3 comments about Renaissance Rivals: Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian.

1. Goffen has provided a clear, engaging, and refreshing view of Michelangelo and allows for further study and questioning.
   
   I do want to make a remark regaring the review called "Qualified Praise." Goffen does not state that Michelangelo died in 1566. She adheres to the February 17, 1564 date:
   
   "Instead, Vasari paraphrased an anecdote reported by an unknown correspondent, writing within a month of Michelangelo's death on 17 February 1564." (p. 117).



2. Goffen's book is a powerful and thrilling volume of scholarship. Having passed away of breast cancer, the author rests knowing that her words and scholarship will continue to delight and inform many people desiring a new take on the overly discussed pieces of Michelangelo and his "antagonists."
   
   This books is both complex and lucid. Goffen has taken great care to use her language tactfully, but not sparingly. She presents many solid arguments with charged notation. The author leaves her reader swimming and fascinated at the same time. Goffen discusses the works of Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, and Titian with solid grounding in the social context and network previously left behind by many scholars. Goffen is in fact so well grounded in the social context of her subject's time--and her own time--that "Renaissance Rivals" can certainly be seen as a modern day "Lives of the Artists". However, this text has not been embellished, nor fabricated by anyone desiring to create a legacy. Rather, Goffen's careful text offers argument and explanation for why Michelangelo and his rivals were indeed such great artists.
   
   This masterful work is a pleasure to read and will certainly stand in the pantheon of scholars as an accessible text written by a brilliant author.



3. A sumptiously illustrated book, written in a chatty, somewhat prolix style. Worthy of five stars, but for two significant problems, warranting the subtraction of two stars:
   
   1) Some annoying factual errors, the most significant of which is the author's repeatedly giving Michelangelo's date of death as 1566, rather than 1564.
   
   2) The binding is simply not up to the task of keeping the heavy pages of the book together. My copy has already split in a couple of places, even though it has been handled gently.

5 comments about Painting With Water-Soluble Colored Pencils.

1. Everything by him is good so it's no surprise that this is a wonderfully helpful book!



2. This is an excellent book for anyone wanting to learn the nuances of using watercolor pencils. The author's illustrations show the remarkable results that can be attained with this medium.
   
   I especially want to comment on the series of cherries, which other reviewers have referred to. The cherries are the most useful and important part of the book, in my opinion, and the feature that distinguishes this book from others in this field. By repeating the same subject (the cherries) over and over, but as painted by different techniques, the author demonstrates the variety of achievable effects. I was surprised just how different each set of cherries looked when painted in the various techniques. Those demonstrations, along with other instruction in the book, make for valuable instruction. This is a great book for anyone who wants to become skilled in this medium.



3. I don't understand the complaint with the cherries by some of the other reviewers. Gary is just introducing the reader step-by-step to the techniques using cherrys as the example AT FIRST. There are 13 cherry techniques covered over 20 pages, but there are 128 pages in the book. Hmmmm, could there be more? WHY YES! As a matter of fact there is.
   
   He then proceeds to use these techniques on other images that DO NOT repeat themselves. He covers stuff like portraits, animals, landscapes, textures, flowers and a bit of the abstract. There is a large variety. AND WAIT, theres more! He also demonstrates the varying techniques step-by-step with these other various non-repeating works of art! So, don't be fooled by the complaints about cherrys. It's just covered in Chapter 2 and then he goes into more depth in all the other chapters. (Chapter 1 is the usual materials tools and color charts.)
   
   Okay, so it is not for beginners. You should know how to draw well, and be confident in your drawing. You know... be able to create the illusion of 3D on 2D. Or else you'll be one of those reviewers who says "I'm disapointed in this book, I expected more."



4. This book was a gift so I have no knowledge of the contents other than that the gift recipient was pleased with the content and found it helpful in learning to paint with watercolors.



5. As an experienced artist but a beginner in this particular medium, I found this book to be very informative. I noticed that some of the reviewers complained about the cherry paintings, but I found them to be quite helpful. I enjoyed seeing how one subject looked painted several different ways. Though some of the sample step-by-step paintings are pretty substandard, a few are quite good (such as the one of the three parrots). Though probably not the most inspiring art book in the world, this is the best book I have found as an introduction to water soluble colored pencils.

