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Art as Witness is a cluster of barbed writings and biting images from the underbelly of turbulent India and its neighboring countries. Relying on the sustained work of eminent photographers and artists on rights issues in and around South Asia, and on writings by courageous activists, lawyers, journalists, and social scientists, the book focuses on the terror unleashed by armies, states, and courts of law, and tells the stories of brave survivors. Here, text and image are strained to their limits to convey the hopes and anguish of prisoners, death-row victims, murder-victim families, families of missing people, populations living under martial law, and displaced communities, in a world where democratic rights and freedoms are shrinking every day.

Based on Amnesty International India's 'Art for Activism' project, this book hopes to strengthen global campaigns for a world without fear and torture, a world without death penalty, or disappearances and custodial violence. It hopes to reach out to a wider and more diverse readership/viewership through its parallel narrative of images as visual testimonies, and spillover references to the popular worlds of cinema, music, slogan, and performance.

Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Lincoln Center 

Twentieth-century masterpieces from two world-renowned collections

From their inception, the Lincoln Center Public Art Collection and the List Print and Poster Collection have looked toward the future, anticipating with uncanny accuracy both the most significant developments in the art of our time and the artists who would lead the way to them.

Art at Lincoln Center is the first book ever to offer a spectacular and comprehensive tour of both outstanding collections, each of which features numerous masterpieces from the greatest artists of the twentieth century. This elegant, full-color volume includes pieces by Jasper Johns, Marc Chagall, Alexander Calder, Henry Moore, Auguste Rodin, Helen Frankenthaler, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, and many others. 

As fascinating as the art itself are the stories of the creation of these two astounding collections. This compelling account takes you backstage to witness the conception and development of one of the great art projects in history. Revisiting an era before art auctions were reported in the business section and Christie’s and Sotheby’s were featured on the evening news, you’ll meet the architects, collectors, benefactors, and advisors who made art a presence at Lincoln Center, including Philip Johnson, Vera List, Museum of Modern Art director Albert Barr, and many more. You will join these heroes of Modernism as they take on conservative politicians and critics in a suspenseful struggle peppered with provocative issues, inspiring discoveries, and still-relevant discussions about the relationship of fine art to the larger world. 

You will also find engaging anecdotes about a number of major works and the artists who created them—including the stories behind Marc Chagall’s gigantic paintings, which adorn the front of the Metropolitan Opera House; Henry Moore’s Reclining Figure, the centerpiece of Lincoln Center’s outdoor collection; and how a breakthrough work by a little-known downtown artist named Jasper Johns became a landmark for an uptown institution. 

Complete with a catalogue raisonné of the entire List Print and Poster Collection, Art at Lincoln Center is an indispensable addition to the artbook collection of Lincoln Center patrons, art connoisseurs, print and poster collectors, and anyone interested in the ideals and realities of art in public places.

Museums often served nationalist and imperialist interests in the past, but the primary force in the 21st century is the market. Museum franchising—exemplified by the Louvre Abu Dhabi—is one of the most visible cases of the increasing entanglement of art and museums with capital interests. Such projects are often touted as global enterprises diversifying the art world. Frequently, critics of these controversial projects question these claims and market influence.

  The intersection of these two forces—increasing capitalization and moving toward inclusivity—creates a fundamental tension, and that is the subject of Beth Derderian's Art Capital. Focusing on the decade between the Louvre Abu Dhabi's announcement and its eventual opening, the book analyzes how major shifts away from the 19th- and 20th-century paradigm of culture-state representation play out in museums' and artists' everyday practices. Derderian traces the emergence of a new logic, wherein the ways that artists represent the state shift, as does the notion of what constitutes 'good art.' In addition, these intersecting forces spur preemptive erasures that neutralize and depoliticize difference for museum publics.

  Drawing on ethnographic research with artists, curators, museum staff, gallerists, art teachers, and other arts professionals, this book analyzes the UAE art world as a microcosm of these massive, epistemic changes.

Museums often served nationalist and imperialist interests in the past, but the primary force in the 21st century is the market. Museum franchising—exemplified by the Louvre Abu Dhabi—is one of the most visible cases of the increasing entanglement of art and museums with capital interests. Such projects are often touted as global enterprises diversifying the art world. Frequently, critics of these controversial projects question these claims and market influence.

  The intersection of these two forces—increasing capitalization and moving toward inclusivity—creates a fundamental tension, and that is the subject of Beth Derderian's Art Capital. Focusing on the decade between the Louvre Abu Dhabi's announcement and its eventual opening, the book analyzes how major shifts away from the 19th- and 20th-century paradigm of culture-state representation play out in museums' and artists' everyday practices. Derderian traces the emergence of a new logic, wherein the ways that artists represent the state shift, as does the notion of what constitutes 'good art.' In addition, these intersecting forces spur preemptive erasures that neutralize and depoliticize difference for museum publics.

