Towards the end of his life and much inspired by Japanese water gardens, Monet spent a great deal of time in his beloved Giverny. Adorned with poppies, blue sage, dahlias and irises, the waters were disturbed only by bamboos and water lilies. His water garden was originally created to satisfy a need to be near water, and to provide a visual feast that could be enjoyed from his house. The pond was fed by the river Ru, and weeping willow and silver birch hung over its edges, caressing the fronds of the greenery and blossoms below. Its famous green wooden footbridge was built across the water and it became the central focus of many of his works. He said, 'It took me some time to understand my water lilies. I planted them for pleasure.' and so he began to work on what is probably the most famous series of paintings the world has ever seen.

Originally published in Dutch and translated to Spanish for the fourth centenary celebration of the death of El Greco in 2014, this book is a comprehensive study of the rediscovery of El Greco -- seen as one of the most important events of its kind in art history. The Nationalization of Culture versus the Rise of Modern Art analyses how changes in artistic taste in the second half of the nineteenth century caused a profound revision of the place of El Greco in the artistic canon. As a result, El Greco was transformed from an extravagant outsider and a secondary painter into the founder of the Spanish School and one of the principle predecessors of modern art, increasingly related to that of the Impressionists -- due primarily to the German critic Julius Meier-Graefe's influential History of Modern Art (1914). This shift in artistic preference has been attributed to the rise of modern art but Eric Storm, a cultural historian, shows that in the case of El Greco nationalist motives were even more important. This study examines the work of painters, art critics, writers, scholars and philosophers from France, Germany and Spain, and the role of exhibitions, auctions, monuments and commemorations. Paintings and associated anecdotes are discussed, and historical debates such as El Greco's supposed astigmatism are addressed in a highly readable and engaging style. This book will be of interest to both specialists and the interested art public.

One of the European artists who has best combined text, image, and movement, Juliao Sarmento's multidisciplinary oeuvre evinces the tension that exists between image and word, between what is explicitly biographical and the impossibility of all forms of narration. Over the past 26 years, Sarmento's work has revealed an intimate and passionate pre-occupation with desire, explored both in the realm of the speculative and the gestural. Within his work there is no chronology, no unfolding narrative, no apparent logic--simply glimpses of experience that give visual form to primordial desires, ones felt but not defined. Working with various media, including paint, print, photography, sculpture, and video, he determines to define the intangible gap between experience and memory, now and then.

Here is what happens when Jeff Koons, one of the most important and controversial artists of the twenty-first century, sits down with distinguished art curator Sir Norman Rosenthal. Published to coincide with his 2014 2015 retrospective, this new book provides the most revealing portrait that exists of Jeff Koons singular personality and artistic vision as he discusses works across his thirty-five -year career with his long-time friend and collaborator Rosenthal. Rosenthal s masterful interviews, conducted over three years, give unparalleled access to the thoughts of one of the most influential minds in contemporary culture, disclosing the artist undistorted and in his own words. As well as examining all his major series in depth, from his first inflatables to his latest series on antiquities, the interviews shed new light on the artist s interest in other artists works, reveal the significance of his youth and family life on his art, and explain the key concepts of his practice, such as his ideas on self-acceptance, ecstasy and sex. A book of historic importance, extensively and comprehensively illustrated throughout, it will become the reference point for all who want to understand Koons and creativity in the twenty-first century."

Best-known for his corporate brand logos and art direction, Paul Rand (1914-1986) transformed commercial art from craft to profession, introduced European design standards to American commercial art, influenced the look of advertising and book design, and altered the ways in which major corporations including IBM, UPS, and Westinghouse did business. His adherence to a strict design form in his work for corporate clients was balanced by a playful side , captured in this spirited collection of literal (and figural) back-of-the-envelope sketches, doodles, notes, and imaginative sparks that later found their full form in his children's books, logos, and personal work.

Discover the ultimate collection of Ron Cobb's artwork from across his entire career (Alien, Star Wars, Back to the Future) in this comprehensive coffee table book. During his sixty-year career, Ron Cobb provided concept art for some of the biggest films in sci-fi cinema. From designing spaceships for Alien, Dark Star, and Firefly and Delorean from Back to the Future to character designs for Conan the Barbarian and creature concepts for Star Wars and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Ron has left a legacy of artwork behind to inspire future generations of concept artists. This beautiful coffee table book is full to the brim with Ron Cobb's artwork from throughout his career and includes exclusive insights from the talent he worked with along the way, including James Cameron, Joe Johnston, Robert Zemeckis, Bob Gale, and Nick Castle. Brought to you by Concept Art Association in collaboration with the Estate of Ron Cobb.

