1 comments about Art for the Fun of It: A Guide for Teaching Young Children.

1. As a beginning art educator I found this book to be extremely useful. It contains many tips for art room materials and practices that could only be learned through years of experience. Not only does Peggy Davison cover the very practical side of art education but also she explains many of the latest philosophies and strategies used in this area without the book becoming tedious reading. Any art educator, regular classroom teacher, or home-schooling parent would be wise to read this book if they are serious about the quality and efficiency of their art program. It is an easy and interesting read and one that will be referred to many times for information. This is a book I will keep handy in my classroom.

2 comments about The Andy Warhol Catalogue Raisonne Vol. 1: Paintings and Sculpture 1961-1963.

1. The main problem with this book is the layout of each page into three columns, thus all the pictures are quite small. So this is not a book to really enjoy the art. The text is also often far from essential, for example it contains relevant quotes from "The Andy Warhol diaries" or "Popism", which any Warhol fan will already have. It is worth remembering most of the original prints/paintings are measured in meters, so there is little satisfaction in looking at passport-photo sized pictures. "The Andy Warhol Catalogue Raisonne" is really only a reference book for art galleries or perhaps art collectors, and I'd recommend Warhol fans to stay away from this extremely expensive purchase, it contains zero enjoyment compared to leafing through the superb "Giant Warhol", where the appreciation of the immensity of Warhol's work can be much better appreciated.



2. WOW. This is a real work of research. The amount of detail and care that has gone into this study of Warhol's early paintings is not to be believed. The editors have compiled a completely staggering amount of information about each work shown here--and who knew there were so many original paintings?

   My only complaint is the book's design, which doesn't seem to have anything to do with Warhol's own aesthetic. The pictures are beautiful, but the words are tough on the eyes--the table of contents is especially awful. This is really a shame, because you can see pictures of Warhol paintings in lots of places. I don't know where you'd find all this wonderful data, though. (Put it on CD-ROM!)

   It's definitely an expensive book, but unmatched, as far as I can tell, in its field. Bravo!

No comments about James Castle.

No comments about Encounter With the Self: A Jungian Commentary on William Blake's Illustrations of the Book of Job (Studies in Jungian Psychology, 22.).

No comments about Twentieth Century Theories of Art.

No comments about Touch Graphics.

1 comments about Understanding Design: 175 Reflections on Being a Designer.

1. First some background. I'm a Professor of Human-Computer Interaction Design at Indiana University, School of Informatics. I've been teaching interaction design and instructional design since 1973. Kees Dorst has written 175 one page essays (he calls them 'reflections') on all aspects of design. Here's a sample: Design Problems, Elements of Design, Thinking about Design, On Designers, Head Heart Hand, Design Teams, Design and Society, Design Debates, and so on. Under each of these headings are the essays. So, for example, under the topic Head Heart Hand, he has reflections titled: Involvement, Empathy, The Quality Without a Name, and Motorcycle Maintenance. Some of the essays are practical; others are philosophical. Each is profound.
   
   My copy of the "red book" (the first edition, hard bound, with 150 reflections) is totally marked up and highlighted. Almost everywhere do I agree with his sensibilities.
   
   I've given this book to first year master's students -- they didn't get it. The strength of the essays is fully realized by someone who has "been there" and struggled with these issues. Thus, I'd recommend this book not as a first-book on design, but for someone who has struggled with these concepts and wants to read a coherent reflection on each. In our program, we use it as a second year supplementary text.
   
   Warning: don't read these reflections one after another as if you're reading a novel or a technical book. Each essay is to be savored like a fine piece of chocolate. Thank you, Kees, and I'm eager to read your 25 new reflections.

3 comments about The Spirit of Butterflies: Myth, Magic, and Art.

1. Until I read this book I thought that only Nabokov could write about butterflies at such a level
   Maraleen, all my compliments brava!!