  Drawing on ethnographic research with artists, curators, museum staff, gallerists, art teachers, and other arts professionals, this book analyzes the UAE art world as a microcosm of these massive, epistemic changes.

Co-Winner, 2023 Chidananda Dasgupta Award for the Best Writing on Cinema, Chidananda Dasgupta Memorial Trust

Shortlisted, 2022 MSA Book Prize, Modernist Studies Association

Longlisted, 2022 Moving Image Book Award, Kraszna-Krausz Foundation

The project of Indian art cinema began in the years following independence in 1947, at once evoking the global reach of the term “art film” and speaking to the aspirations of the new nation-state. In this pioneering book, Rochona Majumdar examines key works of Indian art cinema to demonstrate how film emerged as a mode of doing history and that, in so doing, it anticipated some of the most influential insights of postcolonial thought.

Majumdar details how filmmakers as well as a host of film societies and publications sought to foster a new cinematic culture for the new nation, fueled by enthusiasm for a future of progress and development. Good films would help make good citizens: art cinema would not only earn global prestige but also shape discerning individuals capable of exercising aesthetic and political judgment. During the 1960s, however, Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, and Ritwik Ghatak—the leading figures of Indian art cinema—became disillusioned with the belief that film was integral to national development. Instead, Majumdar contends, their works captured the unresolvable contradictions of the postcolonial present, which pointed toward possible, yet unrealized futures.

Analyzing the films of Ray, Sen, and Ghatak, and working through previously unexplored archives of film society publications, Majumdar offers a radical reinterpretation of Indian film history. Art Cinema and India’s Forgotten Futures offers sweeping new insights into film’s relationship with the postcolonial condition and its role in decolonial imaginations of the future.

Co-Winner, 2023 Chidananda Dasgupta Award for the Best Writing on Cinema, Chidananda Dasgupta Memorial Trust

Shortlisted, 2022 MSA Book Prize, Modernist Studies Association

Longlisted, 2022 Moving Image Book Award, Kraszna-Krausz Foundation

The project of Indian art cinema began in the years following independence in 1947, at once evoking the global reach of the term “art film” and speaking to the aspirations of the new nation-state. In this pioneering book, Rochona Majumdar examines key works of Indian art cinema to demonstrate how film emerged as a mode of doing history and that, in so doing, it anticipated some of the most influential insights of postcolonial thought.

Majumdar details how filmmakers as well as a host of film societies and publications sought to foster a new cinematic culture for the new nation, fueled by enthusiasm for a future of progress and development. Good films would help make good citizens: art cinema would not only earn global prestige but also shape discerning individuals capable of exercising aesthetic and political judgment. During the 1960s, however, Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, and Ritwik Ghatak—the leading figures of Indian art cinema—became disillusioned with the belief that film was integral to national development. Instead, Majumdar contends, their works captured the unresolvable contradictions of the postcolonial present, which pointed toward possible, yet unrealized futures.

Analyzing the films of Ray, Sen, and Ghatak, and working through previously unexplored archives of film society publications, Majumdar offers a radical reinterpretation of Indian film history. Art Cinema and India’s Forgotten Futures offers sweeping new insights into film’s relationship with the postcolonial condition and its role in decolonial imaginations of the future.

Learn to sew beautiful handmade quilts with Lynne Edwards' simple blanket stitch appliqué technique. This gorgeous tranquil design features a stunning blue rose and would look great in any home. With detailed illustrations and full-colour photography coupled with engaging step-by-step instructions, Lynne guides you though the creative process from start to finish, ensure that each stitch is something you can be proud of!

• Detailed step-by-step instructions
• Full-colour illustrations
• Beautiful photography

The art of ancient Egypt that has been handed down to us bears no names of its creators, and yet we value the creations of these unknown masters no less than the works of later centuries, such as statues by Michelangelo or the paintings by Leonardo da Vinci. This book introduces some of the most important masterpieces, ranging from the Old Kingdom during the Third millennium BC to the Roman Period.

The works encompass sculptures, reliefs, sarcophagi, murals, masks, and decorative items, most of them now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, but some occupying places of honor as part of the World Cultural Heritage in museums such as the Louvre in Paris, the British Museum in London, the Egyptian Museum in Berlin, and the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

Featured works include: Seated statue of King Djoser Wood relief of Hesire on a dining table Statue of a scribe made of various materials Funerary relief of Aschait Sphinx of Sesostris III Robed statue of Cherihotep Reliefs from the Temple at Carnac Sarcophagus of Queen Hatshepsut Murals from Thebes Seated figure of the goddess Sachmet Statue of Queen Teje Head of Akhenaten (Amenophis IV) Queen Nefertiti Golden mask of Tutankhamun Ramses II from Abu Simbel Horus falcon made of granite Stone relief from the temple ambulatory at Edfu

A comprehensive volume covering five seminal genres that shaped art, from the late 19th century and well into the 20th: Impressionism, Expressionism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art. Each approach was distinct in aesthetic and philosophy, but all had immediate impact and enduring influence. Many great names were indelibly associated with one, some explored several during their careers.

