Born in Bombay and based in London since the 1970s, Anish Kapoor (b. 1954) has been a vital force in contemporary art for over three decades. His sculptures are hermetic but unmistakable, both for their striking abstract forms and for their distinctive use of materials, from the traditional (marble, bronze) to the high-tech (stainless steel, fibreglass). His work, in its pursuit of the sublime and the spiritual, updates an artistic lineage that spans from Abstract Expressionism to German Romantic painting and beyond. At the same time, his sustained exploration of the uncanny, centred on the morphology of the human body, gives his work its unique and timeless psychological depth. This is the most complete monograph ever published on the artist, covering more than thirty years of work and illustrated with hundreds of full-colour images, including sketches and technical diagrams from his most ambitious projects. It also features an extensive chronology covering the artist's life in detail and illustrated with snapshots, sketches and ephemera, some never before published. Kapoor has received numerous awards and distinctions, including the Turner Prize in 1991 and a CBE in 2003. His work has been featured in solo exhibitions at major museums around the world, including Haus der Kunst in Munich, Musee des Beaux-Arts in Nantes and Tate Modern in London, as well as important international exhibitions, such as Documenta 9 in Kassel, Expo '92 in Seville and the 44th Venice Biennale, where he represented Great Britain. He is also responsible for some of the world's best known public sculptures, including Taratantara (1999, Gateshead and Naples), Sky Mirror (2001, Nottingham, and 2006, New York) and Cloud Gate (2004, Chicago).

Arata Isozaki is one of the most important and influential Japanese architects working today. Born in Oita, Japan, in 1931 he attended Tokyo University and later worked and studied under Kenzo Tange. In 1963, he opened his own practice and since then has realized a large number of buildings in Japan, Europe and the United States. Through his work, both as an architect and as a theorist, Isozaki has acted as a bridge between the East and the West, exporting Japanese architecture into the Western world and importing outside trends and movements into Japan. Arata Isozaki has conceived this book in collaboration with Ken Tadashi Oshima. It presents a unique, monographic tour through his architecture from the first visionary urban projects of the 1960s to his latest buildings, realized all over the world. The projects featured in the book have been carefully selected from Isozaki's vast portfolio. They are not presented in chronological order but are grouped in chapters titled and arranged in accordance with Isozaki's instructive categorizations of his own work. Each of the six chapters contains conceptual texts by Isozaki (many previously untranslated or unpublished); critical analysis by Oshima; a main case study project (extensively illustrated and explored); and a survey of related projects. Emulating one of Isozaki's central tenets that 'the city, architecture, and various social systems are nothing more than processes', there is an emphasis on process throughout the book — from conception, through construction, to use. We are introduced to projects through drawings and images of models, led through plans and ultimately presented with photographs of the final construction, as each is newly born and then matured in its existence and function.

«The English Garden» is an illustrated survey of 100 iconic, significant and beautiful gardens in England, from the sixteenth century to the present day. This accessible and informative source book includes an unrivalled range of gardens by designers, makers, patrons, artists, architects and literary figures — from Sir Edward Phelips Montacute House (1590), to today's award-winning designs and large-scale environmental creations, such as Nicholas Grimshaw's Eden Project in Cornwall (2001). Following the format of Phaidon's popular «The Garden Book», «The English Garden» is an easy-to-use guide with 100 gardens organised in chronological order. Each garden has been chosen for its unique contribution to the develoment of English garden design throughout time.The selection is comprehensive and covers all key styles and movements — from the Dutch-influenced gardens of the eighteenth century, such as Manyard Colchester's Westbury Court garden (1705), and the formal gardens of the nineteenth century, like Sir Charles Barry's richly planted terrace at Harewood House (1844), to the Modernist creations of the early twentieth century and gardens by today's leading designers. Other examples include the subtropical splendour of Tresco Abbey Gardens (1834), the quintessential Arts and Crafts garden of Wightwick Manor (1887), the Italian Renaissance-inspired garden at Iford Manor (1899) and the romantic herbaceous borders of the White Garden at Sissinghurst Castle (1948).»The English Garden» presents seminal gardens by early English landscape architects such as William Kent and Capability Brown, the work of great horticultural masters and plantsmen like Christopher Lloyd, Gertrude Jekyll and Vita Sackville-West, as well as contemporary garden designers, including Beth Chatto, David Hicks and Christopher Bradley-Hole, among others. Gardens of historical importance feature as well as national favourites, from Hampton Court Palace garden (1728) to Beatrix Potter's Hill Top garden in the Lake District (1905).In addition, the selection includes gardens by famous literary, artistic and architectural figures such as Alexander Pope, William Wordsworth, Barbara Hepworth and Peter Aldington. Organised chronologically, readers can trace the development of the English garden over time. Each entry consists of a full-page image with a concise text, placing the garden and its maker in stylistic and historical context. The book also features a glossary of terms and movements, a directory of gardens open to the public and an index. «The English Garden» is both an accessible reference and an easy-to-use guide, appealing to both the general reader and practicing gardeners.»

