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Books > Arts & Architecture > History of art / art & design styles > 1600 to 1800 > General

MFA Highlights: European Painting and Sculpture before 1800 (Paperback): Frederick Ilchman, Ronni Baer, Marietta Cambareri MFA Highlights: European Painting and Sculpture before 1800 (Paperback)
Frederick Ilchman, Ronni Baer, Marietta Cambareri
R485 R402 Discovery Miles 4 020 Save R83 (17%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days
Material Histories of Time - Objects and Practices, 14th-19th Centuries (Hardcover): Gianenrico Bernasconi, Susanne Thurigen Material Histories of Time - Objects and Practices, 14th-19th Centuries (Hardcover)
Gianenrico Bernasconi, Susanne Thurigen
R1,019 Discovery Miles 10 190 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

The historiography of timekeeping is traditionally characterized by a dichotomy between research that investigates the evolution of technical devices on the one hand, and research that is concerned with the examination of the cultures and uses of time on the other hand. Material Histories of Time opens a dialogue between these two approaches by taking monumental clocks, table clocks, portable watches, carriage clocks, and other forms of timekeeping as the starting point of a joint reflection of specialists of the history of horology together with scholars studying the social and cultural history of time. The contributions range from the apparition of the first timekeeping mechanical systems in the Middle Ages to the first evidence of industrialization in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe - Practices, Objects, and Texts, 1400 - 1800 (Paperback): Pamela H. Smith, Benjamin... Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe - Practices, Objects, and Texts, 1400 - 1800 (Paperback)
Pamela H. Smith, Benjamin Schmidt
R1,042 Discovery Miles 10 420 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

The fruits of knowledge--such as books, data, and ideas--tend to generate far more attention than the ways in which knowledge is produced and acquired. Correcting this imbalance, "Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe" brings together a wide-ranging yet tightly integrated series of essays that explore how knowledge was obtained and demonstrated in Europe during an intellectually explosive four centuries, when standard methods of inquiry took shape across several fields of intellectual pursuit.
Composed by scholars in disciplines ranging from the history of science to art history to religious studies, the pieces collected here look at the production and consumption of knowledge as a social process within many different communities. They focus, in particular, on how the methods employed by scientists and intellectuals came to interact with the practices of craftspeople and practitioners to create new ways of knowing. Examining the role of texts, reading habits, painting methods, and countless other forms of knowledge making, this volume brilliantly illuminates the myriad ways these processes affected and were affected by the period's monumental shifts in culture and learning.

Nicholas Hawksmoor London Map (Sheet map, folded): Owen Hopkins Nicholas Hawksmoor London Map (Sheet map, folded)
Owen Hopkins; Photographs by Nigel Green; Series edited by Derek Lamberton
R258 Discovery Miles 2 580 Ships in 9 - 15 working days
Eighteenth-Century Art Worlds - Global and Local Geographies of Art (Paperback): Michael Yonan, Stacey Sloboda Eighteenth-Century Art Worlds - Global and Local Geographies of Art (Paperback)
Michael Yonan, Stacey Sloboda
R928 Discovery Miles 9 280 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

While the connected, international character of today's art economy is well known, the 18th century too had global systems of artistic production and consumption. Eighteenth-Century Art Worlds is the first book to create a global map of the art world of the 18th century. Fourteen case studies from distinguished experts explore both cross-cultural connections and local specificities of art production and consumption in Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. The result is an account of a series of interconnected and asymmetrical art worlds that were well developed in the 18th century. Capturing the full material diversity of 18th-century art, this book considers painting and sculpture alongside numerous prints and decorative objects. Analyzing the role of place in the history of 18th-century art, it bridges the disciplines of art history and cultural geography, and draws attention away from any one place as a privileged art-historical site, while highlighting places such as Manila, Beijing, Mexico City, and London as significant points on a global art map. Eighteenth-Century Art Worlds combines a broad global perspective on the history of art with careful attention to how global artistic concerns intersect with local ones, offering a framework for studies in global art history.

