«Jeff Wall (b.1946) adopts the nineteenth-century poet Baudelaire's famous description of one of his contemporaries as 'a painter of modern life' to describe his own very different work: huge transparencies mounted on to light boxes that diffuse a brilliant glow of white light evenly through his photographs of contemporary urban scenes and 'constructed' social situations. Wall is foremost among the pioneering artists who since the late 1960s have brought photography to the forefront of contemporary art. His constructed images employ the latest sophisticated technology in the creation of compelling tableaux, which are evocative of subjects ranging from Hollywood cinema to nineteenth-century history painting. When exhibited in their glowing light boxes they evoke both the seduction of the cinema screen and the physical presence of minimalist sculptures such as Dan Flavin's fluorescent light installations or Donald Judd's metal and Perspex wall reliefs. All of these elements — traditional figurative painting, cinema, Minimalism, Conceptual art, documentary photography — are consciously evoked and explored in Wall's work. Associated closely since the late 1960s with Conceptual artists such as Dan Graham, with whom he collaborated on The Children's Pavilion (1988-93), Wall has engaged at a sophisticated level with theories of representation and its social dimensions both as an artist and as a theoretical writer on contemporary art and culture. The survey by Thierry de Duve, author of «Pictorial Nominalism» and «The Definitively Unfinished Marcel Duchamp», proposes an alternative history of modernism. Critic and curator Arielle Pelenc talks with the artist on themes ranging from storytelling to cinematography. Boris Groys, author of «Contemporary Art from Moscow», focuses on the meaning of light in Wall's work. The update section by French art critic and historian of photograpy Jean-Francois Chevrier surveys Wall's work from 1995 to the present. The artist has chosen texts by Blasie Pascal and Franz Kafka for the «Artist's Choice», and the «Artist's Writings» celebrate Wall as an art historian and theorist by including key essays and important interviews.»

A survey of the life and times of Rembrandt van Rijn, one of the most famous and well-loved artists. From his precocious early work in his native Leyden to his emotional late work and his immense artistic influence, Rembrandt's life is traced within the context of the Netherlands in the 17th century, the highly literate and cosmopolitan environment of Amsterdam and Rembrandt's wealthy and influential patrons.

«Born in Philadelphia, Steve McCurry studied history and cinematography at Pennsylvania State University before working as a freelance photographer in India. He is most famous for his evocative color photography, which has captured stories of human experience that, in the finest documentary tradition, transcend boundaries of language and culture. His career was launched when he crossed the Pakistan border into rebel-controlled Afghanistan — just before the Russian invasion — to take the first pictures of the conflict. Since then many of McCurry's images have become modern icons. A high point of his career was the rediscovery of an unidentified Afghan refugee girl, which many have described as the most recognizable photograph in the world today. His coverage won him the Robert Capa Gold Medal for Best Photographic Reporting from Abroad, an award dedicated to photographers exhibiting exceptional courage and enterprise. McCurry has covered many areas of international and civil conflict, including the Iran-Iraq war, Beirut and the Gulf War. His travels have also taken him to southeast Asia and the spiritual temples of Angkor Wat and Cambodia, made known to many through his memorable images for «National Geographic» magazine. A member of the prestigious international photo agency Magnum since 1986, he is the recipient of numerous awards including Magazine Photographer of the Year, awarded by the National Press Photographers Association. This was awarded in the same year in which he won an unprecedented four first prizes in the World Press Photo Contest. He has won the Olivier Rebbot Memorial Award twice. This monograph on McCurry follows a chronological order, identifying major themes and examining key works; a beautifully produced, affordable introduction to one of the leading figures in photography today.»

«The Art Museum is the finest art collection ever assembled between two covers. This revolutionary and unprecedented virtual art museum in a book, features 1,000 oversized pages of over 2,700 works of art. It is the most comprehensive and visually spectacular history of world art ever published. Ten years in the making, this unique book was created with a global team of specialists in all fields of art, including museum curators and educators, who have collected together important works as they might be displayed in the ideal museum for the art lover. Unrestricted by the constraints of physical space, this luxurious book is organized by innovative color-coded «galleries» «rooms» «corridors» and «special exhibitions» which display hundreds of paintings, sculptures, frescos, photographs, tapestries, friezes, installations, performances, videos, woodblock prints, folding screens, ceramics and manuscripts that tell the history of world art. This is the only museum to house Leonardo's Mona Lisa, a collection of Rembrandt's finest self portraits, Velazquez's Las Meninas and Picasso's Guernica, as well as ceramics from China, Hokusai's woodblock prints, gold artefacts from Peru, and works by Jackson Pollock in one place. With intelligent in-depth text throughout, explanatory labels for each artwork, a comprehensive glossary and detailed location maps, The Art Museum, is accessible for everyone from casual art fans to experts in the field.»

The first comprehensive monograph covering the complete career of Elliott Erwitt (b.1928), one of the leading photographers of his generation, and an influential member of the Magnum photographic agency since 1954. Offers a snapshot of the famous and the ordinary, the strange and the amusing over a 50-year period, through the lens of one of the period's finest image makers. Contains over 200 previously unpublished photographs to reveal the extent of Erwitt's prolific photographic output. Includes images of places, things, people and animals all over the globe, captured in Erwitt's unmistakable, often witty, style.

