Ray Atkins (b.1937) is one of the least well known major painters of his generation. He studied at Bromley College of Art in Kent before gaining a post graduate place at the Slade despite having failed the National Diploma in Design in 1961. His first teaching post was at Reading University in 1965 where he lived and recorded in paint the huge upheavals that the town was undergoing, leading to a one person exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, London in 1974.A teaching post at Falmouth Art School in 1974 led to a thirty four year stay in Cornwall where he painted the extraordinary landscape of the china clay country around St Austell with its collossal pits and mounds of micae.The desolation left over by the demise of the tin mining industry was also a major theme, The more intimate subjects of children, gardens, family life and inevitably the sea were also part of the oevre. The nineties also saw a long series of works on the theme of dance.To celebrate the uncelebrated was his dictum.Peter Davies follows Atkins’ journey from the dark but creative London period to the high spots in the eighties with a retrospective at the Royal West of England Academy and with work selected for the John Moores in Liverpool, a room at a Serpentine summer Show, and representation in shows at the Hayward gallery.The book also follows the tensions and problems arising from Atkins’ insistence on working direct from his subjects and places the artist’s career in the wider context of the twists and turns of events in the art world in the UK, Europe and beyond.In addition, David Stoker gives a personal account of his discovery of Atkins in France, leading to a growing friendship and a deep understanding and respect for the work.

This beautifully illustrated and scholarly catalogue presents a selection of exceptional drawings from the Clement C. Moore Collection. It accompanies an exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum. The drawings assembled by Clement C. (“Chips”) Moore constitute one of the preeminent private collections of Dutch drawing in America. The collection also includes works by Flemish, French, Italian and British artists, ranging from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries. These works have long been intended to join the collections at the Morgan Library & Museum, and this exhibition – timed to coincide with the Morgan’s centennial celebrations – makes formal the promised gift. Accompanying the exhibition, this catalogue will demonstrate the breadth of the Moore Collection with a selection of around eighty works that highlight the principal themes of Dutch art, the various functions and techniques of Dutch drawings, and the connections between the Dutch and other European artistic traditions. Works by Hendrick Goltzius, Jacob de Gheyn, Jan Bruegel, Rembrandt van Rijn, Aelbert Cuyp, Jacob van Ruisdael, Peter Lely, Claude Lorrain, Thomas Gainsborough and John Constable are among those featured. The catalogue includes an introductory essay by Jane Turner and entries authored by an international team of specialists.

Accompanying a major exhibition at Philip Mould & Company, Fruit of Friendship: Portraits by Mary Beale presents the work of the remarkable sevenenteenth-century woman artist. Mary Beale (1633–1699) was Britain’s first woman artist to run a successful studio practice. In an era when the arts in Britain were flourishing and portraitists were in high demand, Beale established a unique practice that set her apart from her competitors and brought her great acclaim. Friendship and family played a crucial role in Beale’s success. She was the figurehead of her family and studio, while her husband dedicated himself to supporting the business, often preparing paints and canvasses. Beale’s portraits, many of which are illustrated here for the first time, build a picture of a talented and multi-faceted woman – artist, writer, businesswoman, mother and friend. The title of this publication and of the accompanying exhibition is drawn from Beale’s own writings, and the materials presented span her entire career. Featuring essays by leading scholars, the catalogue introduces a number of recently discovered portraits by Beale and showcases several important works that have never been publicly displayed before.

Winner, 2018 SAH Alice Davis Hitchcock Award Mexico City became one of the centers of architectural modernism in the Americas in the first half of the twentieth century. Invigorated by insights drawn from the first published histories of Mexican colonial architecture, which suggested that Mexico possessed a distinctive architecture and culture, beginning in the 1920s a new generation of architects created profoundly visual modern buildings intended to convey Mexico’s unique cultural character. By midcentury these architects and their students had rewritten the country’s architectural history and transformed the capital into a metropolis where new buildings that evoked pre-conquest, colonial, and International Style architecture coexisted. Through an exploration of schools, a university campus, a government ministry, a workers’ park, and houses for Diego Rivera and Luis Barragán, Kathryn O’Rourke offers a new interpretation of modern architecture in the Mexican capital, showing close links between design, evolving understandings of national architectural history, folk art, and social reform. This book demonstrates why creating a distinctively Mexican architecture captivated architects whose work was formally dissimilar, and how that concern became central to the profession.

