclusion of areas of design and the attention to the history of photography is not just welcome but a breath of fresh air. Yet, there is very little text accompanying the imagery, and a complete lack of architecture.

Why? Kemp and his contributors don't offer an explanation. Where complicated art require an explanation for the uninitiated, the reader is left with little to rely on. This may be due to the fact that Oxford is currently publishing an excellent series of detailed texts on specific periods and ideas (though not all are that good... avoid the volume on Modernism at all costs), but I would think that Kemp's book should be self-sufficient. It isn't.

Most of these large volumes are published with introductary art history classes in mind. As a professor, I look to have material which will enhance my teachings. Kemp fails to provide this. I loved looking through the book, but it would be impossible to teach from this, in that little information is provided for an audience who will be mostly ignorant of that which they're looking at.

Truly, its a beautiful book to look at, and I recommend purchasing it on that basis alone, but don't buy it to read anything substantial. Oxford should think about a second edition quickly if they wish to bite into the market that Gardner, Janson, and Stockstad have established on campuses in this country.

5 out of 5 stars Oxford History of Western Art a must have reference book.......2000-09-20

It is often said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. To an extent that is true but it also has its limitations. The proper appreciation of art is not a matter of taste or impressions but an intellectual understanding of what a particular work is trying to do. That is as true of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel as it is Mark Rothko's Ochre on Red on Red. To understand a piece of art, one must understand the context that created it. That means both the society the artist lived in and the threads that connect art throughout history. A perfect book to explain that is The Oxford History of Western Art, edited by Martin Kemp.

Kemp and the other contributors describe the age artists lived in, the motivations for their creations and the technical details involved in the creation of different kinds of art. There is the perfect combination of art theory and history and Kemp is careful not to impose modern prejudices and understandings (theory, techniques, world view) on the past.

The particular strength of the book is the Renaissance and its weakness may be a longer than necessary examination of the last 200 years (although, unlike earlier ages, there are more areas to cover with the advent of different kinds of art such as photography and splintering of many styles).

The Oxford History of Western Art is must reading for anyone nominally interested in art, but also religion, history and philosophy. We cannot understand art without understanding the context in which it was created. The flip-side, however, is also true. Our understanding of our world is enhanced when we see it through the eyes of our best artists.
Landscape and Western Art (Oxford History of Art)
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Excellent Smart Study
Landscape and Western Art (Oxford History of Art)
Malcolm Andrews
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192842331

Book Description

What is landscape? How does it differ from 'land'? Does landscape always imply something to be pictured, a scene? When and why did we begin to cherish images of nature? What is 'nature'? Is it everything that isn't art, or artefact? This book explores many fascinating issues raised by the great range of ideas and images of the natural world in Western art since the Renaissance. Using a thematic structure many issues are examined, for instance: landscape as a cultural construct; the relationship between landscape as accessory or backdrop and landscape as the chief subject; landscape as constituted by various practices of framing; the sublime and ideas of indeterminacy; landscape art as picturesque or as exploration of living processes. These issues are raised and explored in connection with Western cultural movements, and within a full international and historical context. Many forms of landscape art are included: painting, gardening, panorama, poetry, photography, and art. The book is designed to both take stock of recent interdisciplinary debates and act as a stimulus to rethinking our assumptions about landscape.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Excellent Smart Study.......2007-08-27

