THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 'A burst of springtime joy' Daily Telegraph 'A springboard for ideas about art, space, time and light' The Times 'Lavishly illustrated' Guardian David Hockney reflects upon life and art as he experiences lockdown in rural Normandy On turning eighty, David Hockney sought out rustic tranquility for the first time: a place to watch the sunset and the change of the seasons; a place to keep the madness of the world at bay. So when Covid-19 and lockdown struck, it made little difference to life at La Grande Cour, the centuries-old Normandy farmhouse where Hockney set up a studio a year before, in time to paint the arrival of spring. In fact, he relished the enforced isolation as an opportunity for even greater devotion to his art. Spring Cannot be Cancelled is an uplifting manifesto that affirms art's capacity to divert and inspire. It is based on a wealth of new conversations and correspondence between Hockney and the art critic Martin Gayford, his long-time friend and collaborator. Their exchanges are illustrated by a selection of Hockney's new, unpublished Normandy iPad drawings and paintings alongside works by van Gogh, Monet, Bruegel, and others. We see how Hockney is propelled ever forward by his infectious enthusiasms and sense of wonder. A lifelong contrarian, he has been in the public eye for sixty years yet remains entirely unconcerned by the view of critics or even history. He is utterly absorbed by his four acres of northern France and by the themes that have fascinated him for decades: light, colour, space, perception, water, trees. He has much to teach us, not only about how to see... but about how to live.

Published to coincide with the exhibition at the Foundling Museum in London, this fascinating book will re-introduce Joseph Highmore (1692-1780), an artist of status and substance in his day, who is now largely unknown. It takes as its focus Highmore's small oil painting known as The Angel of Mercy (1746, Yale), one of the most shocking and controversial images in 18th-century British art. The painting depicts a woman in fashionable mid-18th-century dress strangling the infant lying on her lap. A cloaked, barefooted fi gure cowers to the right as an angel intervenes, pointing towards the Foundling Hospital, the recently built refuge for abandoned infants, in the distance. The image attempts to address one of the most disturbing aspects of the Foundling Hospital story - certainly a subject that many (now as then) would consider beyond depiction. But if any artist of the period had attempted such a subject it would surely be William Hogarth, not the portrait painter Joseph Highmore? In fact, the painting was attributed to Hogarth for almost two centuries, until its reattribution in the 1990s. Even so, it is surprising that despite the wealth of scholarship associated with Hogarth and the `modern moral subject' of the 1730s and 1740s, The Angel of Mercy has received little attention until now. The book (and exhibition) seeks to address this, while encouraging greater interest in, and appreciation for, this signifi cant British artist. Highmore expert, Jacqueline Riding, will set this extraordinary painting within the context of the artist's life and work, as well as broader historical and artistic contexts. This will include exploration of superb examples of Highmore's portraiture, such as his complex, monumental group portrait The Family of Sir Eldred Lancelot Lee and the exquisite small-scale `conversations' The Vigor Family and The Artist and his Family, juxtaposed with analysis of key subject paintings, including the Foundling Museum's Hagar and Ishmael and Highmore's `Pamela' series, inspired by Samuel Richardson's bestselling novel. Collectively they tackle relevant and highly contentious issues around the status and care of women and children, master/servant relations, motherhood, abuse, abandonment, infant death and murder.

Contemporary craft, art and design are inseparable from the flows of production and consumption under global capitalism. The New Politics of the Handmade features twenty-three voices who critically rethink the handmade in this dramatically shifting economy. The authors examine craft within the conditions of extreme material and economic disparity; a renewed focus on labour and materiality in contemporary art and museums; the political dimensions of craftivism, neoliberalism, and state power; efforts toward urban renewal and sustainability; the use of digital technologies; and craft's connections to race, cultural identity and sovereignty in texts that criss-cross five continents. They claim contemporary craft as a dynamic critical position for understanding the most immediate political and aesthetic issues of our time.

This book features 45 full-size patterns that provide dozens of designs for both traditional and contemporary spoons. It describes the rich symbolism and interesting history of Welsh and Scandinavian spoon carving. It is suitable for all levels; includes a thorough introduction to carving basics. Classic in simplicity of form, spoons can be carved in an endless assortment of shapes. With a few small scraps of wood and some common carving tools, spoon carving instructor Shirley Adler will get carvers started making beautiful spoons, providing step-by-step instructions for shaping the bowl and adding detail to the handle.

A comprehensive handbook for any art, design or media student, or for those thinking about pursuing studies in this area. This accessible guide is designed for continuing use as the student prepares for and undertakes any HE A, D & M course. From choosing a course, to assessment criteria to graduate life, this book will break down the university experience for this group, providing the answers that they really need. The book will be split into two sections, the first part providing the study information that art, design and media students require and the second looking at the key concerns of specialist media such as animation, photography and 3D design. The guide will address key concepts from the particular perspective of the specialist undergraduate student in managing practical and written projects; including approaches to information gathering, exploration of ideas, and development of creative solutions to problems, presentation of work, and essay and report writing. Study Skills for Art, Design, and Media Students provides essential and practical information of what you need to know to study successfully and prepare for a career within the creative and cultural industries.

With his unerring eye, Kaffe has succeeded in finding the perfect location for his exquisite new collection of quilts, featuring both his scintillating new fabric designs and his classics, all in his unique color palette. This time he has chosen the medieval English village of Lavenham in Suffolk, where the 19 quilts in this book are set off against the ancient half-timbered Tudor houses. They are displayed in all their glory in a sumptuous eye-catching quilt gallery. Included in this set of new designs are many very special ones by Kaffe, and several by his long-time friend and co-designer, Liza Prior Lucy. Kaffe's Starry Night, featured on the cover, fussy cuts some of his brilliant floral fabrics in deep rich colors to great effect, setting them off by surrounding stars in his Shot Cottons. Shards translates the traditional Broken Dishes design into deliciously soft and subtle blends of pastel fabrics, shown off to perfection against the pale plaster and weathered timbers of the Lavenham houses. In a quite different vein, the boldly contrasting background stripes in black and white fabric in Blooming Columns make a dramatic contrast to the huge fussy-cut flowers appliqued onto it. This book--the 23rd in the series--includes a range of quilts for all skill levels, from beginners to advanced. Shaded Squares is one such lovely quilt for first timers, with its cleverly shaded squares each made up from two large triangles, one plain and one striped in Kaffe's Shot Cotton and Wide Stripe fabrics. Flat shots, a practical know-how section and glossary, back up the fully illustrated, step-by-step instructions for each quilt.