New Mexico Colcha Club looks at the history, beauty, and various styles of New Mexico colcha embroidery, and tells the uplifting story of how a small group of determined women revived a cultural tradition destined for extinction. In the 1700s Spanish colonial women in the isolated province of New Mexico wanted to add beauty and warmth to their bedding. They worked their homespun yarn in a long couching stitch to create the flowing needlework that came to be called "colcha embroidery." Highly sought after and valued, a detailed embroidered piece could cost upwards of 46 pesos. (During the same time period, sheep and cows cost 2 and 15 pesos respectively). However, a century later colcha was on its way to oblivion. Like many traditional crafts, this beautiful and skilled artform was becoming obsolete as inexpensive and abundant commercial cloth, modern styles, and machine-made products became more desirable and available. Fast-forward to the 1920s and the Arte Antiguo, a colcha club founded by twelve Hispanic women in the Espanola Valley of New Mexico. Spearheaded by Teofila Ortiz Lujan and then later her daughter, Esther Lujan Vigil, these women heroically sought to rescue colcha and bring it back to its rightful place as a cherished custom. The women traveled to churches to examine vintage altar cloth, hunted through attics and archives in search of examples of the antique embroidery, and sketched old patterns--all in the hopes of keeping colcha from extinction and activating a revival of the embroidery. Esther Lujan Vigil, through her artwork and teaching, keeps the tradition alive and has elevated colcha from a folk art to a fine art. Divided into three sections, the first part of thebook traces the roots of the embroidery tradition and domestic life in colonial New Mexico. The second part looks at the Arte Antiguo's push in the early twentieth century to revive this lost art. The third part focuses on Esther Lujan Vigil's artistic skills and the renaissance of colcha embroidery today. New Mexico Colcha Club features historical and recent photographs of colcha work that demonstrate the beauty, intricacy, and diversity of this Old World custom. This inspirational and informative biography of colcha is folk art enlivened by social history. It is a must read for those interested in Spanish textile traditions and folk art, needlework, and New Mexico history.

Japanese artist Kitagawa Utamaro (1753-1806) was one of the most influential artists working in the genre of ukiyo-e, `pictures of the floating world', in late eighteenth-century Japan, and was widely appreciated for his prints of beautiful women. In this book, Julie Nelson Davis draws on a wide range of period sources, makes a close study of selected print sets and reinterprets Utamaro in the context of his times. Offering a new approach to issues of the status of the artist and the construction of gender, identity, sexuality and celebrity in the Edo period, and now in an updated edition containing a new preface and many new images, this book is a significant contribution to the field, and will be a key work for readers interested in Japanese arts and cultures.

A delightful gift book, celebrating the dogs in Tate's collection Following Tate's recent publication Love, this new selection of works showcases the most endearing, thoughtful, and amusing depictions of dogs drawn from Tate's collection. Divided into key themes--"Hounds of the Hunt," "Painterly Pooches," "Princely Pups," "Man's Best Friend," "Moping Mutts," "Working Like a Dog," "Lap Dogs at Leisure," "Mystical Mutts," and "Loyal Fido"--this little book considers how dogs have been the animal companion of choice for millennia and how their position as hunter, signifier of status, and friend has influenced artists. Works of art--including paintings, drawings, sculptures, illustrations, and installations--are introduced by a brief introduction text at the beginning of the chapter, adding background detail or additional information about the art, artists, and their subjects. Featured artists include: Edwin Henry Landseer, Sidney Nolan, Chris Killip, Giacomo Amiconi, Hamo Thornycroft, William Hogarth, Joshua Reynolds, Cedric Morris, Peter Doig, and Edward Ruscha. Sometimes traditional, sometimes contemporary, often touching and occasionally telling, placed together these beautiful images create a fascinating and enlightening journey through the visual portrayal of canines in Western art.