This book faces two usually insurmountable hurdles - first, designing an art book in a smallish size, with the corresponding destruction of anything like a scale appreciation for larger images true size; and second, covering an enormous amount of material in a very short text.
The first remains an indefensible decision, and there's no more to be said. As for the second hurdle, Andrews does a fine job of what baseball pitchers refer to when they wiggle out of endless bases loaded situations without giving up a run - walking between the raindrops. This scholarly act of prestidigatation calls for hearty applause - usually such surveys are either too careful or too general. Happily this book is neither, but rather thought-provoking and sagacious.
Andrews success seems to lie in an acquired acceptance that for all the modern kitchen sink tools applied to art history, from Levi-Straussian anthropology to historical statistical anaylysis to Foucault's deconstructionist revisionism, there remains an abiding need for aesthetic appreciation. As one reads through the book, a sort of moderated mediatation or commentary on what is landscape, how we see it, a large array of such new thinking pops up, many contemporary responses about the nature of landscape are offered. Yet in the end Andrews falls back, and rather slyly I maght add, on a sort of updated aestheticism. The distinction, and the difference Andrews makes with this old tool is surprising. The material comes across with a clarity and directedness absent from the more typical contemporary approaches to art, approaches emphasizing far more than the works of art, usually at the expense of shrinking down their full import in a maze of dubious cross-referencing.
Andrews greatest gift is confidence - he conveys a sumpreme sureness whatever he is writing about. In an age of relative values Andrews' certainty reverberates with an insolent disdain for doubt. (I am reminded of one critic's snickering potshot at A.L. Rowse's offhand dismissal of alternate Shakepeare author theories as pure nonsense - "for Rowse, doubt is an undiscovered country.") But Andrews, for all of that, is very much the modern, quite up on the various formalized readings and professional jargon. He has taken the measure of each of these chimeras and gone back to draw his own conclusions around an aesthetic largely free of post-modern cant. For Andrews the modern critical methodologies are but tools, used when needed, and not self-indulgence repudiating the reader in deliberately obtuse and hermetic language. And a huge bonus - Andrews is fun to read, displaying an extraordinarily adept mind; his questions and examples rarely failing to not only make his point, but develop it.
Having showered the author with praise I must point out one caveat: unlike Kenneth Clarke, who invariably seemed to put his figure on the one painting defining an age or movement, Andrews sometimes misses the obvious. A discussion of Niagara which is posed to rightly culminate in Church's great masterpiece suddenly veers off into a discussion of the Panorama, interesting enough as idea, but invariably second rate art. In deliberately thumbing an intellectual nose of Church, Andrews reveals some blind spots - he fails to understand what connects Church's greatest work with the early Wright's prairie architecture - land-gripping yet enclosed and interlocking horizontals celebrating the continent's scale. I find it strange indeed that such a book could fail to register Wright's influence and importance on our view of landscape. Next to these responses to the New World Andrew's Panoramas appear quite naked, generalized and simplistic. Although they fit nicely into his argument, he misses the chance to look beyond and over the edge, as it were. This blatant Eurocentric reading of American art continues on in a discussion of imperialist viewpoints and uninteresting observations on the over-rated Bierstadt: for Andrews the historical connections of American painting outweigh the purely artistic. The result? Even a century and half later Europeans refuse to take seriously our greatest landscape artist Church because he doesn't fit their critical template.
Despite these peccadilloes this remains a first rate book, and a must for any Art History collection.
The Dutch Republic : Its Rise, Greatness, and Fall 1477-1806 (Oxford History of Early Modern Europe)
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • Truly Splendid
  • For all of you Dutch I have only one word "READ !!!!!"
  • Flawed but Interesting Book
  • Comprehensive, learned but dull history
  • Not for beginners
The Dutch Republic : Its Rise, Greatness, and Fall 1477-1806 (Oxford History of Early Modern Europe)
Jonathan Israel
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0198730721

Book Description

The `Dutch Golden Age', the age of Grotius, Spinoza, Rembrandt, Vermeer, and a host of other renowned artists and writers was also remarkable for its immense impact in the spheres of commerce, finance, shipping, and technology. It was in fact one of the most spectacularly creative episodes in the history of the world. In this book, Jonathan Israel gives the definitive account of the emergence of the United Provinces as a great power, and explains the subsequent decline in the eighteenth century. He places the thought, politics, religion, and social developments of the Golden Age in their broad context, and examines the changing relationship between the northern Netherlands and the south, which was to develop into modern Belgium. One of the principal aims of the book is to counter the oversimplification which characterizes so much history writing today, and to provide a new type of integrated history which draws the different dimensions of the discipline firmly together in strictly non-technical language.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Truly Splendid.......2005-08-12

This book truly is the difinitive work on Dutch history. The sheer volume and description of detail makes the book very informative. The vivid writing style and the subdivision of the chapters gives the reader the ability to speed through the book in addition to breaking down and digesting each main idea clearly. The maps, charts, and graphs are clear and give the reader an illustration to the detail of the text. Also, the explanation of the Dutch Republican government, which is anything but simple, was clear and precise. I plan on using this book in my classes for reference. A truly great book.