Impressionism, led by Monet and Renoir, focused on light and color, capturing fleeting moments and challenging academic art's rigidity. Expressionism was driven by artists like Edvard Munch and Wassily Kandinsky to convey raw emotion, distorting reality to reflect the angst of human experience. Surrealists, like Salvador Dalí and René Magritte, explored the subconscious, dreams, and the irrational, blending reality with fantasy across art, literature, and film. With Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko leading the charge, Abstract Expressionism emphasized spontaneity and emotion through bold, gestural brushstrokes, and established New York as the post-war art world’s new Mecca. Finally, artists like Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol gained fame and dominated the zeitgeist by synthesizing advertising, pop culture, and high art into Pop Art.

Though diverse, these movements collectively pushed the boundaries of creativity, redefined artistic expression, and altered the trajectory of contemporary art. This lavish edition celebrates their stories, featuring more than 250 high-quality reproductions and texts, exploring how each movement's ideas and innovations transformed art forever.

This inspiring collection covers the work, the lives, and the enduring impact of five key Impressionists, in one volume that’s a primer and a celebration of probably the most popular artistic genre of all time. Each featured artist broke boundaries in different ways, astounding late 19th-century society with their boldness of vision and technique.Edgar Degas explored movement and the human form with masterly style and innovative compositions, most famously of dancers, racehorses, and busy streetscapes. Claude Monet was a maestro of light and atmosphere, capturing the fleeting moment with his iconic water lilies and series paintings. Pierre-Auguste Renoir celebrated beauty and sensuality, bringing vibrancy to everyday scenes with lush brushwork and a radiant palette. Paul Gauguin sought inspiration in the exotic, using bold colors and symbolism, often to unsettling effect. Finally, Vincent van Gogh’s highly emotive use of color and vigorous brushstrokes conveyed his private turmoil and did much to lay the groundwork for Expressionism.Together, these five creative masters redefined what art dared to achieve, emphasizing personal expression alongside their exploration of light, color, and perspective. Their output marked a pivotal shift to modern artistic freedoms and expectations.This collection looks beyond their most famous works and includes an extensive text on each artist’s oeuvre, alongside a detailed biography and more than 400 high-quality color illustrations.

This inspiring collection covers the work, the lives, and the enduring impact of five key Impressionists, in one volume that’s a primer and a celebration of probably the most popular artistic genre of all time. Each featured artist broke boundaries in different ways, astounding late 19th-century society with their boldness of vision and technique.Edgar Degas explored movement and the human form with masterly style and innovative compositions, most famously of dancers, racehorses, and busy streetscapes. Claude Monet was a maestro of light and atmosphere, capturing the fleeting moment with his iconic water lilies and series paintings. Pierre-Auguste Renoir celebrated beauty and sensuality, bringing vibrancy to everyday scenes with lush brushwork and a radiant palette. Paul Gauguin sought inspiration in the exotic, using bold colors and symbolism, often to unsettling effect. Finally, Vincent van Gogh’s highly emotive use of color and vigorous brushstrokes conveyed his private turmoil and did much to lay the groundwork for Expressionism.Together, these five creative masters redefined what art dared to achieve, emphasizing personal expression alongside their exploration of light, color, and perspective. Their output marked a pivotal shift to modern artistic freedoms and expectations.This collection looks beyond their most famous works and includes an extensive text on each artist’s oeuvre, alongside a detailed biography and more than 400 high-quality color illustrations.

This inspiring collection covers the work, the lives, and the enduring impact of five key Impressionists, in one volume that’s a primer and a celebration of probably the most popular artistic genre of all time. Each featured artist broke boundaries in different ways, astounding late 19th-century society with their boldness of vision and technique.Edgar Degas explored movement and the human form with masterly style and innovative compositions, most famously of dancers, racehorses, and busy streetscapes. Claude Monet was a maestro of light and atmosphere, capturing the fleeting moment with his iconic water lilies and series paintings. Pierre-Auguste Renoir celebrated beauty and sensuality, bringing vibrancy to everyday scenes with lush brushwork and a radiant palette. Paul Gauguin sought inspiration in the exotic, using bold colors and symbolism, often to unsettling effect. Finally, Vincent van Gogh’s highly emotive use of color and vigorous brushstrokes conveyed his private turmoil and did much to lay the groundwork for Expressionism.Together, these five creative masters redefined what art dared to achieve, emphasizing personal expression alongside their exploration of light, color, and perspective. Their output marked a pivotal shift to modern artistic freedoms and expectations.This collection looks beyond their most famous works and includes an extensive text on each artist’s oeuvre, alongside a detailed biography and more than 400 high-quality color illustrations.

With this art journal from Xavier Leopold, AKA Xavi Art, young readers can use art to brighten their day, find calmness and confidence, and show how they really feel.