THE COMMONALITY OF HUMANS THROUGH ART: HOW ART CONNECTS MANKIND THROUGH THE AGES explores how art has linked different cultures over the past 30,000 years. Organized thematically rather than chronologically or geographically, it traces how all humans are connected from birth to death. Ten leading scholars offer essays on how the language of art has been used by cultures to explain human behavior. The book begins with a discussion of the brain and art, aesthetics and human cultures, and creation myths. With these important subjects as a foundation, it moves into explorations of lived experiences: motherhood and the family, the world around us, conflict and warfare, portraying ourselves and others, sickness and healing, religion and rituals, and death. Each chapter is illustrated by outstanding artworks showing the commonality between cultures as they expressed their lives to their own people and those who followed them. The essays are written to the lay reader so the book can be a beautiful showcase on a coffee-table, an important art reference book in a library, or an introductory textbook in archaeology, cultural anthropology, and art history classes.

Focusing on the British virtuoso Rex Whistler (1905–1944), who was linked to many of the most illustrious figures of the inter-war period, this book explores an exceptional case of artistic patronage in the twentieth century. In weaving together social and art history, this beautifully illustrated volume will be as much about the artist as it is about his patrons. It accompanies a major exhibition at the Salisbury Museum, which holds the Rex Whistler Archive. Whistler’s cast of patrons reads like the Who’s Who of his time: the art collector and poet Edward James, the avid diarist and socialite Sir Henry ‘Chips’ Channon, Lord and Lady Louis Mountbatten, Cecil Beaton, Duff and Diana Cooper, author and poet Lady Dorothy Wellesley and many others for whom Whistler worked on a diverse range of commissions, from murals, portraits and bookplates to architectural improvements and even book illustrations. The exchange with his patrons, the book argues, gave Whistler an opportunity to explore a rich variety of subjects, materials and techniques.The artworks discussed in the volume range from a recently re-discovered painting for Sir Malcolm Bullock, a substantial history painting unique in Whistler’s oeuvre, to the magnificent murals at Port Lympne and Trent Park designed for Sir Philip Sassoon, one of the greatest hosts of the age, to Plas Newydd, where Whistler created one of the largest private mural schemes in the inter-war period for the 6th Marquess and Marchioness of Anglesey. It culminates with Maud Russell’s mansion at Mottisfont, where in 1938–39 the artist was painting one of his fi nest works in trompe l’oeil as war loomed over Europe, the war in which Whistler gave his life for his country.Whistler’s commissioning circle were both diverse and privileged, with many embracing the sexual fluidity of the time, and the book deepens our understanding of how the elite were protected by their wealth and position from the strict societal mores of the 1920s and 30s. The artist understood the importance of creating beautiful private spaces for all his clients; but, for some, at a time when homosexuality was still illegal, he was painting murals in houses that were acknowledged havens where sexual preferences could be expressed without fear of discrimination.Dr Nikki Frater, an expert on Whistler’s work, draws on extensive archival research and newly available material to present a fresh interpretation of the relationship between the artist and his milieu. Frater’s behind-the-scenes approach illuminates Whistler’s creative methods and techniques and includes many previously unseen drawings and sketches. The book speaks not only of his patrons, but also paints a nuanced portrait of his oeuvre and the artist himself, as he tried to combine his challenging career with a complicated romantic life. This is a timely re-examination, given the recent controversy surrounding his mural at the Tate Gallery Restaurant, and offers an opportunity to understand fully Whistler’s place in and contribution to the arts and culture of his time.