5 out of 5 stars For all of you Dutch I have only one word "READ !!!!!".......2003-02-10

The best historybook I have ever read with no doubt. I think in a small 1300 pages I never learned so much about my own history than I learned in the 2 weeks I spend to read this book. By now I have read it 3 times and if only have time I would pick ip up and read it again and again till I can dream whats in there. The 17th & 18th century is with no doubt one of the most interesting parts in the history of the world. Strangely it was my own country that played the most important role in this very interesting time.

And so many Dutch that earn the right to be named here, so many founders of our nations. Perhaps to them this is the most honarable a man could ever do to them, since they are all named in the book and how !!! I think about John Van Oldenbarnevelt, Hugo De Groot, John & Cornelius De Witt, Micheal De Ruyter, Rembrandt Van Rijn and last but not least Spinoza !!

An amazing achievement that will set out to be THE standard work about the Republic for years to come.

I have read the Dutch version, and that one is a really special one, seperated in 2 books, hardcover !! And everty page printed on photopaper, beautifully released !!! So when you are Dutch you can beter go to a local bookstore to get the Dutch version, since its simply more beautifull, although the price (about $ 130,- is another thing that can keep you away from it.) is worth it every penny !! You will not be regreted.

For non Dutch people, when you want to come over and tour our little nice country, be sure to read this book from beginning till end and back. It will tell you everything you ever need to know to understand our culture & history.

3 out of 5 stars Flawed but Interesting Book.......2001-08-27

This is a frustrating book to review. It is one of the worst-edited books I have read in a long time, yet it contains a wealth of intersting information. It is comprehensive and well-enough explained to interest a lay reader, but it is difficult to read beyond what is necessary given the dryness of the subject matter. First, the good: Israel presents almost a year-by-year discussion of Dutch politics, economics, and demographics. His presentation is highly detailed, generally offering his arguments first, then backing them up with substantial data. Israel has pulled together statistics of population growth, economic activity, and political positions in a wealth of tables. Finally, he defines his terms clearly, then uses them consistently. Now, the bad: This is one of the worst-edited books I can imagine. Israel's excessive use of commas in the most inappropriate places makes reading this work a chore. His meaning is obscured by the incorrect use of punctuation. In short, his editor should [have done a better editing job]. Second, the editing goes downhill toward the end of the book. Whereas the first 2/3 of the text clearly presents the major political events, then follows them with the appropriate economic, social, and demographic consequences, the latter part of the book reverses this presentation. This leaves the reader to infer major political events (like the French invasion of 1792-1794) from the discussion of demographics, economics, or social trends. A consequence of this decline in editing is that the explanation of why the Dutch republic declined is not presented clearly. If the reader pays close attention and has a good grounding in economics, he can understand what must have been going on behind the scenes. But the big story of the sudden decline of one of the major maritime powers in the world is not clearly told. Finally, Israel often uses text where a table would be more appropriate. He will take three pages to go through the voting record of each city in each province, rather than summarize the data in a table. The 1100 pages of the book could easily be reduced by several hundred without impacting the support of Israel's arguments and make the book much more readable in the process.

