As an important part of Chinese culture, Lingnan culture, mainly those in Guangdong province, plays a key role in the world culture. Elegant Guangdong Series cover 5 subjects of the Lingnan cultural and traditional gems in South China. Each volume has used vivid and precious illustrations and portraits. Maolong Brush tells the origin, inventor, making, unique artistic characters and inheritance of this specialized grass brush in Lingnan region.

This edited volume programmatically reconsiders the creative contribution of the littoral and insular regions of Maritime Asia to shaping new paradigms in the Buddhist and Hindu art and architecture of the mediaeval Asian world. Far from being a mere southern conduit for the maritime circulation of Indic religions, in the period from ca. the 7th to the 14th century those regions transformed across mainland and island polities the rituals, icons, and architecture that embodied these religious insights with a dynamism that often eclipsed the established cultural centres in Northern India, Central Asia, and mainland China. This collective body of work brings together new research aiming to recalibrate the importance of these innovations in art and architecture, thereby highlighting the cultural creativity of the monsoon-influenced Southern rim of the Asian landmass.

La grande sfida dell'arte italiana tra l'Unita e la Prima guerra mondiale e quella di creare uno stile nazionale competitivo e riconoscibile a livello europeo. Il volume intende indagare gli sviluppi artistici italiani nei loro rapporti internazionali Tra Oltralpe e Mediterraneo mettendo in rilievo il ruolo di cerniera giocato dall'Italia nell'Europa del tempo, sia dal punto di vista geografico, sia culturale. I singoli casi di studio indagano l'aggiornamento di artisti, critici e amatori d'arte italiani verso la contemporanea scena artistica europea, cercando di creare contatti con i colleghi stranieri dall'Inghilterra alla Turchia, dalla Scandinavia alla Spagna. Ne emerge una piu complessa trama di rapporti nella quale, piu che l'influsso, domina lo scambio. Nach der Staatsgrundung 1861 sahen sich italienische Kunstler mit der Herausforderung konfrontiert, eine eigenstandige und auf europaischer Ebene wettbewerbsfahige Formsprache zu entwickeln. Der Band thematisiert den kunstlerischen Wandel in Italien im Spiegel seiner internationalen Beziehungen von Nordeuropa bis zum Mittelmeerraum. Sowohl in geografischer als auch in kultureller Hinsicht kommt dem Land dabei eine Schlusselposition innerhalb Europas zu. Fallstudien untersuchen, wie italienische Kunstler, Kritiker und Kunstliebhaber sich uber aktuelle kunstlerische Entwicklungen jenseits der Landesgrenzen auf dem Laufenden hielten und Kontakte mit Kollegen von England bis zur Turkei und von Skandinavien bis nach Spanien knupften. Die Ergebnisse dieser Recherchen zeichnen ein komplexeres Bild der italienisch-europaischen Beziehungen, die weniger von einseitiger Beeinflussung als vielmehr von einem wechselseitigen Austausch gepragt waren. After the unification in 1861 the creation of a national art, unique and competitive at a European level, represented a major challenge for Italian artists. This volume analyses artistic developments in Italy with regard to their international relations from Northern Europe to the Mediterranean. In the late 19th century Italy held a key position both from a geographical and from a cultural perspective. Case studies demonstrate how Italian artists, critics and art lovers kept themselves up-to-date about current artistic developments in Europe trying to stay in touch with colleagues from England to Turkey and from Scandinavia to Spain. The results of this research paint a more vivid picture of the Italian-European relationship that was less characterised by one-sided influences than by a mutual exchange, thus benefiting both sides.

The University of New Mexico's Tamarind Institute is a world-renowned center for fine art lithography dedicated to training master printers and providing a professional studio for artists. In "Migrations," Tamarind director Marjorie Devon has compiled the work of six Native American artists, each of whom collaborated with professional printers at Tamarind and at Crow's Shadow Institute of the Arts in Pendleton, Oregon, to create prints. These artists were selected because they engage in contemporary art rather than what is traditionally considered "Native American art." Artists Steven Deo (Creek/Euchee), Tom Jones (Ho Chunk), Larry McNeil (Tlingit/Nisgaa), Ryan Lee Smith (Cherokee), Star Wallowing Bull (Chippewa/Arapaho), and Marie Watt (Seneca) represent a wide spectrum of Native American cultures and experiences.

