First published to accompany the exhibition, John Golding: Pure Colour Sensation at Piano Nobile gallery, this fully colour illustrated catalogue showcases fifteen years of exceptional paintings by John Golding. Although an acclaimed art historian, Golding considered himself, first and foremost, a painter. His work features in prominent institutions such as the Tate, MoMA, the Scottish National Gallery, the British Council, and the Yale Center for British Art. Golding had numerous one-man shows in the UK and abroad, and also participated in many group exhibitions, including international shows with his close friend Bridget Riley. He was appointed a CBE in 1992 and elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1994. The publication presents a survey of works from the 1970s and 1980s, ranging from large scale canvases to both small and large pastels. Golding's work, although abstract, repeatedly returns to the human body. The monumental canvases and the tactile handling of paint through expressive layering of pigment demand a visceral physical reaction from the viewer. Speaking in an interview for Artists' Lives, Golding recollected that his turn to abstraction was in "recognition of what was happening in America in the 1950s...the most important thing going on in painting [of the day]". In his abstract paintings, both intimate and large in scale, Golding sought unadulterated formal brilliance, letting colour and composition take prominence, "so that there is nothing getting between you and the pure colour sensation." Dr David Anfam's introductory essay explores the roots of Golding's abstract work in the early figurative painting he produced whilst living in Mexico. Analysing the influence of the great Mexican muralists during Golding's formative years, Anfam charts the progression of Golding's vision that culminated in the exceptionally accomplished and joyful body of the work produced in the 1970s and 1980s and reproduced in this publication.

Larry Poons (b. 1937) shot to fame while still in his twenties, on the strength of his “dot paintings,” in which dots or ellipses were meticulously arranged on brightly coloured fields, creating a rhythmic, pulsating effect. But within a few years, Poons first loosened the hard-edged precision of the dot paintings and then abandoned them entirely for an organic mode of abstraction based on vertical drips of flung paint. This marked the beginning of an uncompromising five-decade evolution that has finally led the artist back to a more intimate mode of painting with brushes — and his own hands. At every stage, Poons's career has compelled the attention of critics and, in particular, other artists. This handsome volume, the first full-length biocritical monograph on Poons, reproduces more than 140 of his most important works in full colour, some as spectacular gatefolds. The incisive text — a collaboration between four leading critics and historians — traces the development of the artist’s extraordinary career. Larry Poons is a necessary addition to the library of anyone with an interest in American art.

In the decade before his death in 2011, John Hoyland began to reckon with mortality. Confronting his own demise, he painted elegies to departed artist friends and tributes to illustrious artistic forebears. Imagery of the void looms large, but it is a void faced with defiance and vitality, less a rumination on the end than a celebration of life. This publication explores the paintings Hoyland made in this decade, including his final series, the Mysteries. Essays by Natalie Adamson, David Anfam, Matthew Collings and Mel Gooding offer a rich and multifaceted account of a complex body of work. Hoyland’s veneration of Vincent van Gogh, his connections to J.M.W. Turner, the use of black as a colour, his deployment of risk and attempts to subvert his own taste, and his development of the cosmic visual language of the Abstract Expressionists are all discussed. Richly illustrated, the book extends our understanding of Hoyland’s late work within the story of modern painting as a whole.

Abstract Expressionism is the most important art movement since the Second World War. Although it is often considered a revolution in painting alone - for the images created by such leading figures as Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko remain altogether extraordinary - its radical spirit extended further, encompassing the sculpture of David Smith and Aaron Siskind's photography. Along with other key artists such as Barnett Newman and Franz Kline, these artists formed a nucleus united not just against the tensions of American society from the 1930s onwards, but also in their aim to forge diverse new visual languages. David Anfam explores the movement in terms of its political implications and rich cultural contexts, bringing many fresh insights to the works themselves. Taking into account a wealth of scholarship, this new edition also has nearly one hundred works reproduced in colour.

The abandoned and forgotten landscapes of rural southwestern towns are the favoured subjects of Rod Penner's paintings. The artist's keen eye combines photojournalism and photorealism to create images of small-town America. His deft use of contrasts in his images - despondency and hope, isolation and nostalgia - evokes memories of The Last Picture Show and elicits complex responses from viewers. "I'm interested in the look of things and the quality of being there," he says. "A moment that is completely frozen with all the variety of textures; rust on poles, crumbling asphalt, light hitting the grass." Penner's works are based on his photographs, digital video stills, and his experience of the rural landscapes of Texas and New Mexico. He depicts desolate, often deserted locations, the character of old houses and abandoned buildings, weather, and unique geography. His chosen scenes are infused with a cinematic quality that is the result of the exquisite light that he captures with his meticulous process. "The finished paintings should evoke contrasting responses of melancholy and warmth, desolation and serenity," he says.

Accompanying an exhibition at BASTIAN, London, this striking publication presents works by the German-born American artist Hans Hofmann (1880-1966), produced at the end of the Second World War and immediately afterwards. Hofmann's angular abstractions (such as Fury No. 1) personify the insecurities of the period, but this was also the moment that he moved towards the soft ambiguous forms and gesture that would become the hallmark of the Abstract Expressionist movement. Renowned as both an artist and teacher, Hofmann established his first art school in Munich in 1915. Built on the contemporary ideas regarding colour and form of Cezanne, the Cubists and Kandinsky, his work laid the foundations for his reputation as a forward-thinking artist. After relocating to the United States in 1932, he then opened schools in both New York and Provincetown, immersing himself within America's growing avantgarde art scene. His teaching had a significant influence on post-War American artists, including Helen Frankenthaler, Lee Krasner and Joan Mitchell - artists who would later lead the Abstract Expressionism movement. The works presented here span from 1942 to 1946. Whilst demonstrating Hofmann's development towards abstraction, the paintings still reveal an identifiably representational quality which nod to his figurative beginnings; linear paintings such as The Virgin (1946) particularly emphasise this artistic trajectory. Primarily known for his expressive use of bold, often primary colours, the palette used in these paintings consists predominantly of vivid, bright colours and contrasting dark tones, epitomizing the conflicted post-War feeling. Hofmann's work during the 1940s also saw him garner the support of several key figures in the artistic scene, including the renowned gallerists and dealers Peggy Guggenheim, Betty Parsons, and Samuel M. Kootz. A particularly important moment in his career - aged 64 at the time - was his first solo exhibition in New York in 1944 at Peggy Guggenheim's gallery Art of This Century, considered 'a breakthrough in painterly versus geometric abstraction that heralded abstract expressionism' by the influential art critic Clement Greenberg.