3 out of 5 stars Comprehensive, learned but dull history.......2000-02-13

Professor Israel's book is the first volume in what is clearly intended to be a new series of definitive texts, Oxford University Press's History of Early Modern Europe. The book is certainly superbly produced (albeit a bit short of maps), and is packed with information on a fascinating subject. No doubt the Dutch achievement in the seventeenth century was amazing - after rebelling from Spain the Dutch turned themselves into a world power,became the freest and most advanced society in Europe (although Dutch freedom had its limits, as Professor Israel makes clear) and produced a galaxy of stunning artists - Rembrandt, Vermeer, Hals etc. All this based on nothing but hard work and daring, and founded on a country that Dutchmen made themselves - "God made the world, but the Dutch made Holland", as they say. So a great subject, a magnificent looking book, and a first rate scholar who really knows his stuff and who has published a number of excellent books. And yet, it doesn't quite get there...I don't agree with those who say that this book is in the same league as Simon Schama's. I am a historian, but found the book very hard going. I think one problem was the author's obsessive focus on the internal rivalries of the Dutch provinces and towns. By the time the states of Friesland and the States of Zeeland and the States of Holland and the States-General had all fallen out with themselves yet again for the umpteenth time my eyes were starting to glaze over...I'm sure it's very important to understanding Dutch history but I felt the material on internal rivalries and jealousies needed to be shortened and the issues clarified for the non-specialist. As well as being overburdened with material on internal politics other aspects of the Dutch achievement were covered very sketchily. I was surprised for such a large book to have so little on the Dutch seaborne empire - Israel is mainly interested in the VOC as a factor in Dutch internal politics. There is one chapter on the overseas empire but it is not very detailed and Israel is clearly not especially interested in it. As a citizan of a country named, after all, after a Dutch province and whose first European discoverer was a Dutchman I was disappointed to see so little on the DUtch in North America, Brazil, Ceylon, South Africa and the East Indies. The book is essentially a detailed internal political history of the Seven Provinces in 1100 pages. I also would have liked to know more about art and literature. Perhaps the book basically reflects a tendency in modern European historical writing to focus on internal politics and European affairs and to minimise and downplay the European overseas empires. For a great world seapower like the Netherlands this seems very limiting. Older works on the Dutch empire by C R Boxer and others still remain essential reading.

3 out of 5 stars Not for beginners.......2000-01-27

I am afraid I have to disagree with my fellow readers. Israel's account of the rise and fall of the Dutch Republic is exhaustive and certainly impressive, but it is a difficult read. This book is for only those with a burning interest in the subject and a willingness to tolerate dry, academic prose.

I learned a lot, which was my goal, but not without some, in my judgment, unnecessary frustration. Too often, Israel assumes that the reader has a much deeper knowledge of the subject matter than I believe is warranted. He frequently makes use of terms and refers to historical characters that are not explained until much later in the text. The organization of the chapters within each section does not help. It would have been better, I think, to begin each section with an overview of political events and follow with broader commentary on Dutch society and religious development, for example. This way the reader could put the latter into the context of the former. Israel does this in his section, "The Early Golden Age", but not with "The Later Golden Age." The narrative flow suffers as a result. Someone more expert in Dutch history would not find this a problem, but if this is to be the definitive and most accessible account of the rise and fall of the Dutch Republic, as the professional critic suggests, then it is a serious flaw.

I have a bias towards maps. I think history books should include a lot of them. They help readers place events. This book could use more, but the real problem here is that the maps Oxford's editors did produce for Israel are of poor quality.

In short, this is a book for the serious student of Dutch history and not for those looking for a good, accessible introduction to the subject. Turn to Israel after reading a book that provides such an introduction.
Art in Europe 1700-1830 (Oxford History of Art)
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • Good Historical Overview
  • An excellent art history book
Art in Europe 1700-1830 (Oxford History of Art)
Matthew Craske
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192842064

Book Description

Hogarth's pugnaciously xenophobic `Gates of Calais', Giambattista Tiepolo's grandiose murals at Wurzburg, Goya's satirical engravings, Los Caprichos, and Canova's chastely classical sculptures could hardly be more different but all are aspects of the same period. In an era of unprecedented change - rapid urbanization, economic growth, political revolution - artists were in the business of finding new ways of making art, new ways of selling art, and new ways of talking about art. Matthew Craske creates a totally new and vivid picture of eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century art in Europe, taking a critical view of such conventional categorizations as the `Rococo', the `Neo-Classical', and the `Romantic'. He engages with crucial thematic issues such as changes in `taste' and `manners' and the impact of enlightenment notions of progress, and at the same time goes well beyond the usual geographical limits of surveys to take in St Petersburg, Copenhagen, Warsaw, and Madrid. The result is a refreshingly holistic survey which sets the art of the period firmly in its social history.

Customer Reviews:

4 out of 5 stars Good Historical Overview.......2003-01-25

A good addition to your Art Book Library. Good analysis of art in the 18th and early 19th centuries, in conjunction with world events.

