Architecture, Anyone? by Ada Louise Huxtable.
The architecture critic offers a revised and updated collection of articles, originally published in the "New York Times," which she considers to be a summation of her work. Among the many architectural phenomena Huxtable scrutinizes and assesses are Notre Dame Cathedral, South Street Seaport, K-Mart stores, Grand Central Terminal, and doctors’ waiting rooms--where, she says, "Danish modern went to die." RC 25186.
The Arts by Hendrik Willem Van Loon.
A cultural survey of painting, sculpture, architecture, music, theatre, and many minor arts from prehistory to the twentieth century by the author of Van Loon’s Lives (RC 55071). Covers creative expression in ancient Egypt and Greece, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance. RC 58659.
Autocritique: Essays on Art and Anti-art, 1963-1987 by Barbara Rose.
This collection of essays, written by a critic and professor of art history, shows the direction in modern art from the 1960s through the 1980s. Rose finds that the art scene has become a world of "entertainment, fashion, public relations, and investment banking." RC 29291.
Ballet 101: A Complete Guide to Learning and Loving the Ballet by Robert Greskovic.
A primer on the history of ballet and the training of dancers, with an analysis of thirteen popular ballets. Includes a glossary and videography. Foreword by Mikhail Baryshnikov. RC 47554.
Beyond the Tunnel: The Arts and Aging in America by Joan Hart.
The author likens the isolation that many older Americans experience to a tunnel, lined with an endless row of closed doors, behind which the elderly wait. Hart, an art educator, uses reproductions of paintings to stimulate conversation and to encourage the tunnel residents to recall their forgotten world. This volume chronicles Hart’s efforts and traces her success with an elderly person named Sarah. RC 36115.
A Brush with Darkness: Learning to Paint after Losing My Sight by Lisa Fittipaldi.
Author discusses her life after being diagnosed with vasculitis in her forties. Describes her feelings of despair during her first two years of blindness. Relates that a gift from her husband--a child’s watercolor set--became the catalyst for her new career as a renowned painter, and for her new outlook. RC 60724.
Classical Music in America: A History of its Rise and Fall by Joseph Horowitz.
American music historian and artistic adviser to several orchestras presents a social history of classical music in the United States. Chronicles the rise of the Boston, New York, and Philadelphia orchestras. Horowitz contends that the post-WWI performance-centered approach of American conductors and performers has been disadvantageous to native-born composers. RC 60428.
A Concise History of Modern Sculpture by Sir Herbert Edward Read.
A chronological survey of modern sculptors and their work, beginning with Rodin. RC 14315.
Dance Writings by Edwin Denby.
Attitudes toward dance as an art form were greatly influenced by critic Edwin Denby. The articles and essays in this collection were written over a period of thirty years, beginning in the 1930s. RC 27491.
From Bauhaus to Our House by Tom Wolfe.
A social journalist looks askance at the ascetic impersonality of American architecture in the last fifty years. Wolfe directs his broadside at the American artists who he believes have prostituted their own creativity to social and intellectual fads. RC 17321.
Gardner’s Art through the Ages by Fred S. Kleiner, Christin J. Mamiya and Richard G. Tansey.
This eleventh edition of Helen Gardner’s work, originally published in 1926, is an authoritative introduction to the history of world art, from the artistic legacies of the Stone Age and ancient civilizations through the emergence of postmodernism in the later twentieth century. RC 51101.
Happy Alchemy: On the Pleasures of Music and the Theatre by Robertson Davies.
Thirty-three pieces on the theater, opera, and music. Includes speeches, prologs to plays, articles, a discussion of folk song, a ghost story set to music, and ideas for a film scenario. Also contains selections from Davies’s theater diaries going behind the scenes. RC 49381.
Impressionism: Reflections and Perceptions by Meyer Schapiro.
Essays that discuss the concept of impressionism, analyzing the artists of the movement, including Claude Monet. Explores the art’s connection with science, history, and literature. Also describes the genre in relation to its subjects: the environment, railroad, city, and people. RC 48011.
Impressionist Quartet: The Intimate Genius of Manet and Morisot, Degas and Cassatt by Jeffrey Meyers.
Prolific biographer details the intertwined lives of four Parisian Impressionist painters of the nineteenth century. Describes their complex relationships and rivalry and reexamines their art. Portrays bohemian Edouard Manet and his intimate friend, Berthe Morisot, as well as visually impaired Edgar Degas and his close companion, American-born Mary Cassatt. RC 60835.
Kicked a Building Lately? by Ada Louise Huxtable.
Collection of forceful, articulate articles by a distinguished American architecture critic. Favorite themes include diversity in style, preserving amenities in city life, and retaining our architectual heritage as living history. RC 16077.
Let Your Camera Do the Seeing: The World’s First Photography Manual for the Legally Blind by George A. Covington.
A manual prepared by a legally blind photographer who found that photographs, especially black and white prints, are much more visible to him than the objects they portray. The manual explains camera functions concisely and gives directions for shooting, processing, and printing film. RC 17386, BR 4890.
