The Blaue Reiter ("Blue Rider") group of artists was formed in Munich in 1911 on the initiative of two outstanding artists: Wassily Kandinsky,the fundamental pioneer of purely abstract painting, and Franz Marc, the creator of mysterious, abstract animal pictures. Together, the Russian, the German and many others in their circle strove towards an apotheosis of the spiritual in art. The outbreak of the First World War appeared to put a brutal end to what was at the time the most important avant-garde movement in Germany, but its influence continued unabated and inspired whole generations of international artists to create similar utopias.

The moral of this book is that behind every great engineeringsuccess is a trail of often ignored (but frequently spectacular)engineering failures. Petroski covers many of the best knownexamples of well-intentioned but ultimately failed design in action-- the galloping Tacoma Narrows Bridge (which you've probably seentossing cars willy-nilly in the famous black-and-white footage),the collapse of the Kansas City Hyatt Regency Hotel walkways -- andmany lesser known but equally informative examples. The line ofreasoning Petroski develops in this book were later formalized intohis quasi-Darwinian model of technological evolution in TheEvolution of Useful Things , but this book is arguably the moreilluminating -- and defintely the more enjoyable -- of these twotitles. Highly recommended.

An invaluable guide for both casual opera fans and afficionados,this volume contains act-by-act de*ions of operatic worksranging from the early seventeenth century masterworks ofMonteverdi and Purcell to the modern classics of Menotti andBritten. Written in a lively anecdotal style, entries includecharacter de*ions, historical background, and much more.

According to Sacheverell Sitwell in his acclaimed biography of Liszt, this collection of 12 little pieces attest to the supreme skill of a composer attuned "to the smaller perfections and to the poetry of sentiment." Reproduced from an authoritative edition, Liszt's four-hand arrangement of these holiday pieces will make a superb addition to any pianist's repertoire of Romantic music.

Now in paperback, the fascinating, quirky, highly acclaimedbook about that indispensable object, the pencil. Petroski tracesits origins back to ancient Greece and Rome, writes factually andcharmingly about its development, and shows what the pencil canteach us about engineering and technology today.

Unique and comprehensive, this collection features a tremendous variety of slow movements for keyboard players. Highlights include selections from the sonatas of Haydn and Mozart, Chopin preludes, and classics such as the opening movement of Beethoven's "Moonlight" Sonata, Bach's Sinfonia in F Minor, and Debussy's Claire de Lune.

Preserved by Arabic mathematicians and canonized by Christianscholars, Aristotle’s works have shaped Western thought, science,and religion for nearly two thousand years. Richard McKeon’s TheBasic Works of Aristotle –constituted out of the definitiveOxford translation and in print as a Random House hardcover forsixty years–has long been considered the best available one-volumeAristotle. Appearing in paperback at long last, this editionincludes selections from the Organon, On the Heavens, The ShortPhysical Treatises, Rhetoric, among others, and On the Soul, OnGeneration and Corruption, Physics, Metaphysics, NicomacheanEthics, Politics, and Poetics in their entirety.

Though Alfons Mucha (1860-1939) achieved lasting international acclaim as an Art Nouveau painter, graphic designer, and decorator, his outstanding photography is not as well known. His photographic sketchbook and personal visual diary, comprising photographs from the mid-1880s until the end of his life, constitutes a unique and profound artistic statement. This mosaic of captured moments reveals the intimate and personal basis of both Mucha's own life as an artist and the time period in which he lived. The behind-the-scenes glimpses of his studio provided here prove that Mucha--the creator of the ideal of Art Nouveau beauty--was one of the pioneers of the classic nude in Czech photography. This is the first time such a large selection of Mucha's extensive photographic work has been assembled as a book. Many of the photos in this book, never before published, reveal hitherto unknown aspects of Mucha's work, which will be of interest to the general reader and the photographic connoisseur alike. --This text refe

Famed for his modern art and rendering of human, animal and still life compositions, this is a celebration of the works of Colombian painter and sculptor Fernando Botero.

The world of the fashionista is brought to vivid life with 101introductory lessons on such topics as how a designer anticipatescultural trends and "sees" the fashion consumer, the workings ofthe fashion calendar, the ways a designer collection is conceived,the manufacture of fabric, fashion illustration, and more. Illustrated in the distinctly unique packaged style of thebestselling101 THINGS I LEARNED IN ARCHITECTURE SCHOOL, this newbook on fashion design will be a perfect book for any fashionschool wannabe, a recent graduate, or even a seasonedprofessional.

When the final tally of key movers in the plastic arts of this century is compiled, there is no doubt that maestro of movement Alexander Calder (1898-1976), the man who put the swing into sculpture, will be near numero uno. Calder took it off the plinth, gave it to the wind, and left us kinetic playgrounds of the spirit. He operated at the point where Modernity and nature Fused, developing an environmental art that changed the medium Forever. Visiting his Paris atelier in 1932, Duchamp coined the term "Mobiles" For Calder's delicate wire and disc pieces, constructions that would soon become immensely popular. But he didn't rest on his innovations. Friends with Miro, Mondrian and Leger, Calder also turned his hand to painting, drawing, gouaches, toys, textiles and utensil design. A graphic master who sketched as much in air as in ink, the Sixties and Seventies saw Calder take on the monumental, translating the dynamics of cities into both his Mobiles and "Stabiles". At a time when sculpture was perceived to be

An illustrated, inside look at the rock group Nirvana offers acandid look the band's members, chronicling their rapid rise in themusic world and revealing the true story of the drug-abuse rumorssurrounding them.