Raphael (1483-1520) was for centuries considered the greatest artist who ever lived. Much of what we know about him comes from this biography, written by the Florentine painter Giorgio Vasari and first published in 1550. Vasari's Lives of the Painters was the first attempt to write a systematic history of Italian art. The Life of Raphael is a key text not only for the appreciation of Raphael's own art - whose development and chronology Vasari describes in detail, together with the spectacular social career of the first painter to be mooted, it was claimed, as a Cardinal - but also for its unprecedented attention to theoretical issues.

"I always thought I would get into painting, but I got waylaid by rock 'n' roll. Finally, I thought, 'Now's the time.' As soon as I could be alone and paint without any interruptions, I just couldn't stop." – Chrissie Hynde

"These paintings wake me up, show me life, make me want to get up and do something." – Brian Eno

"The fact that Chrissie is a great musician doesn’t undermine her painting; it underpins it…" – Tim Marlow

In 2015, Chrissie Hynde, the singer, songwriter and leader of The Pretenders, produced an oil painting of a ceramic vase. It proved to be the starting point for Chrissie Hynde’s first body of work, nearly 200 canvases in all. These paintings are now shared for the very first time in Adding The Blue.

Beginning with still life studies and culminating in vibrant abstract compositions, Adding The Blue is a beautiful book of paintings that reveals Chrissie Hynde as an artist as passionate about her painting as her music.

With forewords by visionary musician and artist, Brian Eno, and The Royal Academy’s Artistic Director, Tim Marlow, Adding The Blue is captioned throughout with Chrissie Hynde’s thoughts, anecdotes and reflections.

Published in hardback the front cover features the work,'Tuesday Self-Portrait'

Explore the world of Tyler Jacobson and find yourself lost in a fascinating culmination of cinematic moments frozen in time. The Art of Tyler Jacobson invites you to explore every aspect of this quintessential artist's career. This treasure trove covers everything from works created during Tyler's youth, to thesis work made during his college years and continues into every aspect of his professional life. Examples shown include paintings done for books, advertising and editorial purposes, and most notably for the gaming industry. Included are finished works done in digital and traditional methods while also revealing rare sketches and concept art. In addition, Tyler offers exclusive insight as he shares background stories to key pieces found in these pages. Immerse yourself in Tyler's world, where you can find cinematic moments frozen in time. He builds new worlds with the help of his science background and interest in how things work combined with his passion for fantasy. Tyler has a highly sought out ability to design and create everything from new cultures, environments, weapons and tapestry to clothes and more. He is also well known for his mood plates, as he establishes the overall feeling and tone of the world being built. Tyler loved playing Dungeons & Dragons when he was younger, which sparked his initial interests and career toward being an artist. With this book, Tyler hopes to share his thought processes and his love of storytelling.

Hokusai: the blue, foam-crested wave rearing above Mount Fuji; the celebrated volcano idealized and reinventedby the artist in every nuance of view, season and painting; extraordinary bridges, the waterfalls of Japan, the contortions, costumes, gestures – the very breath of men, women, peasants, townsmen, warriors, artisans, leaping horses, birds, insects, fish, almost live on the ground on which they are painted – the countless imaginative drawings or the lively sketches done on the spot for the Manga, Hokusai’s record of shapes and forms drawn from life or imagined over time. With a body of work comprising more than 30,000 drawings and paintings, Hokusai (1760–1849) was the most prolific, varied and indisputably the most creative artist of old Japan. A universal genius in everything that constituted drawing and painting in his time, he practised all genres of ukiyo-e, those ‘images of the floating world’, as his contemporaries liked to describe their pleasures and their daily life.

This book traces the career of this child from a working-class district of old Tokyo, then known as Edo, evoking the special atmosphere of this great city and of Japanese life, when Japan – closed to foreigners – developed in a vacuum a powerfully original culture. Hokusai became one of the great masters of the woodcut, this ‘brush gone wild’, as he called himself, being rediscovered by the Impressionists and aesthetes at the end of the 19th century. He remains one of the greatest and – thanks to his personality – one of the most attractive figures of world art.

