Yale University Press

Under the rule of Henry VII (r. 1485-1509) England became a powerful nation. The Tudor court sought to express its worldliness and political clout through major artistic commissions, employing Florentine sculptors and painters to create lavish new interiors, suitable for entertaining foreign dignitaries, for its royal palaces. These were exemplified by Henry VIII's palace of Nonsuch, so named because no other palace could match its magnificence. Italian sculpture, painting, and tapestries of the day reflected an interest in portraiture and dynastic monuments, epitomized in England by the royal tomb projects created by Baccio Bandinelli, Benedetto da Rovezzano, and Pietro Torrigiani. Generously illustrated throughout, The Anglo-Florentine Renaissance traces the artistic links between Medicean Florence and Tudor England through essays by an international team of scholars and explores how the language of Florentine art effectively expressed England's political aspirations and rose to prominence as a new international courtly style.

During the last two centuries BC, the Western Han dynasty of China forged the first stable empire covering all of China and presided over a golden age that shaped much of subsequent Chinese art and culture. From family values to the structure of the civil service, Han thinking and philosophy continue to pervade Chinese society up to the present day — indeed, the majority of Chinese people consider themselves 'Han Chinese'. In their search for immortality, the Han imperial family left an artistic legacy of spectacular beauty and power. The finest of these treasures to have survived — including exquisite jades, silver and goldwork, bronzes and ceramics — have been found in the tombs of the Han imperial family and of a rival 'emperor' of Nanyue and are brought together for the first time in a landmark exhibition at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. The accompanying catalogue, written by an international team of leading scholars in the field, presents a ground-breaking account and is sumptuously illustrated by nearly 500 striking photographs, many of them specially commissioned.

Titian is acknowledged as the greatest of the sixteenth-century Venetian painters, best known for his portraits, mythological pictures and religious subjects. Yet his first great achievement as a painter, schooled in the workshop of Giovanni Bellini, was to refashion the portrayal of nature in his own distinctive style by studying the work of Albrecht Durer, whose naturalistic paintings of plants, animals and landscape — for which northern European artists were renowned — had caused a sensation in Venice in the first decade of the sixteenth century. In this short, beautifully illustrated book, Antonio Mazzotta presents this experience, together with Titian's native landscape of PievediCadore, as crucial influences in the artist's early representation of nature. The recently restored Flight into Egypt (now in the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg) — probably painted when Titian was still a teenager — is vivid proof of his interest in the depiction of animals, plants and figures in the landscape. The author's carefully chosen comparisons of paintings, prints, drawings and details of works by the young Titian, Durer and their contemporaries (including Sebastiano del Piombo and Giorgione) suggest that Titian was as innovative and as influential in his unique view of nature as he was in portraiture.

This completely reconceived and rewritten guide to the Metropolitan Museum's encyclopedic holdings — the first new edition of the guidebook in nearly thirty years — provides the ideal introduction to almost 600 essential masterpieces from one of the world's most popular and beloved museums. It features a compelling and accessible design, beautiful color reproductions, and up-to-date descriptions written by the Museum's own experts. More than a simple souvenir book, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide provides a comprehensive view of art history spanning five millennia and the entire globe, beginning with the Ancient World and ending in contemporary times. It includes media as varied as painting, photography, costume, sculpture, decorative arts, musical instruments, arms and armor, works on paper, and many more. Presenting works ranging from the ancient Egyptian Temple of Dendur to Canova's Perseus with the Head of Medusa to Sargent's Madame X, this is an indispensable volume for lovers of art and art history, and for anyone who has ever dreamed of lingering over the most iconic works in the Metropolitan's unparalleled collection.

Many of the most familiar sartorial images of the 20th century can be traced to the prestigious college campuses of America. The Ivy League Look, or Ivy Style, was once a cutting-edge look that for decades led the evolution of menswear. Far more than a classic way of dressing, Ivy Style spread beyond the rarified walls of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton to influence countless designers. Focusing on menswear dating from the early 20th century through today, this elegant book traces the main periods of the look: the interwar years when classic items, such as tweed jackets and polo coats, were appropriated from the English man's wardrobe and redesigned by pioneering American firms such as Brooks Brothers and J. Press for young men at elite East Coast colleges; then from 1945 to the late 1960s, when the staples of Ivy Style — oxford cloth shirts, khaki pants, and penny loafers — were worn by a new, diverse group that included working-class students and jazz musicians; and finally the current revival of the Ivy look that began in the early 1980s. Ivy Style celebrates both high-profile proponents of the style — including the Duke of Windsor, Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Miles Davis — who made the look their own, and designers such as Ralph Lauren, J. McLaughlin, Tommy Hilfiger, Michael Bastian, and Thom Browne, who have made it resonate with new generations of style enthusiasts.