When day trader Xavi picked up a brush during lockdown in 2020, he found a whole new world of communication for feelings. Xavi Art uses his unique story to show kids how to use art for self-expression and wellbeing. Throughout this journal, he explains how anyone can put their thoughts and dreams on paper, no matter what training they have.


Themed around key wellness topics like healthy living, positive thinking and expressing emotions, each chapter contains lots of inspiration for art from the heart. Plus, there's ample room for readers to make the journal their own by filling the pages with their art.


With loads of fun ideas and activities, this is the perfect book for young people who want to find wellness through art – even if they’ve never drawn or painted before.

Sadie wants to be an artist more than anything. She loves playing with color and finding shapes in unlikely places. But whenever Sadie picks up a paintbrush, she makes a big mess. How will she express her creativity if she can’t even paint a flower?

Full of beautiful watercolor illustrations and vibrant depictions of nature, The Art Garden is an encouraging story about friendship, the joy of gardening, and finding your own way of being creative. Join Sadie and her best friend Tom as they explore the garden, bake cakes, chase tadpoles and play. Young readers will delight in the bright colors and imaginative antics of the two budding artists.

Sadie explores her creativity throughout the book, and one day when she suddenly looks at things from a different perspective, she makes a big discovery! Maybe being an artist doesn’t have to mean being a painter like Tom – maybe she can create a work of art using a talent she already has…

This whimsical, inspiring story is the perfect way to encourage little ones to find their own creative flair. Both a celebration of nature and of the variety of art, it encourages children to explore different ways of expressing themselves and highlights the importance of individuality and self-acceptance.

Art History: A critical introduction to its methods provides a lively and stimulating introduction to methodological debates within art history. Offering a lucid account of approaches from Hegel to post-colonialism, the book provides a sense of art history’s own history as a discipline from its emergence in the late-eighteenth century to contemporary debates. By explaining the underlying philosophical and political assumptions behind each method, along with clear examples of how these are brought to bear on visual and historical analysis, the authors show that an adherence to a certain method is, in effect, a commitment to a set of beliefs and values. The book makes a strong case for the vitality of the discipline and its methodological centrality to new fields such as visual culture.

This book will be of enormous value to undergraduate and graduate students, and also makes its own contributions to ongoing scholarly debates about theory and method.

Art History as Social Praxis: The Collected Writings of David Craven brings together more than thirty essays that chart the development of Craven’s voice as an unorthodox Marxist who applied historical materialism to the study of modern art. This book demonstrates the range and versatility of David Craven’s praxis as a ‘democratic socialist’ art historian who assessed the essential role the visual arts play in imagining more just and equitable societies. The essays collected here reveal Craven’s lifelong commitment to exposing interstices between western and non-western cultures by researching the reciprocating influences between First- and Third-World artists, critics and historians.

Collaborative plays with diverse ensembles across the country address pressing issues of our times

The plays in Volume 2 come from Roadside’s intercultural and issue-specific theater work, including long-term collaborations with the African American Junebug Productions in New Orleans and the Puerto Rican Pregones Theater in the South Bronx, as well as with residents on both sides of the walls of recently-built prisons. Roadside has spent 45 years searching for what art in a democracy might look like. The anthology raises questions such as, What are common principles and common barriers to achieving democracy across disciplines, and how can the disciplines unite in common democratic cause?

Collaborative plays with diverse ensembles across the country address pressing issues of our times

The plays in Volume 2 come from Roadside’s intercultural and issue-specific theater work, including long-term collaborations with the African American Junebug Productions in New Orleans and the Puerto Rican Pregones Theater in the South Bronx, as well as with residents on both sides of the walls of recently-built prisons. Roadside has spent 45 years searching for what art in a democracy might look like. The anthology raises questions such as, What are common principles and common barriers to achieving democracy across disciplines, and how can the disciplines unite in common democratic cause?

Seminal plays and essays reveal the radical origins and approach of Appalachia’s Roadside Theater

This two-volume anthology tells the story of Roadside Theater’s first 45 years and includes nine award-winning original play scripts; ten essays by authors from different disciplines and generations, which explore the plays’ social, economic, and political circumstances; and a critical recounting of the theater’s history from 1975 through 2020. The plays in Volume 1 offer a people’s history of the Appalachian coalfields, from the European incursion through the American War in Vietnam.

Seminal plays and essays reveal the radical origins and approach of Appalachia’s Roadside Theater

This two-volume anthology tells the story of Roadside Theater’s first 45 years and includes nine award-winning original play scripts; ten essays by authors from different disciplines and generations, which explore the plays’ social, economic, and political circumstances; and a critical recounting of the theater’s history from 1975 through 2020. The plays in Volume 1 offer a people’s history of the Appalachian coalfields, from the European incursion through the American War in Vietnam.