Like its successful predecessors 10x10 (published in 2000) and 10x10_2 (published in 2005), 10x10_3 is a comprehensive overview of contemporary world architecture. Generously illustrated, this volume presents 100 of the world's most exceptional emerging architects, selected by 10 esteemed members of the international architecture community. Arranged alphabetically by architect, the book features more than 1,500 illustrations and approximately 250 buildings and projects from the past five years, including recently built work as well as competition entries. The result will be an up-to-the-minute collection representing the best of both global and regional architecture around the world.

Abstract Expressionism emerged in New York in the years immediately following the Second World War and quickly became one of the most powerful and influential movements in the history of modern art. Building on developments in European avant-garde art of the preceding decades, a wave of artists such as Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Barnett Newman and Clyfford Still developed a new abstraction that was simultaneously elemental and sophisticated. Though several of Abstract Expressionism's key figures were emigres, including Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmann and Arshile Gorky, it was art's first definitively American movement, establishing New York as the new capital of artistic innovation for years to come while creating a visual language that would soon reach to the farthest corners of the globe. The enduring importance of Abstract Expressionism reflects the boundless ambition of its practitioners and their engagement with the key intellectual currents of their time, including existentialism and Jungian mysticism. For many critics and art historians, their achievements represent the high-water mark of the modernist movement begun almost a century earlier. Abstract Expressionism continues to occupy a distinguished place not only in history books and museum collections but also in the popular consciousness, where its enduring appeal is testament to its profound achievements. Editor Katy Siegel has assembled a complete overview of the subject in three sections. The definitive Survey recounts in detail the movement's emergence, high period and later accomplishments, incorporating both contemporaneous critical writing and up-to-the-minute scholarship. The Works section presents large full-colour images of over 200 key artworks, each accompanied by an informative caption. And the Documents section provides a generous archive of primary and secondary texts, including artist's statements, exhibition reviews and critical writings. The extensive back matter includes biographies on all the artists and authors plus a full bibliography.

«Art & Today» is an innovative and extensive survey of international contemporary art from the 1980s to the present. Over four hundred of the most significant contemporary artists from around the world are represented in this comprehensive overview — some emerging, some mid-career, and others long established. Each of the book's sixteen chapters address recurring and relevant themes as diverse as «Art & Popular Culture,» «Art & Its Institutions,» and «Art & Globalism,» rather than follow a strict chronological, geographical, or stylistic structure. Lively and up-to-date, «Art & Today» explores an era in which art defies simple categorization. The result is a surprising and original yet clear and reasoned perspective on contemporary art that breaks from prescribed classifications to offer a survey as expansive as the art it describes.For instance, in the chapter «Art & the Body,» one might find performance discussed alongside figurative painting, sculpture and photography alongside video, and North American artists alongside Asian artists. The chapter «Art and Globalism» discusses artists whose nationality, generation, and medium are as diverse as those of Alan Sekula, Michal Rovner, Cildo Meireles, Manuel Ocampo, Chen Zhen, and Andreas Gursky. Internationally renowned art critic and scholar, Eleanor Heartney is respected for her clear language and pragmatic approach to contemporary art. Her straightforward, engaging descriptions and explanations will appeal to both experts and newcomers alike, and will serve as an invaluable resource for years to come.»

As a precocious child talent, growing up in 1890s Vienna — the same that nurtured the psychoanlysis of Freud — Egon Schiele developed a distinctive personal style that matched his obsession with sex, life and death. Although he died young he produced a body of paintings, watercolours and drawings that rank him among the most original artists of the 20th century, and an important forerunner of the Expressionist movement. In this book Christopher Short presents a biographical introduction and survey of Schiele's art, following his detailed commentaries on a selection of male and female nudes, self portraits, portraits, landscapes and allegorical works representing a cross-section of the artist's finest works in all media.

«James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) was one of the most original artists of the late 19th-century. Flamboyant dandy and ebullient publicist, friend of Oscar Wilde, Whistler was also a meticulous craftsman dedicated to the perfection of his art. He was born in the United States but travelled to Paris to study painting. Under the influence of Courbet, he began as a realist painter, but gradually developed a startlingly original method of composition, refining his technique to the barest essentials. He was one of the first to argue that the abstract ingredients of a painting — the lines, shapes, colours and tones — could in themselves be the subject; he entitled the portrait of his mother «Arrangement in Grey and Black». His emphasis on selection and swiftness of execution made a shocking contrast with the art of his day, concerned as it was with finish and elaborate literary allusions. Ruskin, the champion of Pre-Raphaelitism, accused him of «flinging a pot of paint in the public's face» — a comment that promptly inspired the famous lawsuit which left Whistler victorious but bankrupt. Whistler was one of the most independent artists in the second half of the nineteenth century, comparable in stature with Degas. His «Nocturnes» create an indefinable mood of wistful poetry, while his portraits remain some of the most haunting images in nineteenth-century art.»