2 comments about Garden of Paris Sketchbook.

1. A lovely collection of art on the gardens around Paris, printed on high quality paper. The book displays your favourite gardens but does introduce you to a series off gardens that would otherwise go unnoticed by the casual tourist. Highly recommended for the quality of the art work and the informal conversational tone of the writing



2. This book is by far one of the very best art sketch books, like the other sketch books from Editions Didier Millet, it is printed on watercolor paper, the colors are bright and vivid. The drawings have just the right detail, and the text exciting to read. I learned about Paris, about drawing, and adding colors to my own works of art after seeing this book. This book is a must for a traveler, or just the person who wants insight to travel destinations. The pictures are so skillfully drawn and painted by Fabrice Moireau, they will fill your imagination with dreams of being in each scene. This book is a real treasure and keepsake. I think it would make a wonderful and impressive gift as well.

No comments about The Subject in Art: Portraiture and the Birth of the Modern.

2 comments about The Allen Book of Painting and Drawing Horses.

1. The drawings and watercolors in this book are utterly beautiful. A beginner might want a second book but this should be in everyone's library. It shows how to create beginning drawings to mature accomplished drawings and they all capture the magic and mystery of the horse. Its my favorite horse drawing book!!!!



2. I was dissipointed in the fact that it was mostly drawing and NOT painting. The price is too high for such a small amount of pages.
   The drawings are well done , but for beginngers. Anyone who loves horses will love it anyway.

No comments about Insects and Flowers: The Art of Maria Sibylla Merian.

1 comments about The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Salvador Dali (Adventures in Art).

1. It is hard to do justice to the imaginative insanity of Salvador Dali, but Angela Wenzel does a pretty good job for this volume in the Adventures in Art series. "The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Salvador Dali" introduces young readers to the Surrealist artist who knew how to put himself in the limelight in ways other than his paintings. One of things that Wenzel does is that she provides some of Dali's own comments about his art, such as the 1937 painting "Sleep," where a heavy face that looks like the film director Luis Bunuel is propped by my crutches and explaining the link between the writings of Sigmund Freud on dreams and Dali's painting "The Burning Giraffe" (1936-37), where drawers are coming out of a tall woman's body. Also included are the famous melting clocks of "The Persistence of Memory" (1931), the fried eggs of "The Sublime Moment" (1938), and the multiple pictures within "The Metamorphosis of Narcissus" (1937).

   What I especially like about this volume is how it looks at the origins of some of these paintings. For "The Endless Enigma" (1938) we have the original sketches of the six different paintings that Dali hid in the finished painting, while a postcrd showing an African village became a face turned on its side in "Paranoid Faces" (1931). Then there was the "Portrait of Mrs. Isabel Styler-Tas" (1945), which Dali based on Piero della Francesca's "Battista Sforza and Federico de Montefeltro" (circa 1465) by way of Giuseppe Arcimboldo's "Winter," a marvelous example of how the old becomes new in the hands of a talented artist.

   Young readers will also be exposed to some prime examples of Dali's imagination with regards to other types of art beyond paintings, such as his infamous "Lobster Telephone" (1936) and the "Mae West Lips Sofa" (1937), although I miss seeing the harp covered with silverware that he made for his friend Harpo Marx. There are also some choice photographs of "Dali the superstar" engaging in the art of self-promotion. Just showing young readers examples of Dali's artwork is enough to get them interested in the artist, but Wenzel takes pain to explain how Dali created his masterpieces and what he was trying to do with some of these pieces. This is one of the more truly educational books I have seem about a great artist written for young readers.

No comments about Watermedia Painting with Stephen Quiller: The Complete Guide to Working in Watercolor, Acrylics, Gouache, and Casein.

5 comments about The Ajanta Caves: Ancient Paintings of Buddhist India.

1. If you, like me, have never been to the Ajanta Caves and would like to get a feel for the treasures they hold this is the right book to get. The quality of the prints is great - the artistry is beautiful. Very delicate and sensual in most places and quite bewildering in others. At times I wished the captions offered even more insight on the individual scenes but then I remember that this is not what this book is about. It is a delight to simply sit there, browse through this book and imagine what life must have been like in those faraway days. This book takes you places. If you are into ancient India you will not be disappointed.