5 out of 5 stars An excellent art history book.......2000-06-20

I bought this for an art history course in college. The book has many high quality illustrations and half of them are in color. The book also features many details of the works presented in it. There are also comments about what was happening in the artists' lives when they were painting the works shown. The book also includes the political events that occured during the 18th and early 19th centuries. There is even a timeline in the back which shows what was happening in the art world and in the political world at the same time. The book focuses on the Rococo, Neo-Classical, and Romantic movements in painting and sculpture. There is no mention of architecture. This is a great book to have if you like art history.
Symphonies and Other Orchestral Works: Essays in Musical Analysis (Oxford Paperback Reference)
Average customer rating: Not rated
    Symphonies and Other Orchestral Works: Essays in Musical Analysis (Oxford Paperback Reference)
    Donald Francis, Sir Tovey
    Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
    ProductGroup: Book
    Binding: Paperback

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    A Descriptive Catalogue of the Western Medieval Manuscripts of St John's College, Oxford
    Average customer rating: Not rated
      A Descriptive Catalogue of the Western Medieval Manuscripts of St John's College, Oxford
      Ralph Hanna
      Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
      ProductGroup: Book
      Binding: Hardcover

      MedievalMedieval | Schools, Periods & Styles | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
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      ASIN: 0199202397

      Book Description

      St John's College owns one of the largest collegiate collections of medieval manuscripts in Oxford. Ranging from the early eleventh century to the early sixteenth century, the collection is particularly rich in mid-twelfth-century monastic books. Some are rare, and some are of great beauty. This a detailed and excellent catalogue of a valuable collection, compiled on up-to-date principles. It replaces the monumental work of Henry O. Coxe (1852), and uses materials assembled by the late Jeremy J. Griffiths.
      The Kantian Sublime: From Morality to Art (Oxford Philosophical Monographs)
      Average customer rating: Not rated
        The Kantian Sublime: From Morality to Art (Oxford Philosophical Monographs)
        Paul Crowther
        Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
        ProductGroup: Book
        Binding: Hardcover

        AestheticsAesthetics | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
        Ethics & MoralityEthics & Morality | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
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        OntologyOntology | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
        Similar Items:
        1. Beauty and the Contemporary Sublime (Aesthetics Today) Beauty and the Contemporary Sublime (Aesthetics Today)

        ASIN: 0198248482

        Book Description

        With this, the first volume in the Oxford Philosophical Monographs series, Paul Crowther breaks new ground by providing what is probably the first study in any language to be devoted exclusively to Kant's theory of the sublime. It fills a gap in an area of scholarship where Kant makes crucial
        links between morality and aesthetics and will be particularly useful for Continental philosophers, among whom the Kantian sublime is currently receiving widespread discussion in debates about the nature of postmodernism. Crowther's arguments center on the links which Kant makes between morality
        and aesthetics, and seek ultimately to modify Kant's approach in order to establish the sublime as a viable aesthetic concept with a broader cultural significance.
        The Oxford Companion to Western Art
        Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
        • Everything You've Wanted to Know about Jean de Marville
        • extremely helpful companion
        The Oxford Companion to Western Art

        Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
        ProductGroup: Book
        Binding: Hardcover

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        Similar Items:
        1. The Oxford Companion to Art The Oxford Companion to Art
        2. The Oxford Companion to Music The Oxford Companion to Music
        3. The Oxford History of Western Art The Oxford History of Western Art