The natural Japanese affinity for decorative art is apparent in this striking collection of 104 exquisite stencil designs, reproduced from a rare 19th-century publication. Motifs depict -- among other subjects -- lush florals, bamboo branches, birds on the wing, and rustic country homes. Captions identify the patterns.
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Appearing for the first time in paperback and illustrated with line drawings, diagrams, and 26 half-tone plates, this study of the iconographic aspect of Japanese Buddhist sculpture surveys the significance of eight principal and six secondary hand gestures (mudra), in addition to the postures (asana), such as the "lotus," and the symbolic attributes. A pictorial index helps the reader in identifying the gestures.

African-American art has made an increasingly vital contribution to the art of the United States from the time of its origins in early-eighteenth-century slave communities. This major reassessment of the subject discusses folk and decorative arts such as ceramics, furniture, and quilts alongside fine art -- sculptures, paintings, and photography -- produced by African Americans, both enslaved and free, throughout the nineteenth century. It explores art and politics, the influence of galleries and museums, and examines the New Negro Movement of the 1920s, the Era of Civil Rights and Black Nationalism through the 1960s and 1970s, and the emergence of new black artists and theorists in the 1980s and 1990s. African-American Art shows that in its cultural diversity and synthesis of cultures it mirrors those in American society as a whole.

`a much needed text. . . breaks down the barrier between folk and formal art, and articulates an interrelationship of both concepts to African-American people and their culture' Keith Morrison, Artist and Dean of the College of Arts, San Francisco State University.

`a fine survey of contemporary African-American art and ideas... a volume, which, like no other, can be used both as an unusual reference book and a good read' Emma Amos, Artist and Professor of Art at Rutgers University

One of the last great names in the Japanese "ukiyo-e" style, Utagawa Kuniyoshi was an undisputed master of the warrior woodblock print. Born in Tokyo in 1797, his talent became evident by the tender age of 12, when he became an apprentice to a famous print master. Starting out with vivid illustrations of cultural icons -- including Kabuki actors and Japanese heroes -- he moved on to a unique treatment of warrior prints, incorporating elements of dreams, omens, and daring feats that characterized his distinctive style. These dramatic eighteenth-century illustrations represent the pinnacle of his craft. One hundred and one full-color portraits of legendary samurai pulse with movement, passion, and remarkably fine detail. A must for collectors of Japanese art and a perfect first work for those who want to start their own collection, it includes brief captions and a new introduction.

Nous avons vecu une periode particulierement difficile. Il n'y avait aucune direction connue dans notre travail. Pas a pas, nous avons depasse l'effroi de l'egarement et decouvert le plaisir de domaines nouveaux... Mais les critiques n'etaient pas de notre cote, aucune valeur sociale n'etait attachee a nos travaux. C'est en ces termes que le peintre Ahmad Esfandiari (1922-2012) decrit l'effervescence des annees 1940 durant lesquelles un style pictural novateur - la Nouvelle peinture - apparait en Iran. A l'appui d'archives et d'entretiens, cet ouvrage tente de restituer la flamme qui a anime ces artistes-pionniers: leur esprit d'innovation face a une tradition artistique multiseculaire; les risques pris, les transgressions osees et soutenues contre vents et marees. Ils furent les premiers a explorer des terres inconnues, annonciatrices de la modernite. Nombreuses furent les resistances: proces en justice, vandalisme, censure, interdiction de publier leurs revues. Aujourd'hui encore, leur heritage demeure paradoxalement occulte. Leur determination et leur force de conviction ont pourtant suscite des mutations artistiques majeures, sources de changements sociaux non moins importants.

In this richly illustrated volume Rosa Giorgi argues that because much of Western art depicts key events, leaders, and practices in the history of the Christian Church, knowledge of that history is critical to an appreciation of many of our great masterpieces.
Giorgi begins by analyzing artistic representations of liturgical objects, including altars, crosses, and censers, and follows with an examination of the duties and vestments of the variety of clerics, ranging from minor clerks to the pope. Both the rituals of the monastic life and worshippers' devotional practices are well documented in paintings depicting prayer, communal meals, funeral rites, religious processions, and cult practices.
The author next turns to artworks that capture important episodes from the Church's history, including crusades and pilgrimages, the Inquisition and the Reformation, and power struggles between popes and rulers. Giorgi ends with an analysis of the lives and portraits of the notable leaders who made this fascinating history, from Peter and Paul to Thomas More to Pope Paul VI.