Collaborative plays with diverse ensembles across the country address pressing issues of our times

The plays in Volume 2 come from Roadside’s intercultural and issue-specific theater work, including long-term collaborations with the African American Junebug Productions in New Orleans and the Puerto Rican Pregones Theater in the South Bronx, as well as with residents on both sides of the walls of recently-built prisons. Roadside has spent 45 years searching for what art in a democracy might look like. The anthology raises questions such as, What are common principles and common barriers to achieving democracy across disciplines, and how can the disciplines unite in common democratic cause?

Seminal plays and essays reveal the radical origins and approach of Appalachia’s Roadside Theater

This two-volume anthology tells the story of Roadside Theater’s first 45 years and includes nine award-winning original play scripts; ten essays by authors from different disciplines and generations, which explore the plays’ social, economic, and political circumstances; and a critical recounting of the theater’s history from 1975 through 2020. The plays in Volume 1 offer a people’s history of the Appalachian coalfields, from the European incursion through the American War in Vietnam.

Focusing on the rich heritage of art-making in the eighteenth century, this lushly illustrated book positions both well-known painters and unknown artisans within the framework of their economic lives, their families, and the geographies through which they moved as they created notable careers and memorable objects. In considering both painting and decorative arts simultaneously, Art in a Season of Revolution departs from standard practice and resituates painters as artisans. Moreover, it gives equal play to the lives of the makers and the lives of the objects, to studying both within the interdependent social and economic webs linking local and distant populations of workers, theorists, suppliers, and patrons throughout the mercantile Atlantic.

Emphasizing maritime settlements such as Salem, Newport, and Boston and viewing them within the larger framework of the Atlantic world, Margaretta Lovell considers the ways eighteenth-century New England experience was conditioned by its source cultures and markets. Colonial material culture participated in a nonsubsistence international economy, deriving ideas, pigments, and conventions from abroad, and reexporting them in the effort to enlarge market opportunities or to establish artistic reputations in distant London. Exploring these and other key aspects of the aesthetic and social dimensions of the cultural landscape, Lovell concentrates on a cluster of central issues: the relevance of aesthetic production to social hierarchies; the nature and conditions of artisan career trajectories; the role of replication, imitation, and originality in the creation and marketing of art products; and the constituent elements of individual identity for the makers, for the patrons who were their subjects, and for the creations that were their objects.

Art in a Season of Revolution illuminates the participation of pictures, objects, and makers in their cultures. It invites historians to look at the material world as a source of evidence in their pursuit of even very abstract concerns such as the nature of virtue, the uses of identity, and the experience of time. Arguing in favor of a more complex approach to research at the nexus of aesthetic and ideological concerns, this provocative new book challenges established frameworks for understanding the production of art in British America during the tumultuous decades bracketing the Revolution.

“This kaleidoscopic collection will help you see and comprehend the world anew—which is, in my book, what good art should do.”
—Astra Taylor

It is a scary and disorienting time for art, as it is a scary and disorienting time in general. Aesthetic experience is both overshadowed by the spectacle of current events and pressed into new connection with them. The self-image of art as a social good is collapsing under the weight of capitalism’s dysfunction.

“This kaleidoscopic collection will help you see and comprehend the world anew—which is, in my book, what good art should do.”
—Astra Taylor

It is a scary and disorienting time for art, as it is a scary and disorienting time in general. Aesthetic experience is both overshadowed by the spectacle of current events and pressed into new connection with them. The self-image of art as a social good is collapsing under the weight of capitalism’s dysfunction.

Would you believe me if I told you that you're a witch? A crafty enchanter born with the abilities to create beauty, read secret languages, heal the heart and attract the attention of the strange and wonderful?

The serendipitous event of this grimoire making its way into your hands is evidence of the buzzing creative power calling out from within you. It's time, Art Witch.

This inspirational grimoire invites you to the shimmering primordial crossroad of the imagination where art and magick meet. Discover the basics of art magick: what art magick could be, how to enrich your life with art magick, how to cast potent spells for yourself, loved ones and community, and enjoy the energizing thrill of a creative magickal practice to call your own.

Learn how to:

• Enchant art tools and materials to produce soulful creations.
• Create sacred spaces, altars and magickal allies for healing, fun and growth.
• Harness color, celestial aid, poetry and personal symbols to create layers of meaning.
• Banish creative doubt and strengthen your intuitive instincts.
• Choose art forms and context for robust spell craft.
• Uncover your gifts and enchant your world with a wide variety of media.

With step-by step instructions and illustrations for over 15 projects, Art Magick reveals how to make an array of bewitched objects and establish your very own art magick practice, including your own pop oracle set, scrying mirrors, magickal mandalas, protection plushies, healing weavings, ensorceled altar boxes, print process sigils, manifestation mobiles, spirit statuary, dream incubation eggs, otherworldly wands and more.

Whether you are a curious beginner, experienced crafter, dabbling magician or recovering creative, Art Witch, Molly Roberts will be your guide as you explore a colorful animated world that lies just beneath the surface—a world where your imagination and personal power collide to create real magick.

Are you ready to awaken the Art Witch within?