«This striking new publication, a sequel to Phaidon's 2000 publication «South Southeast», is a selection of Steve McCurry's most astounding and powerful portraits from South and Southeast Asia. McCurry takes photographs all over the world, for «National Geographic» magazine and his own projects, but it is the people, places, colours and forms of Afghanistan, India, Sri Lanka, Cambodia and Myanmar (Burma) that have inspired his most sublime images — photographs which transcend their original editorial purpose to become classics of photography. Like «South Southeast», this book features a remarkable range of photographs with brief captions and a short essay introduces the book.»

«The title of this book is a phrase that Steve McCurry uses a lot when talking about his work — he is always trying to capture those 'unguarded moments' when people are at their most unselfconscious and natural. McCurry takes photographs all over the world, for National Geographic magazine and his own projects, so this book includes the places, colours and forms of Yemen, Mali, Niger, Chad, India, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Myanmar (Burma), France and the former Yugoslavia, among others. «The Unguarded Moment» is the same size as South Southeast, but apart from the wider range of countries and continents covered, another key difference between the two titles is that all the images in this new book are landscape format. In «The Unguarded Moment», people go about their everyday business in extraordinary circumstances and settings, like the young tea vendor wading through the waist-deep monsoon waters in India, the fishermen casting their nets in the Niger river in Mali's Sahel Desert and the boy working in a candy factory in Kabul, Afghanistan. This book includes striking portraits of a Tuareg woman in Mali, an intense you ng gypsy boy in Marseille, France and pro-democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma. There are children paying close attention to their teachers in school rooms in Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, as well as five young monks happily playing with computer games at a monastery in India, just like any other boys their age would.»

In this lively and comprehensive book, Monica Bohm-Duchen examines Marc Chagall's prodigious output, not only in painting but also in book illustration, theatre design, stained glass and poetry. She follows Chagall from his Russian-Jewish childhood, through his encounter with the Parisian avant-garde and his activities in revolutionary Russia, to his later years in America and the South of France. This is the first ever survey to take full advantage of new material made available to the West since glasnost.

Salon to Biennial documents the most important international group art exhibitions from 1863 to today, and will become the key and most comprehensive reference book on the subject of contemporary art group exhibitions. Salon to Biennial will be published in two volumes; Volume 1, scheduled for publication in the Fall of 2007, begins with the Salon des Refuses, Paris, 1863, and the beginning of the evolution of the exhibition format, and ends with the The New American Painting, a multi-location international exhibition organized by the Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1958-59.

Begun in 1973, Audio Arts is a one-of-a-kind venture: an audio magazine of new interviews with the world's most important contemporary artists. Distributed in cassette format until 2002 and on CD from 2003-07, the interviews in Audio Arts have never before been published. Speaking of Art collects the c. 50 best interviews from the Audio Arts archive. These range from towering figures in art history (Joseph Beuys, Frank Stella, John Cage) to the current stars of the contemporary scene (Wolfgang Tillmans, Thomas Demand, Mike Nelson). At a future date all c. 350 interview transcripts from the Audio Arts archive will be unveiled on the Phaidon web site, creating an unparalleled online resource that will be a trove for artists, students, researchers and art fans everywhere.

The Beatles follows the extraordinary development of four self-taught musicians from Liverpool, from their beginnings, until the break-up in 1970. This biography sets the group's evolution against the backdrop of a popular culture explosion in the 1960s. A serious study of the Beatles' music is expanded here by consideration not only of the group's commercially released disks but also of rare working tapes which both shed light on the compositional process and reveal how many of their milestone recordings took shape in the studio. It also examines why the innovative music of the Beatles — created, at least initially, as ephemera — has remained so durable.

10,000 Years of Art is a compact guide to world art, offering a fresh perspective on the whole of art history from 8,000 BC to the present day. Organized in chronological order, the 500 works of art presented here cover all cultures (not just western) and represent the finest examples of fine and decorative art from 10,000 years of human history. Each work is illustrated in colour and accompanied by a concise, informative text. A companion title to Phaidon's groundbreaking 30,000 Years of Art, this convenient pocket-sized volume is an indispensable resource for any art enthusiast.