2. although many of the old frescos hardly survived,
   their essence and perennial beauty remains intact in the excellent reproductions, taken without any flashlights of this masterly book
   I consider this book the most impressive in my big collection of works on Oriental and Buddhist art,
   the expression of the faces, their compassion and their gestures are so delicate
   and well represented in this book



3. If you are planning a trip to India, you should consider visiting the caves at Ajanta. If you are planning to visit the caves, you should read this book before the trip. You will get a lot more out of the experience of the caves if you know the Jataka stories and understand the Buddhist iconography described in this book.

   Even if you have no plans to travel to Ajanta, the boook contains beautiful photograpghs which will make a nice addition to any collection of art books or, for that matter, to any coffee table.




4. The Ajanta caves can be considered among the wonders of the ancient world, both in terms of their artistic and their spiritual value, and this book captures the beauty and detail of the remarkable murals. If I were to make one criticism, it would be that it emphasizes the murals at the expense of largely neglecting the sculptures, which are magnificent in their own right. The book might better be titled, "Murals of the Ajanta Caves." I ordered it without seeing it first, and I was a little disappointed to see how few photographs were included of the sculptures. Nevertheless, the beautiful and clear photographs of the murals alone are worth the price of the book, and I'd certainly recommend it to anyone interested in the Ajanta caves, or in ancient Indian or Buddhist art.



5. This book offers the best color photographs of the Ajanta caves that I have seen. The text offers an excellent explication of the history and iconography of the images. Having been to the caves, I can honestly say that you see the paintings more clearly in this book than at the caves themselves. (This is due to crowded conditions and poor lighting at the caves.) This book is an important adjunct to any study of Buddhist art and inconography. If you're planning to travel to Ajanta, buy this book first.

1 comments about Sister Wendy's Grand Tour: Discovering Europe's Great Art.

1. In a world where so many things compete for one's attention, the world of fine art is often overlooked for more contemporary and, as we often see it, more relevant media. This book opened up a whole new world for me as I read it, on an eight hour flight home to my native Britain from the US. I've since taken several art history courses and read a great deal more. Sister Wendy has had her critics in the art world, invariably from those elitists who would use art as a means to promote themselves, and perhaps don't wish to see any kind of knowledge or familiarity of great art trickle down to the person in the street. Sister Wendy, far from popularizing art in the trendy sense, individualizes it, not by personalizing it, but by humanizing it. While some of her interpretations may not always coincide with the the received criticism, she does something far more important and far more indicative of the true Christian nature of the woman; she humanizes it for us and thereby makes it accessible. What once looked like a painting of some people from the past on a balcony is now a comment on ourselves and our society, as relevant today as when it was painted, and that is the great truth Sister Wendy gave me: that art is not something to be afraid of but, like the great literature and music of the ages, with which many of us are infinitely more familiar, art is as important and as rich a source of the human experience, its moments and its continuity, as is any novel or symphony. I used to think that it was only given to a few people to really understand art, and that "I must not have a very visual mind" but I failed to see what is, in retrospect, quite stunningly obvious. Art was always, after all, meant to be seen, and with a little work to understand the references in a work, which viewers of the time would have often have immediately understood, and by not being afraid of it or thinking it obscure, one can find every bit as much satisfaction and humanity in a work of art as one can in literature. For me literature was always my habit, now, thanks to Sister Wendy, I have an art habit (all accusations of a very poor nun pun there are denied in the strongest possible terms). To be honest, I wasn't even all that interested in art. I knew nothing about it and didn't try to find out with any seriousness of intent, mostly because I thought it was all too terribly serious in itself and the arty people I knew all took themselves way too seriously. So, to her critics, I say, Sister Wendy has done more than anyone or anything I have encountered to truly bring art to the people, where it is meant to be. She does not jealously guard her knowledge of art, only to be shared with an elite few but, in true Christian spirit, is spreading an appreciation of it to those who might not otherwise care all that much, and gently opening up whole new amazing worlds for them. I thoroughly recommend this book to everyone.