A collection of intensive discussions about the role of visual arts in public life

The past decade has seen American culture deeply divided by debates over social identity, public morality, communal values and freedom of expression. A key focus of these polarizing discussions has been the role of visual arts in public life. In Art Matters, five leading cultural critics and two prominent contemporary artists show the ways that this debate has profoundly reshaped our view of American culture. Lucy Lippard investigates the extraordinary recent transformations in visual art; Michele Wallace takes on high art, popular culture, and African American identity; David Deitcher discusses queer culture and AIDS; Carole S. Vance ponders censorship and sexually explicit imagery; and Lewis Hyde considers democracy and culture. Projects by artists Julie Ault and Andrea Fraser provide a context for these debates. Art Matters also offers a close examination of attempts to develop alternative funding sources for artists, focusing specifically on the influential private foundation Art Matters-a foundation which became an important proponent for new forms of art and for protecting freedom of expression through its funding and advocacy efforts.

Why do people choose the life of an artist, and what happens when they find themselves barely scraping by? Why does New York City, even in an era of hypergentrification, still beckon to aspiring artists as a place to make art and remake yourself?

Art Monster takes readers to the margins of the professional art world, populated by unseen artists who make a living working behind the scenes in galleries and museums while making their own art to little acclaim. Writing in a style that is by turns direct and poetic, personal and lyrical, Marin Kosut reflects on the experience of dedicating your life to art and how the art world can crush you. She examines the push toward professionalization, the devaluing of artistic labor, and the devastating effects of gentrification on cultural life. Her nonlinear essays are linked by central themes—community, nostalgia, precarity, alienation, estrangement—that punctuate working artists’ lives. The book draws from ten years of fieldwork among artists and Kosut’s own experiences curating and cofounding artist-run spaces in Bushwick, Bedford-Stuyvesant, and Chinatown. At once ethnography, memoir, tirade, and love letter, Art Monster is a street-level meditation on the predicament of artists in the late capitalist metropolis.

Why do people choose the life of an artist, and what happens when they find themselves barely scraping by? Why does New York City, even in an era of hypergentrification, still beckon to aspiring artists as a place to make art and remake yourself?

Art Monster takes readers to the margins of the professional art world, populated by unseen artists who make a living working behind the scenes in galleries and museums while making their own art to little acclaim. Writing in a style that is by turns direct and poetic, personal and lyrical, Marin Kosut reflects on the experience of dedicating your life to art and how the art world can crush you. She examines the push toward professionalization, the devaluing of artistic labor, and the devastating effects of gentrification on cultural life. Her nonlinear essays are linked by central themes—community, nostalgia, precarity, alienation, estrangement—that punctuate working artists’ lives. The book draws from ten years of fieldwork among artists and Kosut’s own experiences curating and cofounding artist-run spaces in Bushwick, Bedford-Stuyvesant, and Chinatown. At once ethnography, memoir, tirade, and love letter, Art Monster is a street-level meditation on the predicament of artists in the late capitalist metropolis.

Art Nouveau was deliberately nouveau. With a spirit of willful reform, this “New Art” style between the 1880s and the First World War inflected architecture, design, painting, graphic work, applied arts, and illustration with a radical rejection of imitative historicism and a new undulating aesthetic of flowing lines and organic forms, ripe with linear freedom and a liberation from artistic tradition and expectation. Within this repertoire of sensual contours and natural motifs, Art Nouveau also followed the example of the English Arts and Crafts movement to emphasize a return to handcraftsmanship and the synthesis of artistic media and practices into a Gesamtkunstwerk, or total work of art. In this, as in its turn to nature, Art Nouveau is often seen as an aesthetic response to the Industrial Revolution, a recoil from the mass-produced and mechanic, and an elevation of the human hand and wonders of the great outdoors. This fresh TASCHEN edition considers Art Nouveau as a broad historical phenomenon with distinct local features. We consider the style’s wider artistic, economic, and political circumstances, as well as its particular flavor in such hubs as Vienna, Glasgow, Munich, Weimar, and Chicago. Outstanding proponents such as Victor Horta, Antoni Gaudí, and Charles Rennie Mackintosh are featured in connection with the cities of their greatest activity. The result is a vivid portrait of the age and a movement that is as much entrenched in our imagination of the fin de siècle as it is in the trajectory of modernism.

(English / German)

Around 1900, Germany was the main centre for the production of Art Nouveau tiles in Europe. Hallways were regarded as status symbols, and the entranceway became like a calling card. Today, few people are aware that many original tiled walls from that period have been preserved in Berlin. Jugendstil im Quadrat presents 120 fascinating tiles, explains their motifs, and sets them in the context of Art Nouveau ornamentation. The plant theme is particularly widespread: abstract or naturalistic depictions of flowers and trees unfold their full beauty in the square format. This book is the first to document historical Berlin tile paintings, most of which are not listed and therefore at risk.