The history of the handbag — its design, how it has been made, used, and worn — reveals something essential about women's lives lived over the last 500 years. Perhaps the most universal item of fashionable adornment, it can also be elusive, an object of desire, secrecy and even fear. Handbags explores these rich histories and multiple meanings. This book features specially commissioned photographs of an extraordinary, newly formed collection of fashionable handbags that dates from the 16th century to the present day. It has been acquired to exhibit in the first museum devoted to the handbag, in Seoul, South Korea. The project is a commission undertaken by experimental exhibition-maker Judith Clark, whose innovative practices are revealed in Handbags. Essays by leading fashion historians and an acclaimed psychoanalyst investigate the history of gesture, the psychoanalysis of bags, and the museum's state-of-the-art mannequins and archive cabinets. In order to preserve the words that describe the unique qualities of each bag, a terminology of handbags has been compiled.

As part of a unique collaboration between the National Gallery and the Royal Opera House, fourteen leading poets were invited to respond to three great masterpieces by the Renaissance painter, Titian: Diana and Callisto, Diana and Actaeon and The Death of Actaeon. Titian's paintings were inspired by Ovid's Metamorphoses — stories of transformation — and depict the fatal consequences of a mortal tragically caught up in the affairs of the gods. Titian would have known Ovid's poem from a contemporary translation in Italian. This book's introduction by Nicholas Penny, Ovid, Titian, and English Poetry, shows how Titian incorporated specific elements from Ovid's verses in his paintings, and compares some of the most famous translations in English, from the first version by Arthur Golding (1565) to those by Joseph Addison (1717) and Ted Hughes (1997). The late Lucian Freud described Diana and Callisto and Diana and Actaeon as 'simply the most beautiful pictures in the world'. These new poems, each illustrated with full-colour details from Titian's paintings, demonstrate the quality and range of writing in Britain today, and show how Old Master paintings continue to inspire living artists.

Despite his untimely death in 1667 at the age of thirty-seven, Gabriel Metsu left a substantial oeuvre of history paintings, portraits, still lifes, and a large number of exquisite genre scenes. These charming depictions of kitchen maids, elegant young ladies, hunters, drinkers, and amorous couples have gained Metsu a place among the most celebrated painters of seventeenth-century Holland. But his personal life has remained enigmatic. This absorbing book presents the information for Metsu's life and his network of connections, and details the complete range of his work. It will become the standard work on the artist.

Throughout his long working life, Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) produced large-format portraits and subject pictures. This book offers fresh insights into Renoir's complex ambitions as a young artist, when he submitted works to both the avant-garde impressionist exhibitions and the official Salon.

This volume is the first to explore fashion as a critical aspect of modernity, one that paralleled and many times converged with the development of Impressionism, starting in the 1860s and continuing through the next two decades, when fashion attracted the foremost writers and artists of the day. Although they have depicted fashionable subjects throughout history, for many artists and writers, including Charles Baudelaire, Stephane Mallarme, Emile Zola, Gustave Caillebotte, Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, Berthe Morisot, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, fashion became integral to the search for new literary and visual expression. In a series of essays that examine fashion and its social, cultural, and artistic context during some of the most important years of the Impressionist era — years that also gave birth to the modern fashion industry — a group of fifteen scholars, drawn from five interdisciplinary fields, examine approximately 140 Impressionist-era artworks, including those by dedicated fashion portraitists, in light of the rise of the department store, new working methods for designing clothing, and new social and technological changes that led to the democratization of fashion and, simultaneously, its ascendance as a vehicle for modernity.