Unseemly Pictures - Graphic Satire and Politics in Early Modern England (Hardcover): Helen Pierce Unseemly Pictures - Graphic Satire and Politics in Early Modern England (Hardcover)
Helen Pierce
R1,370 Discovery Miles 13 700 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

This engaging book is the first full study of the satirical print in seventeenth-century England from the rule of James I to the Regicide. It considers graphic satire both as a particular pictorial category within the wider medium of print and as a vehicle for political agitation, criticism, and debate. Helen Pierce demonstrates that graphic satire formed an integral part of a wider culture of political propaganda and critique during this period, and she presents many witty and satirical prints in the context of such related media as manuscript verses, ballads, pamphlets, and plays. She also challenges the commonly held notion that a visual iconography of politics and satire in England originated during the 1640s, tracing the roots of this iconography back into native and European graphic cultures and traditions. Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art

Godefridus Schalcken - A Late 17th-century Dutch Painter in Pursuit of Fame and Fortune (Hardcover): Wayne Franits Godefridus Schalcken - A Late 17th-century Dutch Painter in Pursuit of Fame and Fortune (Hardcover)
Wayne Franits
R1,724 Discovery Miles 17 240 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Godefridus Schalcken: A Late 17th-century Dutch Painter in Pursuit of Fame and Fortune is the first book in English dedicated to the entire artistic output of seventeenth-century Dutch artist Godefridus Schalcken (1643-1706). It examines the artist's paintings and career trajectory against the background of his ceaseless pursuit of fame and fortune. Combining a comprehensive analysis of Schalcken's artistic development and style with our increasing biographical knowledge, it provides an authoritative overview of Schalcken's ample production as an artist. It also integrates his art into the circumstances of his life in relation to his ambitious career aspirations, exploring how economic conditions, a concomitantly oversaturated art market, talent and ambition, demographics, and even sheer luck all played a role in Schalcken's great professional success. Since Schalcken's art, like that of all Dutch painters, provides a plethora of information about seventeenth-century culture-its predilections, its prejudices, indeed, its very mind-set-the book inevitably links his work to the broader socio-cultural contexts in which it was created.

A Rembrandt Invention - A New Baptism of the Eunuch (Paperback): Gary Schwartz A Rembrandt Invention - A New Baptism of the Eunuch (Paperback)
Gary Schwartz
R462 Discovery Miles 4 620 Ships in 12 - 17 working days
Rembrandt's Roughness (Hardcover): Nicola Suthor Rembrandt's Roughness (Hardcover)
Nicola Suthor
R1,511 R1,288 Discovery Miles 12 880 Save R223 (15%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Roughness is the sensual quality most often associated with Rembrandt's idiosyncratic style. It best defines the specific structure of his painterly textures, which subtly capture and engage the imagination of the beholder. Rembrandt's Roughness examines how the artist's unconventional technique pushed the possibilities of painting into startling and unexpected realms. Drawing on the phenomenological insights of Edmund Husserl as well as firsthand accounts by Rembrandt's contemporaries, Nicola Suthor provides invaluable new perspectives on many of the painter's best-known masterpieces, including The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Deyman, The Return of the Prodigal Son, and Aristotle with a Bust of Homer. She focuses on pictorial phenomena such as the thickness of the paint material, the visibility of the colored priming, and the dramatizing element of chiaroscuro, showing how they constitute Rembrandt's most effective tools for extending the representational limits of painting. Suthor explores how Rembrandt developed a visually precise handling of his artistic medium that forced his viewers to confront the paint itself as a source of meaning, its challenging complexity expressed in the subtlest stroke of his brush. A beautifully illustrated meditation on a painter like no other, Rembrandt's Roughness reflects deeply on the intellectual challenge that Rembrandt's unrivaled artistry posed to the art theory of his time and its eminent role in the history of art today.

Architecture and Statecraft - Charles of Bourbon's Naples, 1734–1759 (Hardcover, New): Robin L. Thomas Architecture and Statecraft - Charles of Bourbon's Naples, 1734–1759 (Hardcover, New)
Robin L. Thomas
R2,656 Discovery Miles 26 560 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

The eighteenth century was a golden age of public building. Governments constructed theaters, museums, hospices, asylums, and marketplaces to forge a new type of city, one that is recognizably modern. Yet the dawn of this urban development remains obscure. In Architecture and Statecraft, Robin Thomas seeks to explain the origins of the modern capital by examining one of the earliest of these transformed cities. In 1737 King Charles Bourbon of Spain embarked upon the most extensive architectural and urban program of the entire century. A comprehensive study of these Neapolitan buildings does not exist, and thus Caroline contributions to this new type of city remain undervalued. This book fills an important gap in the scholarship and connects Charles’s urban improvements to his consolidation of the monarchy. By intertwining architecture and sovereignty, Thomas provides a framework for understanding how politics created the eighteenth-century capital.