        ASIN: 0198662033

        Book Description

        This work replaces Harold Osborne's Oxford Companion to Art (1970), which has been continuously in print for thirty years. Though originally commissioned as a new edition of Osborne's book, it is effectively a completely new work, planned and written afresh for new generations of art lovers. Apart from a handful of classic articles by Harold Osborne mainly on aesthetics, and a few others which needed only minor change, the text is entirely new. Unlike Osborne, it focuses on Western art rather than the whole of world art, concentrating primarily on painting, sculpture, and the graphic arts, leaving architecture to be covered separately. With not only a tighter focus but also a greater extent than Osborne's, the new Companion offers far deeper coverage of the subject than previously; it includes many more artists and their works, and also pays proper attention to new topics of interest focused on patronage, taste, theory and criticism, materials and techniques, and the new art history. There are over 2600 entries, alphabetically arranged. Almost half of them cover artists, from classical times to the twentieth century. Other entries discuss art styles and movements, art forms (such as battle painting, landscape, caricature, or stained glass), specialist terms, and materials and techniques in all media. There is strong emphasis on location as a focus for art: not only are there regional and cultural surveys, but also entries on specific places of importance such as Paris or Urbino; and, in addition, entries on museums and galleries are arranged under the their city headword so that the reader can easily survey the major sites within a particular locality, such as New York, Boston, or Madrid. Patronage receives imaginative treatment: here, rather than focusing on a limited number of individual patrons, the Companion has entries on towns and cities as centres of patronage and collecting - such as Nuremberg, Dresden, or Prague. In addition, there is a novel series of entries on the critical fortunes of the art of the major European countries, covering, for example, patronage and collecting of Italian art in France, Spain, Britain, Germany and Central Europe, the USA, and in Italy itself. A further category of entry covers topics in the theory of art, such as iconography, perspective, and synaesthesia; and there is wide-ranging coverage too of art scholarship and criticism from Aristotle and Pausanius to Sartre, Panofsky, and Michel Foucault. All this is supplemented by entries on general topics as varied as reproduction, anatomy, guilds and confraternities, frames, and the conservation and restoration of paintings and sculpture. This is a work for everyone who loves art, whether actively engaged in the subject professionally or as one of the countless amateurs visting sites and cities, galleries, and exhibitions, churches, libraries, country houses, and palaces in pursuit of beauty and cultural enrichment.

        Customer Reviews:

        5 out of 5 stars Everything You've Wanted to Know about Jean de Marville.......2006-03-11

        This is a huge, wonderful reference book on almost every aspect of art you can think of. Beware, though, this is not a "picture" book nor is it a narrative history of art. Though it does contain about 50 color paintings between its covers, it is basically an art encyclopedia with entries laid out in alphabetical order.

        Besides containing biographical information on just about every artist who ever took brush in hand it has entries on major museums, schools of art, and various other feature length articles on:

        Classicism
        Casting
        Conservation and Restoration
        Illuminated Manuscripts
        Gilding
        Funerary Monuments
        Gothic Art
        Arts of Countries
        Portraiture
        Proportion
        Impressionism
        Perspective.

        That's just a sampling of the many interesting topics discussed in a book of over 800 pages. Each page has three columns so there is an immense amount of material covered here. Another interesting group of feature articles pertains to Art as Objects of Patronage and Collecting. These are listed by country, e.g. England, Italy, Spain.

        This is a serious art book, and probably would not be of interest to anyone with a very casual interest in the subject. The long article on Perspective, for instance, requires some focusing of the mind. If you've spent some time studying the basics of art, and think that the best way to spend a Sunday afternoon is to tour the local art gallery, then this is the book for you.

        5 out of 5 stars extremely helpful companion.......2003-11-25

        this is one of the most comprehensive companion guides i've found. most art texts only cover the basics but this includes more obscure info and provides excellent definitions. one of the best features is that it includes themes and topics in art. gray boxed info covers such things as patronage, the tradition of the nude model, comparisons of southern and northern renaissance and portraiture. terrific book, cannot recommend it enough!!!!
        Oxford History of Western Art
        Average customer rating: Not rated
          Oxford History of Western Art
          Martin Kemp
          Manufacturer: EASTON PRESS
          ProductGroup: Book
          Binding: Hardcover
          ASIN: B000UDJBYS
          The Oxford History of Western Art
          Average customer rating: Not rated
            The Oxford History of Western Art

            Manufacturer: Easton Press
            ProductGroup: Book
            Binding: Leather Bound
            ASIN: B000FW3W6C

            Product Description

            leather bound book is accented in 22kt. gold.

            Books:

            1. The Photographer's Eye
            2. The Qin Terracotta Army: Treasures of Lintong (National Museums & Monuments of Ancient China Ser.))
            3. The Restoration of Paintings
            4. The Secret
            5. The Secret
            6. The Wizard of Oz and Other Narcissists: Coping with the One-Way Relationship in Work, Love, and Family
            7. Turnaround: Crisis, Leadership, and the Olympic Games
            8. Victorian Lace Today
            9. Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde, 1943-2000
            10. Visions Beyond the Veil: Visions of Heaven, Angels, Satan, Hell and the End of the Age

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