Rene Magritte (1898-1967) was a surrealist artist whose thought-provoking works used ordinary objects to challenge how viewers perceived reality. His extensive oeuvre was documented in a comprehensive five-volume project, led by distinguished art critic and writer David Sylvester. In the years that followed the publication of the final volume in 1997, numerous works purporting to be by Magritte appeared on the art market. Under the auspices of the Fondation Magritte, a committee was established to verify the authenticity of newly discovered works as well as those previously recorded as «whereabouts unknown» or listed as appendix items in the original volumes of the Rene Magritte Catalogue Raisonne. Rene Magritte: Newly Discovered Works includes colour illustrations of 130 previously unpublished or unknown works authenticated by the committee between September 2000 and March 2010. Like its predecessors, this volume is the culmination of years of research, which synthesizes new discoveries about the artworks and details of the life of Magritte himself. Accompanying text and comparative documentation provide a wealth of complementary information, including the circumstances of a work's discovery, references to letters, quotations in their original languages, and citations from previous volumes.

London was the quintessential modern city of the 19th century, and its artists were the first to rise to the challenge of depicting the many facets of this new world. From the 1850s to 1900, the city underwent vast changes, resulting in rapid urbanization, a dramatic increase in population, and the creation of dramatic contrasts between the gold of its wealth and splendor and the mud of its squalor and poverty. Artists sought to make sense of this novel and exciting — but often bewildering — environment in images not only of the pageantry, parks, and rituals of the city but also of its newly visible street types: minstrels and chimney sweeps, street urchins, shoe-black boys, and flower girls. City of Gold and Mud raises questions about the Victorian metropole in terms of how these popular paintings of modern life portrayed national and imperial identities; relationships of race, class, and gender; and the values, desires, and fears of their makers and users. Nancy Rose Marshall draws on artists' writings, arts criticism, popular poetry, news reports, cartoons, tourist guides, religious tracts, and more to paint a vivid and multifaceted picture of London during this critical time in its economic and artistic development.

While Baroque artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) is celebrated as a sculptor, architect, and painter, it is less known that he also was a playwright, scenographer, actor, and director. The Baroque period saw the rise of opera and ballet, as well as increasingly elaborate scenographic technologies for court and religious theatre. Bernini drew from this lexicon of theatrical effects, deploying light, movement, and the porous boundary between fictive and physical space to forge a language of Baroque illusion for both his scenographies and his sculptural ensembles. Bernini: Art and Theatre investigates the different types of cultural space for the staging of his art, from court settings to public squares and church interiors. Drawing parallels between the visual and theatrical arts, and highlighting the dramatic amplification of religious art in the period, this provocative study provides a model that can be extended beyond Bernini to enable us to reconsider 17th-century visual culture as a whole.

Although Jane Hading (1859-1940), Lily Elsie (1886-1962), and Billie Burke (1884-1970) gained fame as stage actresses, their popular appeal also rested on their ability to cultivate a glamorous appearance. Their careers illustrate the early transformation of actresses into marketable commodities whose celebrity status depended on the consumption of their images. This celebrity, in turn, was used to market an array of beauty and fashion goods to women striving to emulate them. The three women featured in «Staging Fashion» exemplify the factors that ensured success for 20th-century actresses. Each of these women was dressed by a leading couturier (or several couturiers), both onstage and offstage. In major cities such as New York, Paris and London, actresses depended on exquisite, custom-made gowns both to secure principal roles and to maintain popularity. Their physical beauty, which was consistent with elite notions of class and race, was depicted on postcards and in popular fashion and theatre magazines and newspapers. Finally, these actresses developed distinct «personalities», which were conveyed by their stage roles and in numerous photos and articles.

More than most artists, Henri Matisse conducted an ongoing dialogue with his earlier works, continually questioning himself and his methods in order to, as he put it, push further and deeper into true painting. In a fresh approach to this giant of 20th-century art, Matisse: In Search of True Painting examines sixty works and more than five decades in a series of concise chapters by prominent Matisse scholars from the United States and Europe, each focusing on a particular aspect of his artistic development. From early pairs such as Young Sailor I and II (1906) and Le Luxe I and II (1907-8) through five Interiors at Nice (1917-21) to scenes from the studio in Vence (1946-48), the book shows Matisse responding to earlier styles and artists and developing his own, often radical, answers to such problems as how to portray light, handle paint, select colours, and manipulate perspective. The volume also discusses findings from new technical studies carried out on the early paired works that shed more light on Matisse's complex and deeply-felt evolution. Both an intimate glimpse into the artistic process and a significant addition to literature on modern art, Matisse: In Search of True Painting traces the path by which Matisse becomes himself.

A remarkably visual writer, Charles Dickens (1812-1870) emerged from a tradition where illustrations formed a significant part of both serial and book publishing. At the centenary of his birth, Dickens and the Artists explores the novelist's artistic opinions and connections. His tastes are manifest in his novels, his magazine Household Words and his journalism. Dickens engaged with the art of the Old Masters, commenting forthrightly on the latest changes at the National Gallery, and recording his visits to museums during his tours of Europe. As well as exploring Dickens' own views, the distinguished contributors reveal his influence on Victorian artists. He had long and close friendships with some of the leading artists of his time, including Clarkson Stanfield, Daniel Maclise, Frank Stone and William Powell Frith. These and other artists depicted scenes from his novels or drew inspiration from his subjects and characterizations that continue to influence our image of Dickensian England today.

A colourfully decorated Christmas tree, lit with twinkling lights, provokes awe and delight. We understand the lighted tree as a central symbol of the Christmas season, but what are the roots of the tradition? Who first thought to bedeck a tree, to bring it inside? How and where did the local activity grow into a widespread tradition, and how has the Christmas tree traveled across time and continents? Bernd Brunner's brief history — enriched by a selection of delightful and unusual historical illustrations — spans many centuries and cultures to illuminate the mysteries of the Christmas tree and its enduring hold on the human imagination. Tracing various European traditions from the Middle Ages forward, Brunner finds that only in the nineteenth century did Christmas trees become common in European family homes. In North America, the imported custom soon fascinated, though some found the tree not quite compatible with a Puritan mindset. Brunner explores how the Christmas tree entered mainstream American culture and how in recent times it has become globally popular. He introduces Jacqueline Kennedy's Nutcracker Tree in the White House, trees used to celebrate the New Year in Turkey, and the world's most expensive Christmas tree, erected in Abu Dhabi. The author also considers the place of the artificial tree and the ecological dimensions of the Christmas tree trade. A book rich with anecdote and insight, Inventing the Christmas Tree will enchant a wide audience.

From Wonder Woman's satin stars and golden bracelets to Batman's brooding cape and mask, the style of superheroes' dress has influenced both street wear and high fashion. This richly illustrated book explores how radical couture, avant-garde sportswear, and state-of-the-art military garments — as seen through the lens of the superhero — can be metaphors for sex, power, and politics. Beginning with the origins of the superhero costume, this volume looks at how designers have been influenced by iconographic components such as the cape, mask, boots, and unitard. Costumes, such as those worn by Batman and Catwoman, are examined as reflections of sexual and physical prowess, while others, most notably those of Superman and Captain America, are analyzed as political propaganda. Superheroes also explores superpowers and their manifestations in literal, symbolic, or metaphorical aspects: Flash's speed, Iron Man's invulnerability, Hulk's strength, and Spiderman's agility are presented in their fantastical evocations. The featured designers include Pierre Cardin, John Galliano, Azzedine Alaia, Giorgio Armani, Hussein Chalayan, Alexander McQueen, Nicolas Ghesquiere, Jean Paul Gaultier, Comme des Garcons, and Walter van Beirendonck.

Portraiture is an enduring genre that has captivated artists and viewers for hundreds of years. From the late 15th through the early 19th century, artists continued to find new ways of approaching the portrait by exploring a range of styles, strategies, and themes. In this beautiful book, noted scholars discuss these various approaches and explain how they apply to specific examples, focusing on thirty superb portraits drawn from a distinguished private collection. Although many of these portraits are by renowned artists such as Lucas Cranach the Elder, Jacques-Louis David, Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Hans Memling, and Anthony van Dyck, others testify to the talents of lesser-known artists who are equally deserving of attention. Several of the featured paintings have never before been published, including outstanding portraits by acclaimed European masters such as Giovanni Battista Moroni, Parmigianino, Jusepe de Ribera, and Peter Paul Rubens. «Eye to Eye» offers a new understanding of these exceptional and rarely seen works within the portrait genre.