In addition to the art, essays by Jo Ortel, Lucy Lippard, Kathleen Howe, and Gerald McMaster contribute expert analyses of Native American art. Ortel, an associate professor of art history at Beloit College, defines "Migrations" as it applies to this project. Lippard is an art critic and author whose essay discusses the cultural baggage forced upon the American Indian. As director of the Pomona College Museum of Art and professor of art history, Howe offers an overview of Tamarind Institutes projects with indigenous peoples. A Plains Cree artist, McMasters essay details the history of Crow's Shadow Institute on Oregon's Umatilla Reservation. A traveling exhibition of the art contained here, also entitled "Migrations," will begin in 2007, venues to be announced.

The first global history of architecture to give equal attention to Western and non-Western structures and built landscapes, "Architecture since 1400" is unprecedented in its range, approach, and insight. From Tenochtitlan's Great Pyramid in Mexico City and the Duomo in Florence to Levittown's suburban tract housing and the Bird's Nest Stadium in Beijing, its coverage includes the world's most celebrated structures and spaces along with many examples of more humble vernacular buildings. Lavishly illustrated with more than 300 photographs, plans, and interiors, this book presents key moments and innovations in architectural modernity around the globe.

Deftly integrating architectural and social history, Kathleen James-Chakraborty pays particular attention to the motivations of client and architect in the design and construction of environments both sacred and secular: palaces and places of worship as well as such characteristically modern structures as the skyscraper, the department store, and the cinema. She also focuses on the role of patrons and addresses to an unparalleled degree the impact of women in commissioning, creating, and inhabiting the built environment, with Gertrude Jekyll, Lina Bo Bardi, and Zaha Hadid taking their place beside Brunelleschi, Sinan, and Le Corbusier.

Making clear that visionary architecture has never been the exclusive domain of the West and recognizing the diversity of those responsible for commissioning, designing, and constructing buildings, "Architecture since 1400" provides a sweeping, cross-cultural history of the built environment over six centuries.

Artist, teacher, and Red Progressive, Angel De Cora (1869-1919) painted Fire Light to capture warm memories of her Nebraska Winnebago childhood. In this biography, Linda M. Waggoner draws on that glowing image to illuminate De Cora's life and artistry, which until now have been largely overlooked by scholars.One of the first American Indian artists to be accepted within the mainstream art world, De Cora left her childhood home on the Winnebago reservation to find success in the urban Northeast at the turn of the twentieth century. Despite scant documentary sources that elucidate De Cora's private life, Waggoner has rendered a complete picture of the woman known in her time as the first "real Indian artist." She depicts De Cora as a multifaceted individual who as a young girl took pride in her traditions, forged a bond with the land that would sustain her over great distances, and learned the role of cultural broker from her mother's MEtis family. After studying with famed illustrator Howard Pyle at his first Brandywine summer school, De Cora eventually succeeded in establishing the first "Native Indian" art department at Carlisle Indian School. A founding member of the Society of American Indians, she made a significant impact on the American Arts and Crafts movement by promoting indigenous arts throughout her career. Waggoner brings her broad knowledge of Winnebago culture and history to this gracefully written book, which features more than forty illustrations. Fire Light shows us both a consummate artist and a fully realized woman, who learned how to traverse the borders of Red identity in a white man's world.

Conventional wisdom holds that Judaism is indifferent or even suspiciously hostile to the visual arts due to the Second Commandment's prohibition on creating "graven images," the dictates of monotheism, and historical happenstance. This intellectual history of medieval and modern Jewish attitudes toward art and representation overturns the modern assumption of Jewish iconophobia that denies to Jewish culture a visual dimension.

Kalman Bland synthesizes evidence from medieval Jewish philosophy, mysticism, poetry, biblical commentaries, travelogues, and law, concluding that premodern Jewish intellectuals held a positive, liberal understanding of the Second Commandment and did, in fact, articulate a certain Jewish aesthetic. He draws on this insight to consider modern ideas of Jewish art, revealing how they are inextricably linked to diverse notions about modern Jewish identity that are themselves entwined with arguments over Zionism, integration, and anti-Semitism.

Through its use of the past to illuminate the present and its analysis of how the present informs our readings of the past, this book establishes a new assessment of Jewish aesthetic theory rooted in historical analysis. Authoritative and original in its identification of authentic Jewish traditions of painting, sculpture, and architecture, this volume will ripple the waters of several disciplines, including Jewish studies, art history, medieval and modern history, and philosophy.