Listening Out Loud: Becoming a Composer by Elizabeth Swados.
The author describes not only how to develop a career as a composer but also how to make music a way of life. As a successful composer of widely divergent musical styles, Swados encourages students to explore many alternatives. She also guides the young composer through practical considerations, including getting a good technical foundation, rewriting, marketing, and other realities of a creative life. RC 34957, BR 8749.
Lives of the Great Twentieth-century Artists by Edward Lucie-Smith.
Biographical sketches of one-hundred deceased artists, presented roughly in chronological order, grouped by movement or nationality. Begins with Edvard Munch and major European trends--cubism, dada, and the Bauhaus. Proceeds to North Americans such as Diego Rivera and Edward Hopper, abstract expressionists, pop artists, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. RC 50710.
The Lives of the Muses: Nine Women and the Artists They Inspired by Francine Prose.
Discusses the role of the real-life muse as a connection between eros and artistic creativity. Explores varieties of the inspirational bond in carefully researched studies, probing themes of passion, exploitation, self-sacrifice, and obsession. Includes studies of Alice Liddell and Lewis Carroll, Gala and Salvador Dali´, and Yoko Ono and John Lennon. RC 55457.
The Maestro Myth: Great Conductors in Pursuit of Power by Norman Lebrecht.
An inside story of the nature of orchestral conductors, beginning with nineteenth-century Hans von Bulow, first of the genre to impose his interpretation of the music upon a group of performers. The author chronicles the rise of professional conductors during the late-Wagnerian era, their education and training, their lofty salaries, their opinions, and, above all, their attitudes toward power. RC 38301.
The Meaning of Art by Sir Herbert Edward Read.
This book originated as a series of essays by one of Britain’s foremost art critics and students of esthetics. He surveys the history of art, especially painting and sculpture, and discusses the bases of esthetic judgments. BR 548.
The Met: One Hundred Years of Grand Opera by Martin Mayer.
Entertaining history of New York’s Metropolitan Opera Company celebrating its centennial. Emphasis is on the Met’s creation, development, and management over the past century. Describes how the company operates, and shows how both stars and impresarios have directed its fortunes. RC 20530.
Music and Imagination by Aaron Copland.
These six talks, originally delivered as the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard, deal with the musical mind at work in its different capacities as listener, interpreter, and creator. Copland also discusses specific manifestations of musical mind in the music of other twentieth-century composers in Europe and the Americas. RC 32580.
Nineteenth-century European Art by Petra ten-Doesschate Chu.
Art historian Chu traces the evolution of artistic works in the context of social and cultural trends from the mid-eighteenth century up to roughly 1900. She also explores the impact of new technology on art forms, focusing mainly on painting and sculpture, and incorporates biographical sketches of individual artists. RC 56257.
The Object Stares Back: On the Nature of Seeing by James Elkins.
An art historian examines the phenomenon of vision, a complex and interactive process that "is irrational, inconsistent, and undependable." Discusses selective and unconscious aspects of sight, "forbidden images" of death and sex, the visual focus on bodies and faces, and the links between blindness and sight. RC 44561.
Opera; Its Story Told through the Lives and Works of Its Foremost Composers by David Ewen.
Traces the history of opera, discussing important composers and their works from the Renaissance to the present. Includes a glossary of operatic terms. RC 10315.
Reason in Art by George Santayana.
The renowned American philosopher and aesthetician discourses on artistic meaning, purpose, spirit, endeavor, activity, and creation. Examines the function of art as a vehicle for the human effort to improve life. Analyzes the role of instinct and experience in art and the relationship of art and happiness. Originally published in 1905. RC 25641.
Stradivari’s Genius: Five Violins, One Cello, and Three Centuries of Enduring Perfection by Toby Faber.
Provides a brief biography of Italian stringed-instrument-maker Antonio Stradivari. Recounts the history of five surviving violins and one cello from their creation among more than one thousand to modern ownership by such well-known musicians as Paganini, Yehudi Menuhin, Itzhak Perlman, and Yo-Yo Ma. RC 60554, BR 16252.
True Colors: The Real Life of the Art World by Anthony Haden-Guest.
Traces the New York art scene from the auction of the famous Scull contemporary art collection in 1973 to the mid 1990s. Describes how the Scull sale triggered a steadily escalating worldwide demand for art made after World War II. Analyzes the different art worlds: one of working artists and one of dealers, collectors, and curators. RC 47208.
The Visionary Eye: Essays in the Arts, Literature, and Science by J. Bronowski.
Eleven essays by the well-known mathematician on the relationship between art and science and on the creative forces which shape them. RC 14227.
Who Needs Classical Music?: Cultural Choice and Musical Value by Julian Johnson.
Discusses why contemporary society has marginalized classical music in favor of popular music. Defends the value of classical music as an art, rather than merely entertainment or background noise, and considers the role of music in the modern world. BR 14861.