& Fork seeks to represent the best in international product design from around the world. In order to make the most comprehensive selection of 100 important young product designers working today, 10 key figures from the design world were enlisted to curate the project. These 10 writers, curators and designers have combined their extensive knowledge to ensure that & Fork truly represents this exciting field and its most innovative developments since its highly successful predecessor, Spoon, in 2002. Australia, the UK, South America, the Far East, USA and Europe are all represented and give the book a truly global perspective. With a short written piece provided by the curators for each designer we are given insight into why the designer's work has been chosen, and their background and future design plans. Each curator has also chosen one piece of design for the 'Good Design' chapter of the book. Here they have a chance to discuss one object by one designer that they believe has made a significant impact on the design world, and that young designers of today are still influenced by and can learn from.

Considers electronic media in European as well as American art. This work outlines the importance of figures neglected by art history, including engineers and collaborators. It also addresses the reaction, development and future of artistic practice in the face of technology, and how art can 'humanize and mythologize' science.

Stephen Shore, who has captured the spirit of an age in his photographs, is one of contemporary art's photographers.

Reveals the revolution that took place when a whole generation of artists experimented with the idea of art as an idea. Shows how artists such as Robert Morris, Sol Lewitt and Marcel Broodthaers challenged traditional notions of the art object through unprecedented use of language, actions, processes and forms derived from mass media.

The resulting artworks (such as his project for the Reichstag in Berlin, Der Bevolkerung [To The Population, 1999]) have often drawn immense controversy. Haacke is a unique figure in post-war art, and his work has touched on such diverse movements as Conceptual, Pop, Minimal and Land art.

As the creator of Jackie Kennedy's signature pillbox hat and the designer of choice for Liza Minelli in the 1970s, Halston (1932-90) was synonymous with American style: a modern, minimal yet glamorous look that encompassed everything from flowing caftans to ultrasuede dresses, to uniforms that lent panache to airline attendants and the girl scouts of America alike. Beginning his career in Chicago in the late 1950s, by 1972 Halston had been named 'the premier fashion designer of all America' by Newsweek and was firmly established in New York; he counted such personalities as Andy Warhol and Bianca Jagger among his friends and clients. Tall, charismatic, impeccably dressed, Halston personified the lofty ambitions and non-stop nightlife of the 1970s and early 80s. This book, a visual anthology of Halston's life and legacy, includes previously unpublished catwalk photographs, rare archival photographs by Warhol, behind-the-scenes images of fashion shows and parties, one-off sketches and specially commissioned photographs of the collections. Halston embodies a magnificent tour de force of a life and career that are as monumental historically as they are fascinating, even to the less familiar reader.

This provocative survey reveals how four of the most destructive dictatorships of the 20th century — Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Soviet Russia and Communist China — used graphic design to sell their messages. Explores each regime's distinctive strategies for seducing public opinion and infiltrating people's lives, in media ranging from logos, flags, typefaces and posters to children's books and figurines Remarkable archival photographs set the disturbingly powerful graphic devices in historical context. The perceptive text analyses how these four regimes established the most effective modes of visual propaganda, which were later adopted and adapted by many other dictatorships.

The companion of Phaidon's popular The Endless City, Living in the Endless City will add the cities of Mumbai, Sao Paulo and Istanbul to the six cities of the first volume with the same mix of compelling photographs, in-depth and beautifully presented data, and smart writing by global thinkers. Each city is explored in a series of essays that address vital themes, from security to climate change, looking closely at the problems that face contemporary cities and examining a variety of solutions. Like the first book, the new one includes the best writing and information from the Urban Age project, a series of conferences held by the London School of Economics that explore vital field of urban development. Drawing on the work of scholars from all over the globe, this book will give the reader access to a wealth of ideas and data about Mumbai, Sao Paulo, Istanbul and, by extension, urban life across the globe. In addition to this close focus on each of the three cities, Living in the Endless City will feature analysis of surveys done in each city. Editors Deyan Sudjic of the Design Museum and Ricky Burdett of the LSE have also chosen the best contributors to both this book and The Endless City to write thematic essays that discuss the ideas and the lessons they have drawn across all nine cities.

This new abridged edition of the highly acclaimed Self Life Death provides an overview of Nobuyoshi Araki's (b.1940) prolific forty year career, featuring his finest and most iconic images in a new, expanded format. Arguably Japan's greatest living photographer — and certainly its most controversial — Araki consistently challenges artistic and social conventions in postwar Japan. The book examines Araki's work from a wide variety of viewpoints: Japanese and European; female and male, including all his major works, such as Sentimental Journey (1971), Tokyo Story (1989) and Erotos (1993). Araki's writings, widely admired and published in Japan, which were translated into English for the first time for Self Life Death, are also included. At this affordable and accessible format, a new audience of photography students and enthusiasts will be able to own a book on this influential photographer.

The definitive photographic history of the first decade of the 21'st century. • Charts 500 political, cultural, scientific and sporting moments that shaped the period. • Every event clearly explained. • Sequel to Phaidon's New York Times best-selling Century.