Many of the sitters in this collection were John Singer Sargents close friends. They are posed informally, sometimes in the act of painting or singing, and it is evident from the bold way they confront us that they are personalities of a creative stamp. Brilliant as these pictures are as works of art and penetrating studies of character, they are also records of relationships, allegiances, influences and aspirations. This volume, and the exhibition it accompanies, aims to explore these friendships in depth and draw out their significance in the story of Sargents life and the development of his art. The book is structured chronologically, with sections arranged according to the places Sargent worked and formed relationships during his cosmopolitan career: Paris, London, New York, Italy and the Alps. The cast of characters includes famous names, among them Gabriel Fauré and Auguste Rodin, Robert Louis Stevenson and Henry James. But the authors also make their point with images of Sargents familiars, such as the artists Jane and Wilfrid de Glehn who accompanied him on his sketching expeditions to the Continent, and the Italian painter Ambrogio Raffele, a recurrent model in his Alpine studies. In such paintings Sargent explored the making of art (his own included) and the relationship of the artist to the natural world. These are examples of an absorbing range of images and personalities, all distinguished in one way or another for their artistry, and all linked by friendship and a shared aesthetic to the central figure of Sargent himself.
The chief art critic for "The New York Times" gives a painter's-, sculptor's-, and photographer's-eye view of art as he explores museums with some of today's most important artists. Photos throughout.
Learn all about the fascinating lives and tremendous impact of 100 extraordinary artists from around the world with this fact-filled biography collection for kids 8 and up This easy-to-read biography collection includes: 100 one-page biographies: Find out how artists from around the world made history! Illustrated portraits: Each biography includes an illustration to help bring history to life! A timeline, trivia questions, project ideas, and more: Boost your learning and test your knowledge with fun activities and resources! From Leonardo Da Vinci to Vincent van Gogh to Andy Warhol and many more, readers will be introduced to painters, sculptors, photographers throughout history. Organized chronologically, 100 Artists Who Shaped World History offers a look at how the lives, techniques, advancements, and great works of artists have influenced culture and society for thousands of years.
Most famous for his military marches, John Philip Sousa led a group of devoted musicians around the world and shaped a new cultural landscape. This book documents almost every aspect of the "March King's" band: its history, its star performers, its appearances on recordings, and the problems the group faced on their 1911 trip around the world.
Five centuries of fascinating female creativity presented in more than 400 compelling artworks and one comprehensive volume The most extensive fully illustrated book of women artists ever published, Great Women Artists reflects an era where art made by women is more prominent than ever. In museums, galleries, and the art market, previously overlooked female artists, past and present, are now gaining recognition and value. Featuring more than 400 artists from more than 50 countries and spanning 500 years of creativity, each artist is represented here by a key artwork and short text. This essential volume reveals a parallel yet equally engaging history of art for an age that champions a greater diversity of voices. "Real changes are upon us, and today one can reel off the names of a number of first-rate women artists. Nevertheless, women are just getting started."—The New Yorker
For fifty years, Marti Friedlander (1928–2016) was one of New Zealand's most important photographers, her work singled out for praise and recognition here and around the world. Friedlander's powerful pictures chronicled the country's social and cultural life from the 1960s into the twenty-first century. From painters to potters, film makers to novelists, and actors to musicians, Marti Friedlander was always deeply engaged with New Zealand's creative talent. This book, published to coincide with an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in Wellington, brings together those extraordinary people and photographs: Rita Angus and Ralph Hotere, C. K. Stead and Maurice Gee, Neil Finn and Kapka Kassabova, Ans Westra and Kiri Te Kanawa, and many many more. Marti Friedlander: Portraits of the Artists chronicles the changing face of the arts in New Zealand while also addressing a central theme in Marti Friedlander's photography. Featuring more than 250 photographs, many never previously published, the book is an illuminating chronicle of the cultural life of Aotearoa New Zealand.
The correspondence of Joanna and George Boyce, and Joanna's husband Henry Wells (published as The Boyce Papers) gives us a rare insight into the milieu of the artists of the mid-Victorian period. Many different aspects of mid-nineteenth century artistic life are recorded in their letters, providing surprising detail which is highly relevant to the study of their contemporaries. Victorian Artists and their World is a series of case studies based on this material. This book brings together a team of authors both well-established in their fields and emerging, offering a broad range of expertise and insight. The first group of essays begins with travel, particularly in Europe where the new railroads made journeys much easier than in the past, particularly to the new museums being created in European cities. All three of them went to Paris and other European cities, while George Boyce also travelled in the French countryside to find new subjects for his art. Paris was also where Henry Wells and Joanna Boyce trained, but there is also a great deal of material about art training in Britain. The Boyces began essentially as financially independent amateurs, and were gradually drawn in to the increasingly institutional world of art, with the formation of new societies and the activities of commercial galleries. The next stage in an artist's career, involvement with the art market, is a continuing theme in the correspondence, 'the quirks and eccentricities of patrons and art dealers'. Studios, clubs and societies all played a part in this process, while Henry Wells, as a portrait painter, dealt directly with his often wayward clients. It was also a period of great changes in the painting materials available to artists, and there are questions in the letters such as 'Does indigo fly?', referring to a long established colour. The survival of two of Joanna Boyce's paintboxes means that her use of newer artists' materials could be investigated, along with the problems they could cause, - several of Joanna Boyce's paintings deteriorated rapidly because of the use of new materials. A second group of essays looks at the place of women in the art world, as reflected in Joanna Boyce's career. While she did not belong to the campaigners who were creating a space for women artists, including the formation of the Society of Female Artists in 1857, she was very much aware of what they stood for, as is evident from her paintings, and also from her art criticism, which was praised by Ruskin; her writing for the Saturday Review remains vivid and impressive even today. The correspondence comes to an end with Joanna Boyce's untimely death, but the three final essays deal with the longer careers of George Boyce and Henry Wells. George Boyce moved in the different world of the watercolour artists, with the Old Watercolour Society at its centre, and was until recently the best known of the trio. His place in this world is the subject of one essay; another shows him as an important art collector; there is a complete record of the sale of the collection after his death which enables us to see the range of his interests. Finally, there is a collaborative study of the career of Henry Wells, which extended from miniatures of the early Victorian era into the twentieth century and a handful of paintings of modern life. The effect of photography led him to change from miniatures to formal portraiture in the 1850s, and he was a very active if rather conservative member of the Royal Academy towards the end of his life. This multi-facetted volume is a valuable set of case studies on topics which are not often treated on their own, but which are very relevant to Victorian art. They remind us that there is much more to this period than the Pre-Raphaelites, and that other movements, (such as the Aesthetic painters who were an important influence on Joanna Boyce's art) flourished in their shade. Edited by Katie J T Herrington. Contributors: Sue Bradbury, Meaghan Clarke, Louise Cooling, Pamela Gerrish Nunn, Alicia Hughes, Christiana Payne, Mark Pomeroy, Matthew Potter, Joyce Townsend, and Glenda Youde.