He was the founding father of modern art, the grand master who pointed painting forward on its way from Impressionism to the 20th century: Paul Cezanne (1839-1906). In Paris, but above all in Provence, he quested tirelessly for "a harmony parallel to nature" - discovering it in still lifes of apples, in bathers, or in the renowned landscapes of his beloved Montagne Sainte-Victoire. This book discusses this extraordinary artist's major works and his theories of painting and colour.

Vincent van Gogh's paintings and his tempestuous life story continue to command enormous popular interest, inspiring numerous blockbuster exhibitions and biographies. This compact collection returns to what started it all--the paintings themselves. With a hand-held size, this volume manages to be affordable and comprehensive--a veritable dictionary of the artist's work. Included are all genres and periods of his work-from his gorgeous irises to his striking night skies and portraiture. Introducing the paintings is an intriguing essay by celebrated art critic Robert Hughes. This book provides an essential resource for students as well as for all art lovers. And it represents an extraordinary value. No other book on the artist offers as many images at this price.

Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) is now universallyacclaimed: museums pride themselves on his paintings, crowds flockto his retrospectives. His work shows art at its mostlight-hearted, sensual and luminous. Renoir never wanted anythingugly in his paintings, nor any dramatic action. "I like pictureswhich make me want to wander through them when it's a landscape,"he said, "or pass my hand over breast or back if it's a woman."Renoir's entire oeuvre is dominated by the depiction of women.Again and again he painted "these faunesses with their poutinglips" (Mallarme) and invented a new image of feminity.

Life is life, and art is art. ""It is my wish to come very close, strikinglyclose, to the times in which we live, without submitting toartistic dogma...I need the connection to the world of senses, thecourage to portray ugliness, life as it comes."" - Otto Dix In the 1920s, Otto Dix was the artist ofNeue Sachlichkeit, the New Objectivity, par excellence. Painting ina very realistic, almost photographic style, he chose as subjectsthe poverty, violence, death, and war that he experienced as asoldier in World War I. After this terrible experience, he paintedthe famous triptych "The War." Dix staged the world as a play, a grotesquefarce. But the form he chose to do so was based on the classicalcanon of beauty. Dix lived his life and served art, for he adheredto the age-old rule that the American painter Ad Reinhardt put in anutshell: "Life is life, and art is art."

In this compulsively readable, fascinating, and provocativeguide to classical music, Norman Lebrecht, one of the world's mostwidely read cultural commentators tells the story of the rise ofthe classical recording industry from Caruso's first notes to theheyday of Bernstein, Glenn Gould, Callas, and von Karajan. Lebrechtcompellingly demonstrates that classical recording has reached itsend point-but this is not simply an expos? of decline and fall. Itis, for the first time, the full story of a minor art form,analyzing the cultural revolution wrought by Schnabel, Toscanini,Callas, Rattle, the Three Tenors, and Charlotte Church. It is thestory of how stars were made and broken by the record business; howa war criminal conspired with a concentration-camp victim to createa record empire; and how advancing technology, boardroom wars,public credulity and unscrupulous exploitation shaped the musicalbackdrop to our modern lives. The book ends with a suitable shrineto classical recording: the author's critical selectio

A Tribe Called Quest - Beastie Boys - De La Soul - Eric B. andRakim - The Fugees - KRS-One - Pete Rock and CL Smooth - PublicEnemy - The Roots - Run-DMC - Wu-Tang Clan - and twenty-five morehip-hop immortals It's a sad fact: hip-hop album liners have alwaysbeen reduced to a list of producer and sample credits, a publicityphoto or two, and some hastily composed shout-outs. That's a damnshame, because few outside the game know about the true creativeforces behind influential masterpieces like PE's It Takes a Nationof Millions. . ., De La's 3 Feet High and Rising, and Wu-Tang'sEnter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). A longtime scribe for the hip-hopnation, Brian Coleman fills this void, and delivers a thrilling,knockout oral history of the albums that define this dynamic andiconoclastic art form. The format: One chapter, one artist, onealbum, blow-by-blow and track-by-track, delivered straight from theoriginal sources. Performers, producers, DJs, and b-boys-includingBig Daddy Kane, Muggs and B-Real, Biz Markie, RZA, I

Caravaggio - A genius beyond his time Notorious bad boy of Italian Baroque painting, Caravaggio (1571-1610) is finally getting the recognition he deserves. Thoughhis name may be familiar to all of us, his work has been habituallydetested and forced into obscurity. Not only was his theatricalrealism unfashionable in his time, but his sacrilegious subjectmatter and use of lower class models were violently scorned. Caravaggio's great work had the misfortune of enduring centuries ofdisrepute. It wasn't until the end of the 19th century that he wasrediscovered and, quite posthumously, deemed a great master. He is now considered the most important painter of the early Baroqueperiod ; without him there would have been no Ribera, Zurbarán,Velázquez, Vermeer or Georges de la Tour. Franz Hals, Rembrandt,Delacroix, and Manet would have been different. In this anniversary edition you'll find over 50 ofCaravaggio's best paintings; we think you'll agree that he was agenius beyond his time.

本书的照片都是从国家地理学会超凡的馆藏摄影档案中精心挑选出来的，时间跨越了一个多世纪，反映的题材遍及地球上的每一个角落，也涉及了摄影艺术的每一个层面。这些照片既反映了一些*摄影大师观察生活的独特视角，也代表了我们人类某些共同的情感追求和人性的张扬。 The Collectors Seriesedition of "In Focus" is simply the existing book at a smaller trimsize. This magnificent collection of 280 photographs by many of theworld's greatest photographers tells the tale of portraitphotography over time in page after page of arresting images. Eachphotograph stands proudly on its own, yet taken together, they tella much more complex and subtle story of the ever-evolving art formin constant creative response to new ideas, new eras, and newtechnologies.