• First publication about Art Nouveau tiles in Berlin
• Bilingual descriptions of the widespread plant and tree symbolism in art nouveau
• With works by Henry van de Velde, Anna Gasteiger

Deutschland war um 1900 das führende Zentrum für die Herstellung von Jugendstilfliesen in Europa. Hausflure galten als Statussymbole, das Entrée wurde als eine Art Visitenkarte gesehen. Bis heute wenig bekannt ist, dass in Berlin zahlreiche originale Fliesenspiegel aus dieser Zeit erhalten geblieben sind.

Jugendstil im Quadrat stellt 120 dieser faszinierenden Fliesen vor, erläutert ihre Motive und ordnet sie in den Kontext der Jugendstilornamentik ein. Besonders prägend ist das Pflanzenthema: Abstrakte oder naturalistische Darstellungen von Blumen und Bäumen entfalten im quadratischen Format ihre ganze Schönheit. Erstmals dokumentiert dieses Buch die historischen Berliner Fliesenbilder, die meist nicht unter Denkmalschutz stehen, und dadurch vom Verschwinden bedroht sind.

• Erste Publikation zum Thema Jugendstilfliesen in Berlin
• Zweisprachige Beschreibungen der im Jugendstil verbreiteten Pflanzen- und Baumsymbolik
• Mit Werken von Henry van de Velde und Anna Gasteiger

What is an immersive soundscape? It can be as simple as a recording made in a forest: leaves crunching underfoot, birds chirping, a squirrel chattering. Or it can be as complex as a movie soundtrack, which involves music but also uses many other sounds—to set the mood for the action and to literally put the viewer in the picture. Sound art defies categorization, and artists using this medium describe their work in many different ways: as sound installations, audio art, radio art, and music.

The Art of Immersive Soundscapes provides a fascinating tour of contemporary sound art practices that comprises scholarly essays, artists’ statements, and a DVD with sonic and visual examples. Included are perspectives from soundscape composition and performance, site-specific sound installation, recording, and festival curation. The book and accompanying DVD will appeal to a broad audience interested in music, sound, installation art, the environment, digital culture, and media arts. Importantly, it recognizes the pioneering place of Canadian sound artists within this international field.

The Art of Landscape Photography is an expert guide to the theories, techniques, and artistry of composition and how it can be used to create beautiful and engaging landscape images. 

In this visually stunning and highly informative book, two of the UK’s leading photographers, Mark Bauer and Ross Hoddinott, investigate widely accepted theories on composition and what appeals to our sense of beauty. They also put the principles into practice, using their own images to illustrate the points. Technique is discussed, but the emphasis is firmly on how it affects the aesthetics of an image. This book is aimed at those who have grasped the fundamental technical aspects of photography and are keen to expand your artistic understanding. 

The principles of composition to convey meaning and emotion are at the heart and soul of landscape photography. This title tackles the art of composition in great depth, emphasizing how technique can impact on the aesthetics of an image. 

Key points: 

• Written by two of the UK’s leading landscape photographers 
• Expert advice on equipment, shooting technique, and processing 
• Guidance on shooting in different types of landscape and how to use light creatively 
• Examination of formal styles and how to develop a personal style 

“ . . . a culinary showcase of palate-pleasing regional delights.”—The Midwest Book Review

“Here is a collection of Lithuanian recipes that will be welcome on any table.”—The International Cookbook Revue

Lithuanian cuisine is famed for its hearty and satisfying meat dishes, soups, stews, noodles and dumplings, and desserts. This perennial favorite cookbook includes over 150 authentic recipes. Among the chapters included are Appetizers & Breads, Soups, Vegetables & Salads, Aspics, Garnishes & Sauces, Meat Dishes, Poultry & Game Dishes, Fish, Pancakes, Noodle Dishes, Dumplings & Egg Dishes, Cakes & Desserts, and Drinks & Cocktails.

With almost 50 recipes for cakes and desserts, this cookbook is sure to please anyone’s sweet tooth! The recipes include many of the traditional desserts served at Christmas and Easter. The author’s introduction and easy step-by-step instructions ensure that even novice cooks can create authentic, delicious Lithuanian meals.

Sample recipes:

• Fresh Cucumber Soup
• Lithuanian Meat Pockets
• Hunter’s Stew
• Potato Zeppelins
• Homemade Honey Liqueur
• Easter Gypsy Cake

Once the home of Catherine the Great’s private art collection, Russia’s State Hermitage Museum became the largest museum in the Soviet Union and, since the collapse of the USSR, one of the most active museums in the world. The Hermitage is a global model for the collection and preservation of fine art, deeply shaped by its need to protect itself and its holdings from the world beyond its gates. In Art of Memories, Vincent Antonin Lépinay documents the Hermitage’s curatorial practices in an innovative consideration of the museum as a cultural laboratory.