A fresh exploration of Native American art that positions the work within the broader context of North American art history This landmark publication presents Native American art within the broader context of American art history, through an examination of notable works from a major private collection. The insightful texts provide a new evaluation of the art, culture, and daily life of numerous North American tribes, including Acoma, Apache, Cheyenne, Creek, Crow, Hopi-Twea, Kiowa, Lakota, Pomo, Seneca, Seminole, Tlingit, and Zuni, among others. The works featured in this lavish volume span centuries, from the period prior to contact with European settlers through the early 20th century, and represent the extensive artistic achievements of culturally distinct indigenous peoples. Both known and unrecorded makers' innovative visions are manifest in a wide variety of aesthetic forms and media-from painting, sculpture, and drawing to costume, ceramics, and baskets. Challenging traditional presentations of American Indian art, this publication situates and analyzes them alongside other North American artistic practices. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Distributed by Yale University Press Exhibition Schedule: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (10/01/18-10/06/19)

Die Autorin analysiert umfassend das Fruhwerk des deutschen Kunstlers Otto Freundlich (1878-1943). Dieser begann bereits wahrend seines ersten Paris-Aufenthaltes 1908 eine eigenstandige, nicht-gegenstandliche Formensprache zu entwickeln, ohne sich wie zahlreiche seiner Zeitgenossen den vorherrschenden Kunststilen anzupassen oder unterzuordnen: "Ich habe [...] nach meiner inneren UEberzeugung geschaffen, die verlangte, von der Tradition abzugehen." Anhand der Rekonstruktion seines Netzwerkes positioniert die Untersuchung den Kunstler als selbstbewussten Wegbereiter der Abstraktion innerhalb der Pariser Avantgarde.

This work explains how and why Japan supports a community of professional dancers, musicians, production companies, and visual artists that has nearly tripled in size during the past 25 years. Originally published in 1982. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Renowned photographer Jonathan M. Singer presents his striking black-and-white images of Chinese ornamental rocks from a leading collection. Shaped by nature and selected by man, scholars' rocks, or gongshi, have been prized by Chinese intellectuals since the Tang dynasty, and are now sought after by Western collectors as well. They are a natural subject for the photographer Jonathan M. Singer, most recently acclaimed for his images of those other remarkable hybrids of art and nature, Japanese bonsai. Here Singer turns his lens on some 140 fine gongshi, ancient and modern, from the world-class collection of Kemin Hu, a recognized authority on this art form. In his photographs, Singer captures the spiritual qualities of these stones as never thought possible in two dimensions. He shows us that scholars' rocks truly are, in Hu's words, "condensations of the vital essence and energy of heaven and earth." Hu contributes an introductory essay on the history and aesthetics of scholars' rocks, explaining the traditional terms of stone appreciation, such as shou (thin), zhou (wrinkled), lou (channels), and tou (holes). She also provides a narrative caption for each stone, describing its history and characteristics. Spirit Stones forms a trilogy with Singer's two previous books, Botanica Magnifica and Fine Bonsai. In these volumes, he has established a new style of photography that blends the tonal richness and chiaroscuro of Old Master painting with a scientific clarity of detail; they represent a lasting achievement.

This work explains how and why Japan supports a community of professional dancers, musicians, production companies, and visual artists that has nearly tripled in size during the past 25 years.

Originally published in 1982.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

"Ask the beast and it will teach thee, and the birds of heaven and they will tell thee." -Job 12:7 In the Middle Ages, the bestiary achieved a popularity second only to that of the Bible. In addition to being a kind of encyclopedia of the animal kingdom, the bestiary also served as a book of moral and religious instruction, teaching human virtues through a portrayal of an animal's true or imagined behavior. In A Jewish Bestiary, Mark Podwal revisits animals, both real and mythical, that have captured the Jewish imagination through the centuries. Originally published in 1984 and called "broad in learning and deep in subtle humor" by the New York Times, this updated edition of A Jewish Bestiary features new full-color renderings of thirty-five creatures from Hebraic legend and lore. The illustrations are accompanied by entertaining and instructive tales drawn from biblical, talmudic, midrashic, and kabbalistic sources. Throughout, Podwal combines traditional Jewish themes with his own distinctive style. The resulting juxtaposition of art with history results in a delightful and enlightening bestiary for the twenty-first century. From the ant to the ziz, herein are the creatures that exert a special force on the Jewish fancy.