Toward the end of his monumental career as a painter, sculptor, and lithographer, an elderly, sickly Matisse was unable to stand and use a paintbrush for long. In this late phase of his life-he was almost 80 years of age-he developed the technique of "carving into color," creating bright, bold paper cut-outs. Though dismissed by some contemporary critics as the folly of a senile old man, these gouaches decoupees (gouache cut-outs) in fact represented a revolution in modern art, a whole new medium that reimagined the age-old conflict between color and line. This edition of the first volume of our original award-winning XXL book provides a thorough historical context to Matisse's cut-outs, tracing their roots to his 1930 trip to Tahiti and continuing through to his final years in Nice. It includes many photos of Matisse, as well as some rare images by Henri Cartier-Bresson and the filmmaker F. W. Murnau, with texts by Matisse, publisher E. Teriade, the poets Louis Aragon, Henri Michaux, and Pierre Reverdy, and Matisse's son-in-law Georges Duthuit. In their deceptive simplicity, the cut-outs achieved both a sculptural quality and an early minimalist abstraction, which would profoundly influence generations of artists to come. Exuberant, multi-hued, and often grand in scale, these works are true pillars of 20th-century art, and as bold and innovative to behold today as they were in Matisse's lifetime. About the series TASCHEN is 40! Since we started our work as cultural archaeologists in 1980, TASCHEN has become synonymous with accessible publishing, helping bookworms around the world curate their own library of art, anthropology, and aphrodisia at an unbeatable price. Today we celebrate 40 years of incredible books by staying true to our company credo. The 40 series presents new editions of some of the stars of our program-now more compact, friendly in price, and still realized with the same commitment to impeccable production.

Nonfiction. In this pioneering work Olu Oguibe charts the life and career of Uzo Egonu, from his origins in Africa to his expatiation in Britain. Egonu, a remarkable, compassionate and very private artist, has been described as "perhaps Africa's greatest modern painter," one whose work challenges the impoverished Western myth of the naive African artist. The complexity of Egonu's work is firmly located within the tradition of modernism. What we see is a judicious synthesis of visual languages developed from his critical encounter with Western art and an informed awareness of his African heritage; a synthesis which reaches beyond mere formalist concerns to involve both the experience of his life in the West and the painful turmoils of his country of origin, post-colonial Nigeria. This monograph is a timely intervention in the prevailing debates on the role, position and aesthetic concerns of the African artist in the contemporary world, and offers a unique contribution to the scarce literature on artists of African, Asian or Latin American origin living in the West.

Bettina is the first monograph to showcase the work of the previously unsung artist Bettina Grossman, whose wildly interdisciplinary practice spanned photography, sculpture, textile, cinema, drawing, and more. An eccentric personality fully dedicated to her art, Bettina lived in the famous Chelsea Hotel from 1968 until her death in late 2021. In her tiny studio, she produced and accumulated a considerable body of work, much of which has remained unseen and unpublished until now. Her interests ranged from geometric and abstract studies, drawn from observations of people on the street, to pieces that transformed language into graphic, abstract "verbal forms." Incorporating strategies of chance and the abstraction of everyday form through repetition and seriality, Bettina pushed the photographic medium to and beyond its limits. As Robert Blackburn, artist and founder of the Printmaking Workshop, astutely observed of Bettina's work: "The photography, film, sculpture are as one, for the photographic medium is employed not only for documentation but as an endless source of inspiration from which other disciplines emerge-and merge." Bettina was the winner of the Luma Rencontres Dummy Book Award Arles 2020 and is copublished by Aperture and Editions Xavier Barral.

A collection of essential quotations and other writings from artist and icon Jean-Michel Basquiat One of the most important artists of the late twentieth century, Jean-Michel Basquiat explored the interplay of words and images throughout his career as a celebrated painter with an instantly recognizable style. In his paintings, notebooks, and interviews, he showed himself to be a powerful and creative writer and speaker as well as image-maker. Basquiat-isms is a collection of essential quotations from this godfather of urban culture. In these brief, compelling, and memorable selections, taken from his interviews as well as his visual and written works, Basquiat writes and speaks about culture, his artistic persona, the art world, artistic influence, race, urban life, and many other subjects. Concise, direct, forceful, poetic, and enigmatic, Basquiat's words, like his art, continue to resonate. Select quotations from the book: "I cross out words so you will see them more; the fact that they are obscured makes you want to read them." "I think there are a lot of people that are neglected in art, I don't know if it's because of who made the paintings or what, but, um . . . black people are never really portrayed realistically or I mean not even portrayed in modern art." "Since I was 17, I thought I might be a star." "The more I paint the more I like everything." "I think I make art for myself, but ultimately I think I make it for the world."