«Welles is one of the legendary film directors whose persona has been created through a myriad of myths and legends. Enfant terrible of American cinema, his groundbreaking entry into Hollywood with «Citizen Kane» propelled him to fame as a young prodigy and unfailing genius. Many studies to date have focused on this aspect of Welles, highlighting his clashes with film studios to paint a turbulent picture of an artist repressed by his producers. In this book, however, by returning to the original works and analysing the primary sources, the authors strip back the myths and rumours (many of which were created and fanned by Welles himself) to draw a realistic portrait of this most remarkable filmmaker at work. Welles possessed an exceptional ability to adapt and radically change the stylistic choices of a film to suit his production conditions.His artistic vision was so intense that the various different methods he used from one film to another, and even during the same film, inescapably led to a work stamped with his seal. Whether in control of every detail or deliberately delegating to his team, meticulously prepared or urgently improvised, Welles delighted in working to extremes and was never afraid to challenge the seemingly insuperable. This book recounts the various stages (from conception and pre-production, through the filming and editing to critical reception) of each of his films from the 1940s to the 1970s, including the celebrated «Citizen Kane», «The Magnificent Ambersons», «Othello», «The Trial» and «Touch of Evil».Discussion of each film is supported by numerous illustrations of screenplays and scripts, contracts, sketches, storyboards, models, production reports, memos, letters and correspondence uncovered by new research in European and American archives. In June 2007, «Citizen Kane» was once again voted the 'best movie ever made' by the American Film Institute. A position it has held since the institution opened its poll in 1998. The film has also been hailed by renowned directors worldwide the best film ever made, repeatedly topping the famous ten-year poll of the British Film Institute decade after decade. It is evident that interest in Welles never wanes and his remarkable body of work continuously attracts new devotees.»

A selection of books on five of the most pioneering photographers.

«Gothic & Lolita» charts the current trend of Gothic street fashion that has swept Japan over the last decade. Influenced by Western fashion trends from the mid 1980’s, young teenagers, predominately adolescent girls, congregate in the urban centres of Harajuku, Akihabara and a number of underground clubs in and around Tokyo, dressed head-to-toe in gothic costumes and late-Victorian dress. The psychological characteristics of the average Japanese Goth is one of introversion and exclusivity. The majority of girls in the scene are teenagers and most usually stop by the age of eighteen. The origin of the movement was in Osaka in the mid 1990’s when young teenagers adopted Gothic fashion in response to the clothes worn and promoted by Japanese Gothic rock bands. In the ten years since the trend began it has expanded to a number of cities including Tokyo and now boasts many thousands of devotees who dedicate their lives to creating ever more flamboyant and bizarre variations on the Gothic theme. From handmade black lace dresses based on designs from the 1860's to 'Lolita' outfits, lacy Gothic designs that have a pre-pubescent 'rococo' edge to them, to dresses with an occult flavour, the Gothic and Lolita scene is one of the more bizarre hybrids within Japanese street fashion. «Gothic & Lolita» is specially commissioned by Phaidon Press. Based on the creative design of the best selling «Fruits and Fresh Fruits», it will feature portraits and group portraits of Japanese Goths and Lolitas both at home and in the urban centres of Tokyo and Osaka. In addition to the visual content of the book each subject will also be asked a number of questions about their handmade designs and why the fashion is so important to them. This text will run in a similar 'question and answer' format as in the original Fruits publications. The coupling of portraits and insightful first-person commentary will together make «Gothic & Lolita» the definitive book on the scene in both the West and in Japan, presenting an ideal opportunity to view one of the more surreal aspects of Japanese popular youth culture in an informative yet entertaining manner.»

Albert Watson (b. 1942) is one of the world's most successful and sought-after fashion and commercial photographers working today. His striking images have appeared on more than 250 covers of Vogue and in many publications including Rolling Stone, Face, Time and Arena. He has also been responsible for many major advertising campaigns and over 600 television commercials for clients that range from Levi's and the Gap, to Revlon and Chanel. He has photographed many of the iconic figures and celebrities of our time including world-renowned models such as Kate Moss and Helena Christiansen, and stars from the world of film and music such as Alfred Hitchcock, Jack Nicholson and Mick Jagger. His own artistic projects include still-lifes, portraits of Las Vegas domantrixes and powerful American landscapes. His extraordinary images from both commercial and artistic projects are instantly recognisable in their grandeur, brilliance and technical virtuosity.