Lépinay analyzes the tensions between the museum as a space of exploration of the collections and as a culture heavily invested in self-protection from the outside world. During a time when traveling abroad was rare, a generation of art historians produced a culture of confined scholarship premised on their proximity to the holdings of a museum enclave. As the Hermitage has become increasingly present on the world museum scene, its culture of secrecy and orality has endured. Lépinay analyzes the ethos of Hermitage curators and scholars over the transition from Soviet to post-Soviet museum cultures, considering the mobility of art, documentation of the collection, and the transformation of expertise. Based on Lépinay’s extraordinary access to the Hermitage and the scholars who work there, Art of Memories opens the door of one of the world’s great museums to reveal how art history is made. It is an essential study for readers interested in the role that outside forces play in culture, organizations, and the production of knowledge.

Once the home of Catherine the Great’s private art collection, Russia’s State Hermitage Museum became the largest museum in the Soviet Union and, since the collapse of the USSR, one of the most active museums in the world. The Hermitage is a global model for the collection and preservation of fine art, deeply shaped by its need to protect itself and its holdings from the world beyond its gates. In Art of Memories, Vincent Antonin Lépinay documents the Hermitage’s curatorial practices in an innovative consideration of the museum as a cultural laboratory.

Lépinay analyzes the tensions between the museum as a space of exploration of the collections and as a culture heavily invested in self-protection from the outside world. During a time when traveling abroad was rare, a generation of art historians produced a culture of confined scholarship premised on their proximity to the holdings of a museum enclave. As the Hermitage has become increasingly present on the world museum scene, its culture of secrecy and orality has endured. Lépinay analyzes the ethos of Hermitage curators and scholars over the transition from Soviet to post-Soviet museum cultures, considering the mobility of art, documentation of the collection, and the transformation of expertise. Based on Lépinay’s extraordinary access to the Hermitage and the scholars who work there, Art of Memories opens the door of one of the world’s great museums to reveal how art history is made. It is an essential study for readers interested in the role that outside forces play in culture, organizations, and the production of knowledge.

Jerzy Perzanowski’s ideas were based on an original blend of logic and ontology in what he called onto/logic, where the slash is meant to suggest a quotient of ontology by logic. Perzanowski began as a logician, his early works being on modal logic, then gradually shifted his interest to “logical philosophy”, meaning not so much philosophy of logic as philosophy informed by logic. Perzanowski was a rare breed of analytical philosopher who thought that a philosophical “theory of everything” was worthwhile. In this systematic spirit, he began with method. He presented his “method of total analysis and synthesis” quite simply: reduce the object of research to its simplest possible constituents, and then combine them in some way. Better still, combine them in every possible way, thereby producing a space of possibilities analogous to (and in certain cases identical with) the logical space. Thus, analysis and synthesis differ from a trivial disassembly and reassembly.

Who are the important artists of the 1980s? This book urges a new look at that question in light of the digital direction of our culture since then. Specifically, five artists used advanced technology during that decade in ways that foreshadow many of today’s concerns. Joseph Nechvatal created expressive digital images, and then infected them with computer viruses. Lynn Hershman Leeson created the first interactive work for videodisk, creating a bridge between art and gaming. Nancy Burson foresaw multicultural America when she digitally blended photographs of diverse persons. George Legrady was among the first artists to digitally manipulate news images and offer the results as art. Gretchen Bender’s use of digital imagery in her work has never been adequately discussed. If the digital matters, then these artists should also matter.

Joseph Nechvatal is an American post-conceptual digital artist and art theoretician who creates computer-assisted paintings and computer animations, often using custom-created computer viruses. His work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Art Institute of Chicago an the Moderna Museet, Stockholm.
Hershman Leeson is widely recognized for her innovative work investigating issues including: the relationship between humans and technology, identity, surveillance, and the use of media as a tool of empowerment against censorship and political repression. Artwork by Lynn Hershman Leeson is featured in many public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, and The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Nancy Burson is an American artist known for creating photographs using computer morphing technology, including the Age Machine, Human Race Machine and Anomaly Machine. Burson's work has been featured in all forms of media including segments on Oprah,  Good Morning America, CNN. Articles featuring her work have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Houston Chronicle, the Time Magazine used Burson's Trump/Putin composite as their cover.
George Legrady has exhibited his installations internationally at venues that include the National Gallery of Canada, Centre Pompidou in Paris, San Francisco Museum of Art, MOCA Los Angeles,MOCA Taipei, the Vancouver Olympics in 2010, and others
Gretchen Bender was an American artist who worked in film, video, and photography. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Pompidou Center in Paris and the Menil Collection in Houston.

Who could possibly have forecast on New Year’s Eve 1899 that, one hundred years later, painting and sculpture would be only options, not prerequisites? The term “art” has been defined and redefined so many times over the last 100 years that it has gained entirely new social, political, and technological meanings. Ranging across the full spectrum of disciplines available, including photography and new media, and thematically chaptered to highlight relationships between works and movements, this readable and encyclopedic survey does just what it says on the cover. Whether you want Surrealism or Land Art, Fluxus or Bauhaus, this is your be-all, end-all guide to art of the 20th century.