2. Every culture known to man throughout the rise and fall of civilizations, has carried a myth or symbol about the butterfly. Evidence of this includes the myth of Eros and Psyche, ancient Mycenean gold relics, wall ornaments of Teotihuacan in Mexico, the Japanese paintings, the Native American legend. This book captures the collective ethos of this powerful universal symbol well. It is well-illustrated.
   
   So, what does all of this mean? Why is it such a recurring and powerful symbol in the collective psyche?
   
   The spirit of the butterfly is the transformative symbol of the regeneration of love which can fly. Love gives you the wings to fly, to be free. This notion of the beauty of love with its gossamer wings, is something that is more precious than anything, for it allows one's heart to open within it where the seed may be born to flower. This flower may blossom fully into joy beyond one's own conscious power to imagine. The seed that may open up and spring up within one's heart can be a form of transformation that does last forever. This is a form of one's own opening to a current within one's own being, a current that can magnetize others when it is fully open. That power to magnetize is something that we are all born with, but that few seldom realize because they are not open to their own feeling in their heart of being free and at one with others.
   
   That is what this book is about and why it is meaningful in capturing the essence of a universal symbol.



3. This book succeeds both as a tremendous joy for the general reader and a serious treatment of its subject. It is perhaps the best, maybe the only, book on the market right now treating its subject well and completely. Exceeding the breadth of its title, the book actually treats the cultural significance of butterflies throughout history. This is no small feat. Butterflies have been taken by many cultures to inculcate hope, rebirth, transformation and transcendence, matters at the heart of mankind's internal concern for many millennia. Despite its masterful photography and copious illustrations, Ms. Manos-Jones's production immediately belies any notion that it is simply a "coffee table book". The chapter titles well illustrate the book's topical landscape-- for example "The Sacred Butterfly", "The Artful Butterfly", "The Verbal Butterfly", [famous] "Butterfly People", and so on. By the time you've gotten through each of the ten chapters, be you butterfly buff or butterfly scholar, you will probably be surprised that, concerning this topic, you "didn't know the half of it". It is important to point out that Ms. Manos-Jones brings to this book a well-informed knowledge both of butterflies and world environmental issues. In life, she wears another hat-- as an environmentalist associated with the important Michoacan Reforestation Fund-- a premier conservation group working to protect Monarch butterfly overwintering habitats in Mexico. Given these credentials, the book is a really wedding of Ms. Manos-Jones' professional level expertise on conservation and the pure love of her subject-- butterflies. This book can be recommended wholeheartedly to the general reader and the informed butterfly enthusiast alike. I imagine that a few scholars and historians will want to dig into it as well.

1 comments about Theory of the Novel.

1. Some of the finest literary critics of their time ( 1967) tell us about narrative technique, points- of view, plot, structure and proportion, style , character, time and place, symbol, life and art in the novel. Critics such as Northrop Frye, A.AD. Mendilow and novelists Conrad, James, Cervantes provide insight into the form which is in our world still the highest literary art form. There are many valuable pieces of writing here for any one who wishes to deepen their understanding of the form.

2 comments about Still New York.

1. I enjoyed this book very much, and will return to it over and over to enjoy the excellent reproductions of Brosen's highly realistic watercolors. His work is unique and compelling. I also enjoyed the artist's descriptions and information, given as picture captions, about the scenes he painted. There are also highly readable vignettes with each chapter, focussing on a local, long-term resident of the area of NYC that that chapter pictures. A fine read, but an even more beautiful LOOK.



2. It's extremely well-executed photo realism with pencil + watercolor, and
   the artist has chosen buildings/scenes which are architecturally strong
   and visually rich so as to let his technique really shine. However, the
   real strength, I think, is actually the artist's ability to impart a
   dreamlike quality (reminiscent of children's book illustrator Chris Van
   Allsburg). This elevates the book to a whole different, more evocative
   level, so that you stop marveling at the technique and start thinking of
   the subject matter itself. Anyone who loves New York should love this
   book.