This is Goya (Hardcover): Wendy Bird This is Goya (Hardcover)
Wendy Bird; Illustrated by Sarah Maycock
R316 R176 Discovery Miles 1 760 Save R140 (44%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Modern art begins with Goya. He was the first to create works of art for their own sake, and he lived in a time of incredible cultural and social dynamism when the old concepts of social hierarchy were being shaken by the new concept of equality for all. He saw his world ripped apart by Napoleon's armies and then suffered the reactionary backlash as the old order was restored. Against this epic canvas, Goya painted his own observations of humanity, transforming his youthful images of gaily dancing peasants into his mature penetrating studies of human suffering, despair, perseverance and redemption. Goya's art rises above the chaos of his times, and signals the real revolution of personal expression and independent spirit that would be the generative force behind the modernist movement in art.

Young Vermeer (Hardcover): Waanders Publishers Young Vermeer (Hardcover)
Waanders Publishers
R675 R528 Discovery Miles 5 280 Save R147 (22%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) is world-famous for his scenes of daily life, such as a kitchen maid pouring milk, a woman having a music lesson, or a lady writing a letter. However, when Vermeer began painting around the age of 21, he focused primarily on traditional subjects derived from the Bible and classical mythology. Not only do these early works differ greatly from his later paintings in terms of subject matter, they also differ in style. The exhibition unites three paintings from the beginning of Vermeer's artistic career: the Mauritshuis' "Diana and her nymphs" of c. 1653-1654, is joined by "Christ in the house of Martha and Mary" (c. 1655) from the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh, and "The Procuress" (1656) from the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen in Dresden. These three paintings afford an image of the artist seeking his own style. All three paintings have recently been restored. Within this context, the differences between Johannes Vermeer's early and late work also emerge clearly. "The Young Vermeer" is organised in collaboration with the Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden and the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Graven Images - The Art of the Woodcut (Hardcover): Jon Crabb Graven Images - The Art of the Woodcut (Hardcover)
Jon Crabb 1
R408 R335 Discovery Miles 3 350 Save R73 (18%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

The invention of the printing press led to an explosion of cheap printed materials in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Ballads were no longer confined to the soapbox. Mass communication was now possible. The broadsides pasted on walls and disseminated among the masses, together with the written ballads hawked at street corners, represented the zeitgeist of popular culture in early modern Europe. Frequently designed in 'blackletter' gothic type and accompanied with distinctive woodcut illustrations, this dynamic, lively form encompassed the obsessions and characteristic humour of the times. This beautifully designed book with a foreword by Reece Shearsmith highlights some of the most striking and amusing examples from the British Library's collections and provides brief commentary on the political and social background of the times. Frequent topics of illustration include monsters, witches, criminals, drinking, war and politics.

Rembrandt. The Complete Paintings (Hardcover): Volker Manuth, Marieke de Winkel, Rudie Van Leeuwen Rembrandt. The Complete Paintings (Hardcover)
Volker Manuth, Marieke de Winkel, Rudie Van Leeuwen 1
R4,873 R4,393 Discovery Miles 43 930 Save R480 (10%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

The Dutch Golden Age of painting spawned some of history's greatest artists and artisans, but few can boast the genius and legacy of Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn (1606-1669). Despite never leaving his native Netherlands, Rembrandt projected his oeuvre past the boundaries of his own experience, producing some of art's most diverse and impactful works across portraiture, biblical, allegorical, landscape, and genre scenes. In all their forms, Rembrandt's paintings are built of intricacies-the totality of each subtle facial wrinkle, gaze, or figure amounting to an emotional force that stands unmatched among his contemporaries and artistic progeny alike. Each work is imbued with feeling. Biblical scenes, like Bathsheba at her Bath, become vehicles for meditations on human longing, probing depths beyond that which is canonized in scripture or depicted in other representations. His portraits, be them of wealthy patrons or tradesmen, communicate the essence of an individual through fine demarcations, their faces bathed in an ethereal light against darkened earthtones. Perhaps most striking, his series of self-portraits is a triumph of the medium; beginning in his youth and spanning until a year prior to his death, Rembrandt's self portraiture is an intimate glimpse into his lifelong process of self-reflection. On the occasion of the 350th anniversary of the artist's death, this XXL monograph compiles all 330 of Rembrandt's paintings in stunning reproductions. From Belshazzar's Feast to The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp, we discover Rembrandt's painted oeuvre like never before.