In this first ever English-language edition of Oscar Niemeyer's memoirs, the architect reveals how his many passions — among them his large family, many friends, the sensuous landscape of Brazil, women, Communism, art and literature — have all influenced his life and in turn inspired his architecture.Born in Rio de Janeiro, Niemeyer graduated from the National School of Fine Arts in 1934. As a student he worked in the office of Lucio Costa, and on graduation he began collaborating with Le Corbusier on a new Ministry of Education and Health Building in Rio. Yet, in contrast to the International Style, Niemeyer's curvilinear forms reflected Brazil's lush, undulating landscape and the emotive style of its music and dance. Here Niemeyer recounts his life in an informal, fluid narrative that moves from his childhood in Rio, through to friendships with intellectuals and politicians such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Fidel Castro, to tales of adventurous road trips. The book includes 40 specially-made sketches by Niemeyer, a chronology of his notes and an index.

«Based in Japan and one of an emerging generation of young, world-class architects, Shigeru Ban (b. 1957) designs and builds graceful, serene structures using modest materials such as cardboard, paper tubes, bamboo, and prefabricated wood. His buildings are sometimes soaring and birdlike, sometimes simple, grounded, and evocative of the Japanese aesthetic, but always they are integrated with and respectful of their surrounding environment. Ban has designed projects at both ends of the client spectrum: from one-room temporary houses of paper tubes for earthquake refugees worldwide to a 14,000 square-foot country house in Sharon, Connecticut — his first U.S. commission. His humanitarian efforts and his interest in recyclable, affordable, natural materials have won praise and attention from museums and critics in America and Europe. Ban's Curtain Wall House was a favorite entry in the Museum of Modern Art's «Un-Private House» exhibition in 1999; he has gone on to design a museum for children in Japan, a canal museum in France, and a private art museum in Belgium; he was included in the 2000 and 2002 Venice Biennale, and created the Japan Pavilion for the Expo 2000 in Hannover, Germany. He was a member of the Think team of architects selected in February 2003 as one of two finalist teams to compete for the commission to design the new World Trade Center site in New York. The hardcover edition of this book is only the second book on Ban in print — and unlike the first publication, it is the most recent and complete. Designed in Japan and in collaboration with Ban, it is divided into sections that reflect the architect's approach to materials, and presents 32 projects illustrated with colour photographs, plans, and sketches.»

Paper is generally presumed to be the stock-in-trade of the graphic design profession. However, due to the diverse qualities of paper, and the constant desire of designers to push the boundaries of their profession, its potential is being explored more and more by all disciplines of design. More Paperwork follows on from Paperwork, which looked at the use of paper in graphic design, and reviews the amazing developments in its application across all areas of design in the last ten years, including product, furniture, fashion and architecture. The interactive features of the first book have also been extended in the second, to create a range of special effects designed to be completed by the reader. Through the selected work of leading designers around the world, from Amsterdam to Tokyo and New York to Zagreb, this book sets out to demonstrate how the astounding and diverse qualities of paper can be applied. From an inspirational church by Shigeru Ban and a humorous airmail dress by Hussein Chalayan, to an intricate range of packaging by Pentagram and the Honey Pop chair by Tokujin Yoshioka, More Paperwork shows that paper can be used to create functional, exciting and innovative designs. The book will also include items that are not necessarily chosen for the beauty of their design, but rather because they demonstrate some of the astounding things that paper is capable of: these items still display an intrinsic beauty that will be demonstrated with beautiful photographs.

Each project is thoroughly documented with color photographs, plans, drawings, and a project description.

Claude Debussy (1862-1918) was a great harmonic innovator and one of the most original musical voices of the twentieth century. He created fresh, new tonal perspectives without abandoning tonality itself. With a revolutionary sense of instrumental colour and a fleeting, atmospheric sound world, he is often described, rightly or wrongly, as an 'Impressionist' composer. This book presents a clear narrative history of Debussy's life, work and cultural context along with essential reference material and striking illustrations, making it a vital purchase for anyone interested in the composer.

This volume presents amateur, anonymous snapshots of dogs from the turn of the century to the early 1950s in all kinds of ordinary and extraordinary settings. In it, we see dogs under the Christmas table, on front porches, at play by the beach, and posed beside babies, birthday girls, and in the casual family portrait. Each photograph in this remarkable collection reflects a unique moment in time and the sometimes surprising, occasionally humorous, and always intimate relationships people have with their dogs. Catherine Johnson's collection — with its small format, unpretentious subjects, and days-gone-by aesthetic — not only reveals a love for 'man's best friend', but also presents a sophisticated selection made with a keen eye for the unusual within mundane.