Books, Arts & Photography, Schools, Periods & Styles

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Sarah Thornton
Seven Days in the Art World
by W.W. Norton & Co. (Hardcover)

A fly-on-the-wall account of the smart and strange subcultures that make, trade, curate, collect, and hype contemporary art. The art market has been booming. Museum attendance is surging. More people than ever call themselves artists. Contemporary art has become a mass entertainment, a luxury good, a job description, and, for some, a kind of alternative religion.In a series of beautifully paced narratives, Sarah Thornton investigates the drama of a Christie's auction, the workings in Takashi Murakami's studios, the elite at the Basel Art Fair, the eccentricities of Artforum magazine, the competition behind an important art prize, life in a notorious art-school seminar, and the wonderland of the Venice Biennale. She reveals the new dynamics of creativity, taste, status, money, and the search for meaning in life. A judicious and juicy account of the institutions that have the power to shape art history, based on hundreds of interviews with high-profile players, ...

Benjamin Blech, Roy Doliner
The Sistine Secrets: Michelangelo's Forbidden Messages in the Heart of the Vatican
by HarperOne (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-04-29)

Five hundred years ago Michelangelo began work on a painting that became one of the most famous pieces of art in the world—the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Every year millions of people come to see Michelangelo's Sistine ceiling, which is the largest fresco painting on earth in the holiest of Christianity's chapels; yet there is not one single Christian image in this vast, magnificent artwork. The Sistine Secrets tells the fascinating story of how Michelangelo embedded messages of brotherhood, tolerance, and freethinking in his painting to encourage "fellow travelers" to challenge the repressive Roman Catholic Church of his time. "Driven by the truths he had come to recognize during his years of study in private nontraditional schooling in Florence, truths rooted in his involvement with Judaic texts as well as Kabbalistic training that conflicted with approved Christian doctrine, Michelangelo needed to find a way to let viewers discern what he truly believed. He could not ...

Sharon Waxman
Loot: The Battle over the Stolen Treasures of the Ancient World
by Times Books (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-10-28)

A journey across four continents to the heart of the conflict over who should own the great works of ancient artWhy are the Elgin Marbles in London and not on the Acropolis? Why do there seem to be as many mummies in France as there are in Egypt? Why are so many Etruscan masterworks in America? For the past two centuries, the West has been plundering the treasures of the ancient world to fill its great museums, but in recent years, the countries where ancient civilizations originated have begun to push back, taking museums to court, prosecuting curators, and threatening to force the return of these priceless objects.Where do these treasures rightly belong? Sharon Waxman, a former culture reporter for The New York Times and a longtime foreign correspondent, brings us inside this high-stakes conflict, examining the implications for the preservation of the objects themselves and for how we understand our shared cultural heritage. Her journey takes readers from the great cities of ...

Spectrum 15: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art (Spectrum (Underwood Books))
by Underwood Books (Paperback)

With art drawn from a wide variety of sources — books, graphic novels, video games, films, galleries, and advertising — Spectrum 15 reinforces both the importance and prevalence of fantasy art in today’s culture. Featuring over 300 exceptional works by artists from around the globe, this gorgeous full-color collection celebrates a cadre of creators working in every style and medium. Included are luminaries such as Brom, James Gurney, Marc Gabanna, Shaun Tan, and 2008’s Grand Master Award winner, John Jude Palencar.

Banksy
Wall and Piece
by Random House UK (Paperback)

Banksy, Britain's now-legendary "guerilla" street artist, has painted the walls, streets, and bridges of towns and cities throughout the world. Not only did he smuggle his pieces into four of  New York City's major art museums, he's also "hung" his work at London's Tate Gallery and adorned Israel's West Bank barrier with satirical images. Banksy's identity remains unknown, but his work is unmistakable—with prints selling for as much as $45,000.

Linda L. Nelson
Linda Nelson Stocks Folk Art: 2009 Wall Calendar
by Andrews McMeel Publishing (Calendar)

Linda Nelson Stocks is a renowned folk artist best known for the paintings that graced the Lang Folk Art Calendar for many years. She lives, gardens, and continues to paint in Connecticut.

Don Thompson
The $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art
by Palgrave Macmillan (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-09-16)

Why would a smart New York investment banker pay $12 million for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock’s drip painting No. 5, 1948 sell for $140 million?             Intriguing and entertaining, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark is a Freakonomics approach to the economics and psychology of the contemporary art world. Why were record prices achieved at auction for works by 131 contemporary artists in 2006 alone, with astonishing new heights reached in 2007? Don Thompson explores the money, lust, and self-aggrandizement of the art world in an attempt to determine what makes a particular work valuable while others are ignored.            This book is the first to look at the economics and the marketing strategies that enable the modern art market to generate such astronomical prices. Drawing on  interviews with both past and present executives of auction houses and art dealerships, artists, and the buyers who move the ...

Giorgio Morandi 1890-1964: Nothing Is More Abstract Than Reality
by Skira (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-09-30)

This volume showcases 116 masterpieces arranged into the four major themes that characterize Giorgio Morandi’s work: self portraits, still lifes, landscapes, and flowers. The collection represents all the various expressive techniques used by Morandi over the years, including paint, etching, drawing and watercolor.The volume is the catalog of an outstanding exhibition organized by the Metropolitan Museum in New York and by the Museo d’Arte Moderna in Bologna. The exhibition will be open in New York from September 16 to December 14, 2008 and in Bologna from January 22 to April 12, 2009.The exhibition and the catalog also contain a number of photographs of Morandi’s studio and quotes from his admirers, as well as the memorable 1958 interview with Edouard Roditi.

Iain McCaig
Shadowline: The Art of Iain McCaig
by Insight Editions (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-10-07)

"What is Shadowline? It is the place where things meet: light and shadows, hope and despair, good and evil. It is, to me, the most interesting place to hunt for stories." So begins this stunningly realized and beautifully rendered new work from master storyteller and artist Iain McCaig. McCaig is best known for his work as a principal designer on the three Star Wars prequels, including the iconic characters Queen Amidala and Darth Maul, as well as his work on many major motion pictures, television, and video games. His work can be seen in such acclaimed films as Terminator 2, Hook, Francis Ford Coppola's Dracula, Interview with a Vampire, and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Shadowline presents a stunning portfolio of more than two decades of McCaig's masterful concept designs and storyboards, cover art and illustrations, as well as his private sketchbooks and personal paintings, all woven together within the confines of an engrossing, otherworldly tale. "I've been telling ...

Anton Radevsky, David Sokol
The Modern Architecture Pop-Up Book
by Universe (Hardcover) (Release Date: 2008-10-07)

The Modern Architecture Pop-Up Book showcases three-dimensional replications of some of the most innovative modern and contemporary architecture from around the world. Accompanied by illustrations, photographs, and elaborate pop-ups, the talent and imagination of architects and builders of the modern era is brought to life. Ranging from the nineteenth century to the present day, the pages follow the development of modern architecture: the creation of new buildings and innovations that led to such feats as the Brooklyn Bridge; the birth of the skyscraper and the modern city; mid-century modernism, and the cutting-edge architecture of today. Modern Architecture Pop-Up features the following structures: London’s Crystal Palace; the Brooklyn Bridge; the Eiffel Tower; New York’s Flatiron Building; Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House, Chicago; Reitveld’s Schroeder House; Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye; Saarinen’s TWA terminal; Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Bilbao; Calatrava’s ...

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