Paul Revere: Sons of Liberty Bowl (Paperback): Gerald W. R Ward Paul Revere: Sons of Liberty Bowl (Paperback)
Gerald W. R Ward
R265 R220 Discovery Miles 2 200 Save R45 (17%) Ships in 10 - 15 working days
Sacred Mathematics - Japanese Temple Geometry (Hardcover): Fukagawa Hidetoshi, Tony Rothman Sacred Mathematics - Japanese Temple Geometry (Hardcover)
Fukagawa Hidetoshi, Tony Rothman; Foreword by Freeman Dyson
R1,595 R1,381 Discovery Miles 13 810 Save R214 (13%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

"An enchanting history of Japanese geometry--of a time and place where 'geometers did not cede place to poets.' This intersection of science and culture, of the mathematical, the artistic, and the spiritual, is packed, like circles within circles, with rewarding Aha! epiphanies that drive a mathematician's curiosity."--Siobhan Roberts, author of "King of Infinite Space"

"Teachers will welcome this remarkable collection of mathematical problems, history, and art, which will enrich their curriculum and promote both logical thinking and critical evaluation. It is especially important that we maintain an interest in geometry, which needs, and for once gets, more than its share."--Richard Guy, coauthor of "The Book of Numbers"

"This remarkable book provides a novel insight into the Japanese mathematics of the past few hundred years. It is fascinating to see the difference in mathematical style from that which we are used to in the Western world, but the book also elegantly illustrates the cross-cultural Platonic nature and profound beauty of mathematics itself."--Roger Penrose, author of "The Road to Reality"

"A significant contribution to the history of mathematics. The wealth of mathematical problems--from the very simple to quite complex ones--will keep the interested reader busy for years. And the beautiful illustrations make this book a work of art as much as of science. Destined to become a classic!"--Eli Maor, author of "The Pythagorean Theorem: A 4,000-Year History"

"A pleasure to read. "Sacred Mathematics" brings to light the unique style and character of geometry in the traditional Japanese sources--in particular the "sangaku" problems. These problems range from trivialto utterly devilish. I found myself captivated by them, and regularly astounded by the ingenuity and sophistication of many of the traditional solutions."--Glen Van Brummelen, coeditor of "Mathematics and the Historian's Craft"

Air: Visualising the Invisible in British Art 1768-2017 (Paperback): Christiana Payne Air: Visualising the Invisible in British Art 1768-2017 (Paperback)
Christiana Payne
R768 R607 Discovery Miles 6 070 Save R161 (21%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days
Praying to Portraits - Audience, Identity, and the Inquisition in the Early Modern Hispanic World (Hardcover): Adam Jasienski Praying to Portraits - Audience, Identity, and the Inquisition in the Early Modern Hispanic World (Hardcover)
Adam Jasienski
R2,655 Discovery Miles 26 550 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

In Praying to Portraits, art historian Adam Jasienski examines the history, meaning, and cultural significance of a crucial image type in the early modern Hispanic world: the sacred portrait. Across early modern Spain and Latin America, people prayed to portraits. They prayed to “true” effigies of saints, to simple portraits that were repainted as devotional objects, and even to images of living sitters depicted as holy figures. Jasienski places these difficult-to-classify image types within their historical context. He shows that rather than being harbingers of secular modernity and autonomous selfhood, portraits were privileged sites for mediating an individual’s relationship to the divine. Using Inquisition records, hagiographies, art-theoretical treatises, poems, and plays, Jasienski convincingly demonstrates that portraiture was at the very center of broader debates about the status of images in Spain and its colonies. Highly original and persuasive, Praying to Portraits profoundly revises our understanding of early modern portraiture. It will intrigue art historians across geographical boundaries, and it will also find an audience among scholars of architecture, history, and religion in the early modern Hispanic world.

Jerónimo Antonio Gil and the Idea of the Spanish Enlightenment (Hardcover): Kelly Donahue-Wallace Jerónimo Antonio Gil and the Idea of the Spanish Enlightenment (Hardcover)
Kelly Donahue-Wallace
R2,052 Discovery Miles 20 520 Ships in 10 - 15 working days

Examining the career of a largely unstudied eighteenth-century engraver, this book establishes Jerónimo Antonio Gil, a man immersed within the complicated culture and politics of the Spanish empire, as a major figure in the history of both Spanish and Mexican art. Donahue-Wallace examines Gil as an artist, tracing his education, entry into professional life, appointment to the Mexico City mint, and foundation of the Royal Academy of the Three Noble Arts of San Carlos. She analyzes the archival and visual materials he left behind and, most importantly, she considers the ideas, philosophies, and principles of his era, those who espoused them, and how Gil responded to them. Although frustrated by resistance from the faculty and colleagues he brought to his academy, Gil would leave a lasting influence on the Mexican art scene as local artists continued to benefit from his legacy at the Mexican academy.