A unique and compelling view of the work of leading contemporary artist Nalini Malani through the lens of her most recent commission This publication presents the latest work of Nalini Malani (b. 1946), recipient of the 2022 National Gallery Contemporary Fellowship with ArtFund. For over five decades, Malani's art has focused on giving a voice to the stories of those marginalized by history -particularly women. She is one of the most incisive artists of our time, and the acute analysis and poetic compassion of her experimental film, photography, painting, and drawing has influenced generations of others from the 1960s to the present day. For her first museum commission in the United Kingdom, Malani has created an immersive installation of large-scale, animated drawings inspired by the sites, histories, and collections of the National Gallery, London, and the Holburne Museum, Bath. With a floating palimpsest of digital images, Malani reveals, annotates, and shares new, underlying stories in some of Europe's best-known paintings, offering a contemporary and critical dialogue between past and present. With leading articles based on new research, sumptuous illustrations, and artist-led design, this extensive study documents the Fellowship alongside the artist's previous work. Published by National Gallery Global/Distributed by Yale University Press Exhibition Schedule: Holburne Museum, Bath October 7, 2022-January 8, 2023 The National Gallery, London March 2-June 11, 2023

This exciting new investigation explores the rich variety of indigenous arts in the US and Canada from the early pre-contact period to the present day. It shows the importance of the visual arts in maintaining the integrity of spiritual, social, political, and economic systems within Native North American societies and examines such issues as gender, representation, the colonial encounter, and contemporary arts. Basketry, wood and rock carvings, dance masks, and beadwork, are discussed alongside the paintings and installations of modern artists such as Robert Davidson, Emmi Whitehorse, and Alex Janvier.

In the literary and artistic milieu of early modern Japan the Chinese and Japanese arts flourished side by side. Kod?jin, the "Old Taoist" (1865-1944), was the last of these great poet-painters in Japan. Under the support of various patrons, he composed a number of Taoist-influenced Chinese and Japanese poems and did lively and delightful ink paintings, continuing the tradition of the poet-sage who devotes himself to study of the ancients, lives quietly and modestly, and creates art primarily for himself and his friends.

Portraying this last representative of a tradition of gentle and refined artistry in the midst of a society that valued economic growth and national achievement above all, this beautifully illustrated book brings together 150 of Kod?jin's Chinese poems (introduced and translated by Jonathan Chaves), more than 100 of his haiku and tanka (introduced and translated by Stephen Addiss), and many examples of his calligraphy and ink paintings. Addiss's in-depth introduction details the importance of the poet-painter tradition, outlines the life of Kod?jin, and offers a critical appraisal of his work, while J. Thomas Rimer's essay puts the literary work of the Old Taoist in context.

Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858) was one of the last great artists in the ukiyo-e tradition. Literally meaning "pictures of the floating world," ukiyo-e was a particular woodblock print genre of art that flourished between the 17th and 19th centuries. Subjects ranged from the bright lights and attractions of Edo (modern-day Tokyo), to spectacular natural landscapes. In the West, Hiroshige's prints became exemplary of the Japonisme that swept through Europe and defined the Western world's visual idea of Japan. Because they could be mass produced, ukiyo-e works were often used as designs for fans, greeting cards, and book illustrations. The style influenced Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, and Art Nouveau artists alike, with Vincent van Gogh and James Abbott McNeill Whistler both particularly inspired by Hiroshige's landscapes. This introductory book presents key images from Hiroshige's vibrant, vivid portfolio of blooming cherry trees, beautiful women, Kabuki actors, and busy shopping streets to introduce one of the greats of Asian art history. About the series Born back in 1985, the Basic Art Series has evolved into the best-selling art book collection ever published. Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features: a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance a concise biography approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions