No comments about Thornton: Temple of Flora.

4 comments about Architecture and Meaning on the Athenian Acropolis.

1. Not only is Professor Rhodes's book far from boring, but rare in that it allows easy access to a scholar's interpretation of Greek architecture. I was lucky enough to have been a student in a few of the Professor's classes. A wonderful read for those expanding their knowledge on Greek architecture, or those just beginning.



2. If you are interested in Greek Architecture, this book is great for examining the Athenian Acropolis as a whole, and how the structures function in relation to each other, and to the viewer. Compared to some of the other books on the subject, this book was extremely readable, not to mention informative. To the first reviewer -I actually had Professor Rhodes for a class several years ago, and I have to say I totally disagree with your assessment. I learned volumes from him, and he couldn't have been a nicer person.



3. This book seems to be very well done on the scholarly end, however it is perhaps the driest read of my college career. Our school made it required reading for everyone in the freshman class my freshman year. Three years later it is still on the receiving end of jokes for its obscure and dry reading. The author of the book even came to our school to give an address on his book of which the address is long remembered for its infamous boredom. Perhaps someone with a high interest in Athenian Architecture might find it interesting. However the everyday student is going to be bored out of their mind.



4. Robin Rhodes' intuitive approach to one of the most discussed monuments in the history of art and architecture equips the reader to comprehend the work of a society which, facing destruction, re-interprets a building tradition hundreds of years in the making to express the innovative, nostalgic, and brilliantly defiant nature of the turbulent 5th century B.C.E. Drawing from scuptural attitudes, ritual practices, and political atmospheres, Rhodes places the Athenian Acropolis not at an assumed "zenith" of Greek architecture, but in a very alive and therefore constantly evolving context of artistic achievement. This books appeals to those who enjoy free thought in the most enlightening sense of the words.

5 comments about Coffin: The Art Of Vampire Hunter D.

1. As for content and art this book is fabulous, but I was kind of expecting more prints. The layout they chose for the book is interesting and I don't really find it necessary other than for a wow factor. To me it really didn't add anything to the prints inside, but to be fair, it didn't necessarily take away either. This book defiantly features what I enjoy best about Amano's art.
   
   A good buy for Amano fans or any artist interested in graphic art and/or inking.



2. I bought this book for my boyfriend, who is a huge fan of the series. I cannot speak from my own experience with it, but from his near fainting reaction upon receiving it, I would say it is definitely worth the money. From what he has said, the artwork is incredible. I would recommend it for any fan of the series or the art.



3. The art in this book is detailed, beautiful, and breathtaking... I was blown away by even the pictues which were only sketches.
   
   I recommend it highly to fans of Vampire Hunter D... as well as anyone who is an art fanatic or art book collector... or even just someone who loves Vampiric things in general.



4. This book is HUGE, which it should be to show off the fantastic artwork. Loved it! All Vampire Hunter D fans should get it, just don't expect it to fit in your book shelf.. lol! Pay close attention to the dimensions in the item description. It also comes in a slip case to protect the book.



5. The kind of book one wants to open and roll himself or herself all over the pages. Huge size, excellent paper, amazing printing quality, and I can go on practically forever. Much better than the Japanese edition which is small and most pictures are not even full size, but cropped. (Yes, I am crazy enough to own both editions!) Amano is a genius. His lines and forms are flowing, his colours mesmerizing. Invest in what will hold you spellbound for hours.

5 comments about Real Love: The Drawings for Sean.

1. I received this out of print first edition in mint condition. I was going to give it as a gift, but when I opened the box and saw what a wonderful book it is, I couldn't give it up!



2. I was very excited to find this book, but unfortunitely it was damaged in the mail. This seller was very helpful in resolving this problem. I was satisfied with the outcome and would buy from her again. Thank you.



3. Cover was a little scuffed but in overall good condition. Such a cute book!



4. This book makes me think of the Frank Sinatra classic, "You Make Me Feel So Young." The lyrics to that 1951 classic are startlingly a propos in re this book.
   
   This is an ideal book for all ages. Many people have been inspired to do a "John Lennon's Musical Parade" for a nursery theme have done their children a service by exposing them to high culture early. This book is the loving collaboration of a father and son. John's love for playing with words and stacking them in odd configurations much as young children enjoy stacking blocks is evident in this book as was the case in his 1964 book, "In His Own Write" and his 1965 follow up with "A Spaniard in the Works."
   
   The drawings that accompany the writing are gentle and direct; people of all ages will certainly appreciate the collaborative creativity that went into this book. Yoko Ono said that their son Sean came up with many of the titles and John would then work around those titles to create the imagery. This is truly a delightful book that all will love, regardless of whether or not they are Beatle fans. (Although no doubt Beatle fans will derive an especial amount of pleasure from this one).



5. After purchasing some of the John Lennon line of clothing for my baby, I had to buy the book. It truly reminds you of what a great mind we lost. The drawings are adorable and colorful. The captions are cute and funny. My daughter loves looking at each page. Its really worth buying.

4 comments about Cecilia Beaux: American Figure Painter.

1. A number of years ago I enrolled into an art history course at my local community college, Women in Art. I was suprised, awed and sorry never to have known about some of the women artists when studying art at a university. Shadwoed by the likes of John Singer Sargent, Cecila Beaux can hold her own. Many female artists did not have the same advantages as their male counterparts. But Ms. Beaux built up her own cliental making her own name in the art of portraiture. This is a nice book depicitng the lifestylies of Americana during the age of innocence. A must have for any coffee table. Nice instruction on another American female artisits almost lost in history.



2. Though thorough, the many author's perspectives were not pleasing. Beautiful work by an amazing artist and the reproductions were acceptable but not thrilling.



3. I think that this book shows a lot of Cecilia's work very well. The essays are very nice to read too.



4. While Cecilia Beaux is often overlooked, she was a great American figure painter, close to, if not quite in the same league, as John Singer Sargent. This book has good representation of her work, the more well know, and the lesser. A must have of anyone who is a fan of this period and style of art.

1 comments about World Press Photo 2006 (World Press Photo).

1. I try to buy the annual edition of this photojournalism collection every year. Even now, with the proliferation of web-based communication and international news sites at our fingertips, we don't always see some of these compelling, important images. Not only are they amazing photos, but they're accompanied by often-moving stories that explain the history behind the image and what was happening at the time it was captured. The stories aren't often told in our day-to-day news broadcasts, yet they're usually more important than the news we're actually served by the press.
   
   I've been fortunate enough to see some of these thoughtfully compiled photos in person, at exhibits in Amsterdam and Paris. If the traveling expedition doesn't make it to an area near to you, I recommend buying the World Press Photo books.

1 comments about SuperVisions: Impossible Optical Illusions (Supervisions).

1. This book will keep my kids busy for hours. I needed the rest and they needed the fun.

2 comments about On Not Being Able to Paint.

1. This is one of my all-time favorite books. Reading it slowly, I learned to see the interplay of relationships in which no firm line is drawn between objects, and so to see beauty. I learned that wrapping my imaginative body around my experience is essential to loving and knowing reality. The author sees her struggle to paint symbolized in her key painting of a parrot, that part of us taught in schools to regurgitate, as it angrily fights to protect the treasure of imagination which lives within us.... She compares the eagle-eye view--wide and expansive-- with the narrow focused view emphasized in our schooling.



2. On Not Being Able To Paint would perhaps be better title, Why One Should Paint. Trained as Freudian psychologist, Joanna Field all too painstakingly analyzes her rudimentary drawing and painting efforts in an attempt uncover what ultimately transpires in the process. An ancient quest for sure but depending upon one's knowledge in either the art, education or psychological fields, the road thus traveled is relatively interesting. As a professional artist, I found her all too subjective diatribes tiring, boring, even stretching the limits of believability in the sense that she was able to draw such cataclysmic conclusions from the bad visuals she produced. Her analytical training was obviously taking the upper hand as she "read" so much into own work. However, at the end of each segment, she manages to pull her rantings together for some thoughtful and genuine insights as to what took place throughout her process. Midway through, she departs from her dependence upon the sketches, begins to analyze in a broader, more universal context and salvages the book. She then rather clearly and poetically takes us through dreams, visions, both disillusion and illusion, realizing that, "the inner subjective and outer objective aspects of reality are in a continual state of change and development" and feels that a painter beautifully solves the problem of navigating these (constructed) worlds by inventing a "half-way house between the dream receiver and the external one". She then offers rather keen insight as to how the artist has to "pay" in communicability for this navigational privilege for with others able to share his/her dream, s/he is more "absolved from the guilt or defiance of common sense reality". Of course then, there is the psycho-analytic relation of visual symbols to our sexual development but here her training shines and I found myself thinking of parts of my visual practice in a new light. A colleague, well versed in the history of psychoanalytic development made the astute comment that considering the limited scope of the practice at the time, (she comments on just finishing a drawing at the precipice of WWI), the relationships she manifests are insightful and progressive. Her final strength is her exploration of how this new found knowledge should be boldly carried forth into the classrooms as it would all but revolutionize not only our thought process on the role of visual creation, but our perception of our reality as well. One is deeply saddened however as we realize how we have seemed to regressed rather than progressed in that area in our society's educational role. One absolutely maddening fact however, is the that this current edition omits the a crucial drawing to which she constantly refers on its cover; something the publisher should be taken to task for sure. She ends on a phenomenological note, finding it a pity that the word `reverie' is no longer a part of the language of psycho-pathology for painting, like analysis, provides a safe setting where one can be indulged in its grace and produce the same subsequent and ultimate effect for the person who looks at it. Great for an educator interested in the arts, probably a bit stale for the professional analysts of today and a bit too naive for those in the professional arts.

No comments about In the Making: Creative Options for Contemporary Art History Classes/Creative Options for Studio Art Classes.

1 comments about John Szarkowski: Photographs.

1. Everyone knows of John Szarkowski as the guru behind the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, but too few realize that beyond his scholarship and contribution to the placement of photography in an equal range as painting and sculpture, Szarkowski is a photographer of substance. This excellent book serves as a catalogue of a traveling exhibition of his works and it is quite revealing.
   
   From elegant portraits such as the 1949 Robert Penn Warren example through his surveys of the natural phenomena of nature as he observes it, Szarkowski's eye focuses on the most mundane of images and from them creates masterworks. His preoccupation with trees is microscopically focused in a fascinating work entitled 'Graft', a grid of twelve images that reveal the arborist's magic of making a grafted tree.
   
   Szarkowski's 'landscapes' of meadows, fields, and barns are luminous and endlessly fascinating to study. He creates naturally found still lifes from views through barn windows to trees and grasses outside. From this excellent sampling of his work and writing (and the accompanying fine essay by Sandra Phillips) this book justifies his placement in the realm of exceptional American photographers. Grady Harp, May 06