Florence - The Paintings & Frescoes, 1250-1743 (Hardcover): Ross King, Anja Grebe Florence - The Paintings & Frescoes, 1250-1743 (Hardcover)
Ross King, Anja Grebe
R2,050 R1,679 Discovery Miles 16 790 Save R371 (18%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

Every painted work that is on display in the Uffizi Gallery, The Pitti Palace, the Accademia, and the Duomo is included in the book, plus many or most of the works from 28 of the city's other magnificent museums and churches. The research and text are by Ross King (best-selling author), Anja Grebe (author or The Louvre and The Vatican), Cristina Acidini (former Superintendent of the public museums of Florence) and Msgr. Timothy Verdon (Director of the artworks for the Archdiocese of Florence).

Pasta For Nightingales - A 17th-century handbook of bird-care and folklore (Hardcover): Helen Macdonald Pasta For Nightingales - A 17th-century handbook of bird-care and folklore (Hardcover)
Helen Macdonald 1
R470 R372 Discovery Miles 3 720 Save R98 (21%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days
The Mercantile Effect - Art and Exchange in the Islamicate World During the 17th and 18th Centuries (Paperback): Melanie Gibson The Mercantile Effect - Art and Exchange in the Islamicate World During the 17th and 18th Centuries (Paperback)
Melanie Gibson
R935 Discovery Miles 9 350 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

This lavishly illustrated volume of essays introduces a fascinating array of subjects, each exploring an aspect of the far-reaching "mercantile effect" and its impact across western Asia in the early modern era. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the increased movement of merchants and goods from China to Europe brought desirable commodities to new markets, but also spread ideas, tastes, and technologies across western Asia as never before. Through the newly-established Dutch, English, and French East India companies, as well as much older mercantile networks, commodities including silk, ivory, books, and glazed porcelains were transported both east and west. The Mercantile Effect shows a fascinating array of trade objects and the customs and traditions of traders that brought about a period of intense cultural interchange.

18th Century Colour Palettes (Paperback): Patricia Railing 18th Century Colour Palettes (Paperback)
Patricia Railing
R380 R304 Discovery Miles 3 040 Save R76 (20%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Pigments described by the English chemist, Robert Dossie, the French artists' colourman, Jean Felix Watin, and the London-based pigment maker, Constant de Massoul. 18th century European painting saw the introduction of new pigments to the painters' palettes, from Prussian Blue to the early synthetics such as Patent Yellow. It was a century rich in pigments, the authors of the treatises listing over 150 pigments that could be bought in the shops in London and Paris.

Empire to Nation - Art, History and the Visualization of Maritime Britain, 1768-1829 (Hardcover, New): Geoff Quilley Empire to Nation - Art, History and the Visualization of Maritime Britain, 1768-1829 (Hardcover, New)
Geoff Quilley
R1,245 Discovery Miles 12 450 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Empire to Nation offers a new consideration of the image of the sea in British visual culture during a critical period for both the rise of the visual arts in Britain and the expansion of the nation's imperial power. It argues that maritime imagery was central to cultivating a sense of nationhood in relation to rapidly expanding geographical knowledge and burgeoning imperial ambition. At the same time, the growth of the maritime empire presented new opportunities for artistic enterprise. Taking as its starting point the year 1768, which marks the foundation of the Royal Academy and the launch of Captain Cook's first circumnavigation, it asserts that this was not just an interesting coincidence but symptomatic of the relationship between art and empire. This relationship was officially sanctioned in the establishment of the Naval Gallery at Greenwich Hospital and the installation there of J. M. W. Turner's great Battle of Trafalgar in 1829, the year that closes this study. Between these two poles, the book traces a changing historical discourse that informed visual representation of maritime subjects Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art

Hidden Valuables - Early-Period Meissen Porcelains from Swiss Private Collections (Hardcover): Sarah-Katharina Andres-Acevedo,... Hidden Valuables - Early-Period Meissen Porcelains from Swiss Private Collections (Hardcover)
Sarah-Katharina Andres-Acevedo, Alfredo Reyes, Roebbig Munchen, Claudia Bodinek
R1,881 Discovery Miles 18 810 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Switzerland is well-known for its host of remarkable collections of 18th century European porcelain. Exemplary representatives include renowned collectors such as Dr Albert Kocher and Dr Marcel Nyffeler. A number of these magnificent collections can be found today - as a result of endowments or gifts - in Switzerland's renowned institutions. Today, the 'white gold' from Saxony still fascinates Swiss connoisseurs: this publication is dedicated to their passion for collecting and for exceptional treasures, and is enriched with articles by renowned art historians and porcelain experts. An impressive overview of the gems from the most sumptuous Meissen porcelain of the early period.

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