No comments about Weavings from Roman, Byzantine and Islamic Egypt: The Rich Life and the Dance.

1 comments about Charles Sheeler in Doylestown: American Modernism and the Pennsylvania Tradition.

1. Charles Sheeler in Doylestown: American Modernism and the Pennsylvania Tradition investigates one artist's lifelong engagement with the rich, distinctive traditions of rural Buck's County. It charts Sheeler's discovery of the region's architechture and artifacts beginning about 1910, when he and fellow artist Morton Livingston Schamberg rented an eighteenth-century farmhouse in Doylestown. It assesses what impact this seminal event had on Sheeler's early career, and how his cyclical return to Bucks County themes in later life reveals poignant attachments and emotional depths not usually ascribed to this twentieth-century painter and photographer - known primarily as an iconographer of the machine. By analyzing Sheeler's core attachment to the preindustrial vernacular, this exhibition and its catalovue reconstruct his attempt to reconcile part and present in a series of powerful complex pictures that resulted from his enduring fascination with the Pennsylvanian tradition.
   --- excerpt from book's Preface

1 comments about Willem De Kooning: The Late Paintings, the 1980s.

1. Thanks to the efforts of his former wife Elaine, Willem de Kooning was able to enter his last productive period with growing confidence and originality. As a result his late work, in which his unique and beautiful touch and vision come into full flower, may be the best work he ever did. Some critics are dismayed or even offended by the late work, thinking it the result of manipulations by his dealer, assistants and Elaine, but the beauty and originality of these late canvases offer the best testimony against such views. This book is superb in it's organization, layout and printing, and the essays are convincing, eloquent and first-rate. Any lover of abstract art cannot dispense with owning this superb volume.

No comments about National Gallery of Ireland: The Essntial Guide.

No comments about This Is Not To Be Looked At.

2 comments about Visions from the Golden Land: Burma and the Art of Lacquer.

1. The British Museum, London, should be applauded for launching the first significant exhbition of Burmese art in a major European institution. The catalogue is well-researched, well-written and presents provocative questions. A pioneering section pertaining to inscriptions on Burmese lacquer is especially interesting. Furthermore, the installation in London at the museum was stunning.



2. This is the first authoritative book devoted exclusively to the lacquer ware of Burma (Myanmar). I am an importer of Asian antiques, tribal, and folk art primarily from S.E. Asia, including Burma, and was delighted with the thoroughness of this books content. The range of lacquer ware discussed is quite thorough, the discussion on inscriptions is invaluable and the photographs are excellent. If the chapter on lacquer ware in Sylvia Fraser-Lu's Burmese Crafts Past and Present seemed too short, this is the next book to get. For the very knowledgable and very serious Burmese lacquer collector some of the examples used in the book may be dissapointing. I highly recommend this book.

1 comments about National Gallery of Ireland.

1. This small format paperback will not meet your needs if you are looking for a glossy coffee-table book to impress all your friends; but if you want a beautifully printed book containing reproductions of pictures from a little known art gallery, this is just the ticket. Italian Renaissance, Dutch (including one of only 35 known Vermeers), and, of course, Irish art, are well represented, along with Spanish, French, British, Russian and more. Each half-page reproduction is accompanied by a half page of text on the artist and the work.

No comments about John James Audubon in the West: The Last Expedition: Mammals of North America.

4 comments about Encompassing the Globe: Portugal and the World in the 16th and 17th Centuries.

1. As a specialist and research scholar in the history of collecting at European courts, including Portugal, in the Renaissance, I found this book/catalogue to be lacking in any new, innovative scholarship. This exhibition was meant for a general public in the USA never before exposed to such objects, and as a "blockbuster" show it fulfilled its intent to dazzle, draw crowds and surprise. Encompassing was conceived of as a marketing strategy, which gained Levenson an honorary medal, but which had little to do with the advancement of more serious, as yet unanswered, questions concerning trade, political and cultural relations between Europe, the Americas and Asia in the 16th and 17th centuries.
   
   Serious shows dedicated to these same (and identical) themes have been presented in Europe since 1983 in Lisbon, Porto, Brussels, Bordeaux, Vienna and Madrid, and most recently, the Encounters exhibition held at the V & A Museum in London in 2004, from which Jay Levenson and his team drew much material (both written and visual), without citing one of their sources. One case in point: the section dedicated to exotic animals and menageries in the Encounters catalogue was repeated (almost verbatim) in Encompassing. Neither were any objects addressed in-depth, either in the three essays presented here, or elsewhere in the Encompassing catalogue; nor was a bibliography included, which should have been obligatory.
   
   Jay Levenson is not a specialist in any of the areas highlighted in Encompassing, but even if the catalogue falls short of its objectives, it remains a lovely picture book produced to accompany the show.
   
   
   Encounters: The Meeting of Asia and Europe 1500 - 1800
   Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Museums Wien: Jahrbuch des Kunsthistorischen Museums Wien 03. Exotica: Bd 3 (Gebundene Ausgabe) von Helmut Trnek (Autor), Sabine Haag (Autor)
   Black Africans in Renaissance Europe
   Early Modern Zoology: The Construction of Animals in Science, Literature and the Visual Arts (Intersections)
   The Development of Cathararine of Austria's Collection in the Queen's Household: Its Character and Cost
   Kingship and Conversion in Sixteenth-Century Sri Lanka: Portuguese Imperialism in a Buddhist Land (University of Cambridge Oriental Publications)
   Asia in the Making of Europe, Volume II: A Century of Wonder. Book 1: The Visual Arts (Century of Wonder Bk. 1)
   Hindu Arms and Ritual: Arms and Armour from India 1400-1865
   Cultural links between Portugal and Italy in the Renaissance. (Reviews).: An article from: Renaissance Quarterly
   The Jesuits II: Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts, 1540-1773
   Luxury Goods from India: The Art of the Indian Cabinet-Maker (Victoria and Albert Museum Studies)



2. Gorgeous photographs of the artwork and in-depth views of this intensely and fascinating period. Thanks so much for finally creating this masterpiece!



3. I too saw the exhibition and it was simply marvelous. Many amazingly crafted objects from the 16th and 17th century from around the world reflecting the Portuguese influences. Many of the objects will never be put together again in once place for us to see, so this was definitely a treat for history and art lovers. For those who couldn't make the trip, this is an excellent substitute. A coffee-table size book with wonderful reproductions of the exhibit items. It will make you wish you had made the trip! Get it!



4. This book is the catalog of the exhibition of the same name. Unfortunately it will soon close at its only U.S. venue and move to Europe. I made a long trip to see this rare exhibition of Portuguese Colonial objects because I felt that I would never see such things in one place again in my lifetime. The show didn't disappoint and the catalog is bound to be a real collectible

No comments about Frieze Art Fair Yearbook 2007-8.