Alexander McQueen (1969-2010) was one of the most influential, imaginative and inspirational designers at the turn of the millennium. His fashions both challenged and expanded the conventional parameters of clothing beyond utility to a compelling expression of culture, politics and identity. Focusing on the most iconic and acclaimed designs of his prolific career, this stunning book examines McQueen's inimitable technical virtuosity and its subversion of traditional tailoring and dressmaking practices. This book also focuses on the highly sophisticated narrative structures found in McQueen's collections and in his astonishing and extravagant runway presentations, which suggested the most avant-garde installation and performance art. Intended as an assessment of Alexander McQueen's entire career, this book includes in-depth studies of six collections that illustrate and encapsulate thematic chapters as well as an interview with Sarah Burton, the new creative director of Alexander McQueen who had been the designer's right-hand design aide since 1996.

With a consuming enthusiasm for the paintings of Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), art collector Sterling Clark assembled one of the greatest private collections of Renoir's work during the first half of the twentieth century. Today the masterpieces he so admired form a vital part of the Impressionist holdings of the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. «The Genius of Renoir: Paintings from the Clark» offers a fascinating, fresh look at the thirty-two Renoir paintings in the Clark collection, featuring beautiful digital colour reproductions created especially for this volume. This book brings to light new and often revelatory scholarship concerning the importance of each work both within Renoir's oeuvre and within the Clark collection. Among the richly varied paintings, encompassing portraits, landscapes, and still lifes, are such key works as «Marie-Therese Durand-Ruel Sewing», «A Box at the Theatre» (At the Concert), «Onions», and «Venice: the Doge's Palace». John House, a leading authority on Renoir, offers an in-depth analysis of each of the works in the collection, and curator-author James Ganz draws on extensive archival research on Sterling Clark's pursuits as an art collector and museum founder to illuminate this visionary and often enigmatic man.

Objects of beauty and prestige with their rich colour and fine detail, early Netherlandish oil paintings were among the most sought-after works of the Renaissance. Beginning in the early fifteenth century with Jan van Eyck, and ending in the early sixteenth century with the career of Pieter Bruegel, Susan Frances Jones explores the roles played by paintings in political, domestic, religious and secular contexts during this gloriously innovative period. She draws on the National Gallery's remarkable research into materials and techniques to describe how painters' working and creative practices changed and shifted, and examines whether Northern European artists, like some of their Italian counterparts, laid claim to intellectual as well as artistic sophistication. Published alongside the exhibition Jan Gossaert's Renaissance, National Gallery, London, 23 February — 30 May 2011.

Russian artist and theoretician Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) was a significant figure in 20th-century abstraction. His masterwork Painting with White Border (1913; Guggenheim Museum), inspired by his native Moscow, emerged during an intensely creative period in his artistic development. Kandinsky and the Harmony of Silence presents a rare, in-depth examination of the painting and more than fifteen preparatory studies in watercolor, oil, and pencil, along with closely related works made during this influential chapter in Kandinsky's career. This handsome book includes essays illuminating how Painting with White Border also relates to Kandinsky's writings, including Concerning the Spiritual in Art (published 100 years ago) and his autobiography Reminiscences. A jointly authored essay by conservators at the Phillips and the Guggenheim presents the results of a recent conservation analysis of the painting and its related oil sketch (1913; The Phillips Collection), revealing important new discoveries about the artist's creative process, materials, and methods.

The 18th-century painter Johan Zoffany (1733-1810) was an astute observer of the many social circles in which he functioned as an artist over the course of his long career. This catalogue investigates his sharp wit, shrewd political appraisal, and perceptive social commentary (including subtle allusions to illicit relationships) — all achieved while presenting his subjects as delightful and sophisticated members of polite society. A skilled networker, Zoffany established himself at the court of George III and Queen Charlotte soon after his arrival in England from his native Germany. At the same time, he befriended the leading actor David Garrick and through him became the foremost portrayer of Georgian theatre. His brilliant effects and deft style were well suited to theatricality of all sorts, enabling him to secure patronage in England and on the continent. Following a prolonged visit to Italy he travelled to India, where he quickly became a popular and established member within the circle of Warren Hastings, the governor-general. Zoffany's Indian paintings are among his most spectacular and allowed him to return to England enriched and warmly welcomed. This volume provides a sparkling overview of his finest works.