While acknowledging the legacy of Herbert Read’s classic 1959 study A Concise History of Modern Painting in the World of Art series, academic and artist Simon Morley places the foundation of modern art much earlier than Read, at the emergence of Romanticism and the dawn of the industrial age....

Salvador Dali was, and remains, among the most universally recognizable artists of the twentieth century. What accounts for this popularity? His excellence as an artist? Or his genius as a self-publicist?...

The art and architecture of Egypt during the age of the pharaohs capture the imagination of the modern world. Vivid, graceful forms decorating monuments that emanated ambition and authority spark our wonder about this distant culture....

Rembrandt is among the few outstanding artists of universal appeal, his striking self-portraits lauded the world over – yet he remains an elusive, enigmatic figure. Here, the distinguished art historian Christopher White carefully considers the known facts to build a sensitive and thorough account of the artist’s life and work....

An updated edition of this classic survey illustrated in color throughout, this book is the definitive overview of Paul Cezanne\"s life and work. For Picasso he was \\\"like our father\\\"; for Matisse, \\\"a god of painting.\\\" Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) is widely regarded as the father of modern art....

Paul Gauguin achieved a high public profile during his lifetime, and was one of the first artists of his generation to achieve international recognition....

Embracing over a thousand years of history and an area stretching from the Atlantic to the borders of India and China, this is an unrivalled synthesis of the arts of Islamic civilization....

What makes Scottish art Scottish? In this now classic book, Murdo Macdonald explores the distinctive characteristics of Scottish art over the centuries - such as the heritage of Celtic design with its emphasis on intricate pattern; the importance of the landscape, particularly the Highlands and the sea; and a close connection with France....

Genius. Anti-artist. Charlatan. Impostor! Marcel Duchamp has been called all of these. Almost no other artist of the twentieth century has inspired more passion - or greater controversy. Duchamp challenged the very nature of art, striving to redefine it as conceptual rather than as a \"product\"; his influence is felt everywhere in today\"s art world....

The Greek myths are so much part of our culture that we tend to forget how they entered it in the first place. Visual sources - vase paintings, engraved gems and sculpture in bronze and stone - often pre-date references to the myths in literature, or offer alternative, unfamiliar tellings....

Surveying the last forty years since the end of China\"s Cultural Revolution, this book redefines contemporary Chinese art by placing it in the context of unprecedented cultural, political and urban transformation....

The Bauhaus, a school of art and design founded in Germany in 1919, informed the aesthetic of much of our contemporary environment, influencing everything from housing developments to furniture and websites....

From the simple shell beads worn by Palaeolithic hunters to the splendour of Renaissance gold work and the sumptuousness of Art Nouveau enamels, here is a fascinating and informative guide to the development of Western jewelry - concluding with the......

The revolutionary nature of Impressionism emerged from anarchism and political radicalism, from a belief in science and individualism, creating a view of art true to modern life and to immediate visual perception. The author illuminates the thinking......

\\\"A long-needed presentation of Japanese art that concisely offers inclusive coverage from prehistoric times to the twentieth century....