Art History Textbooks ReviewsArt History Textbooks Reviews

An Excellent Collection of Paintings
This book is published on occasion of the new galleries of nineteenth and early twentieth century art. The book contains 193 color reproductions of the greatest paintings in the collection including Rosa Bonheur's,"The Horse Fair", Auguste Renoir's,"Mme Charpentier and Her Children", Edgar Degas' "The Dancing Class", and Pablo Picasso's portrait of Gertrude Stein. The book starts with the history of the collection and then goes into an explanation of each work reproduced. The paintings represent almost every important art movement and artist of the nineteenth century from Neoclassicism to Post Impressionism. The centerpiece of the book focuses on the museum's great Impressionist paintings. In between the reader will see Neoclassical portraits by Jean Dominique Ingres, Romantic paintings by Eugene Delacroix, Realist works by Camille Corot and Gustave Courbet,and early twentieth century masterpieces by Pierre Bonnard, Henri Matisse, Picasso, and Amadeo Modigliani. The last section gives provenance of all the works. The book will be a great addition to any art lover who wants to learn about nineteenth and early twentieth century art.

A Sargent Treasury
First... some disclosure. I am a "card-carrying" admirer of John Singer Sargent and of all of his work. I have more than fifty books on Sargent. And I am an obsessive amateur watercolorist; half of our home is filled with paintings, paintings in progress and painting supplies. But, a little rational mitigation... I am not monomaniacal. I also deeply appreciate the work of other greats such as John Whorf and Winslow Homer. And today's Trevor Chamberlain, John Yardley, David Curtis, etc. So, if you like this kind of work, then you'll love this book.

Love it even without any fancy academic theory, art history or the like. Like me, you can just look at a reproduction of an alpine brook in watercolor by Sargent and simply say, "Wow!" And pass your eyes over every millimeter. "Look how he suggests those rocks and ferns!" But then I also greatly enjoy reading the textual background. Where it was done. In what context. Sargent's visits and vacations. The work's provenance. This last can be facinating as in the case of Sargent's recently surfaced, fabulous and obviously originally "mis-acquired" by a maid, "Spanish Dancer". Why, if my own work was any good and further if I did employ a maid then I'd be very careful to... :)
Well, obviously I can speak only as a naive Sargent enthusiast, but I can't recommend this book more. I read it over and over. I'd have paid twice the price.

Approximately 11 & 1/2 by 9 inches and 426 pages. Published by the Metropolitan in 2000. An excellent physical production in the usual quality manner of Yale University Press, lately the source of excellent series on artists. (Here, Sargent but also the likes of William Merritt Chase. Yale was a physical partner in this particular Sargent enterprise.) This book is organized roughly chronologically, from Sargent's youth onwards. However, there's much more; an Essay on Materials and Techniques, a Sargent Chronology, an Exhibition History, a Record of Travel and Other Studies, and an appendix, Works of Questionable Attribution.

Finally, for some, the category "drawing" can be confusing, as is evident here it also includes watercolors. Go figure. But, I don't mind the nomenclature as long as the academics provide me with pretty decent reproductions and an interesting history.

A Catalogue of Timeless Classical Art
This volume represents just a fragment of the art on display at the Greece and Rome exhibit in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York). But the selections (165 of them) are wisely chosen and the explanatory notes accompanying the photos are very illuminating. All in all, this catalogue of timeless classical art will be a wonderful souvenir for those who have been there and it will be a good gift for someone who has yet to witness this magnificent collection first-hand.