This catalogue sheds new light on the Paris Olympics of 1924, often considered the first international games. From their origins in ancient Greece to their modern transformation into a visually powerful event on the world stage, the Olympics have retained their unique place in sport and culture. Published to coincide with the Paris Olympics of 2024, the book accompanies a major exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum. The summer of 2024 will see the Olympics return to Paris after a century. The Olympics in 1924 were arguably the first truly international games, the first games to transmit live radio broadcasts and the first to have an Olympic village. They incorporated an art competition as well as sporting events, and yielded thirty-five medals for Britain, including for Cambridge sprinter Harold Abrahams of Chariots of Fire fame. This catalogue explores the Olympic games from a visual perspective, investigating the tensions between their classical beginnings and their representation in 1924 and across the modern era. How were the 1924 Olympics shaped by the visual culture of the period? And how, in turn, were the arts shaped by them? From plaster casts of fifth-century BCE athletic statues to Hollywood cinema, and from classic portraits of the protagonists to more abstract art, this catalogue brings together painting, sculpture, film, photography, posters, letters, medals and other memorabilia to tell a story of sporting endeavour that equally mirrored and shaped its times. Issues of gender, race and class, as well as an exploration of celebrity and spectatorship, show that the debate around sport was as complex and momentous in the past as it is today. The exhibition catalogue offers readers the opportunity to explore some of the key themes of the show in more depth. It comprises essays by specialists from the fields of Classics, art history, French history, sports history and medicine, each of whom will focus on key themes in the exhibition and key protagonists in the Olympic story. The wide range of art will appeal to fans of classicism, modernism, Cubism, Surrealism and Futurism, as well as Art Deco, while the subject matter will also chime with sports fans – and tap into the enthusiasm for all things Olympic in 2024.

**Henry Spencer Moore (1898–1986) was one of the most influential British artists of the twentieth century. This catalogue considers Moore’s celebrated Shelter drawings as the point of departure for a new reading of the artist’s fascination with images of walls, during and immediately after World War II. It accompanies a focused exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery. **After the destruction of his London studio early in World War II, Henry Moore began drawing figures sheltering from bomb raids in the London Underground. This catalogue and exhibition consider Moore’s celebrated series as the point of departure for a new reading of the artist’s fascination with images of walls, during and immediately after World War II. In the London Underground, where Moore drew these figures, the walls of these sheltered spaces came to absorb his attention in an altogether new way, becoming scene-setters, and key components of his drawings. This fascination with the bricks and the presence of walls, their texture, mass and volume, became especially important after his project to illustrate the wartime radio play The Rescue, based on Homer’s Odyssey. Henry Moore: Shadows on the Wall, a collaboration with the Henry Moore Foundation, suggests for the first time that the walls in his drawings offer a new way to understand some of his most individual and monumental Post-War sculpture projects.

"The stories and testimonies in this book are not only photographs. They are beautiful, brutal, present, and personal – photographic adjectives, filled with content that is deeper and more relevant than most news photography can ever hope to be. But, perhaps most importantly, they are historical documents, visual evidence to be presented in a future where the fog of war has cleared. And just ice once again prevails." Swedish Photojournalist Paul Hansen wrote in the foreword for the book. In it, he emphasises the relevance of the images, the depth these testimonies bring to the reader, and how they initiate a deeper conversation about the impact of military violence on Ukraine.Ukrainian Warchive published its first book 13 Stories of War to mark the second year full-scale Russian invasion.The book features individual visual essays accompanied by text created by 13 Ukrainian photographers and artists, members of the Ukrainian warchive. Their photographic testimonies are beyond conventional narratives and together with text they give readers a nuanced and personal perspective that goes beyond typical media coverage. The essays delve into themes of resistance, loss and hope and provide a vivid account of the human experience in the midst of war."Despite the backdrop of ongoing military violence, these documentary photographers and artists have been courageously living, working, and sharing the realities of Ukraine with the world since the Russian Invasion. As the photo editor, curating these powerful photo stories represents the photographers’ resilience and resistance to me. Each essay varies in approach, style, and subject matter. We chose to pair each essay with personal texts to convey awareness and immediacy." - says Emine Ziyatdinova, co-editor of the book and director of the Ukrainian Warchive.The book has been supported by the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna (Institut für die wissenschatten vom Menschen, I M) within the Documenting Ukraine program, the Hasselblad Foundation, and the Swedish Institute.

For the first time, National Museums Scotland’s important collection of Renaissance jewellery from Scotland is considered together in this fully illustrated volume alongside significant items from the Royal Collection. The book was inspired by the acquisition by NMS of the extraordinary Fettercairn Jewel: the fine iconography of this exquisitely enamelled locket held coded messages for its sixteenth century owners, and continues to intrigue its viewers today. Renaissance jewellery like this in Scotland is particularly notable given the rare survival of such jewels from the sixteenth century. Some of these owe their survival thanks to their association with Mary, Queen of Scots.Elite Renaissance men and women commissioned, wore and gifted intricate and valuable pieces of jewellery. For most, this was not simply adornment, but used to communicate messages and display status. These were intimate personal possessions and suggest the meanings invested in them by their owners, that resonate with audiences today. Such jewels are evocative objects.This lavishly illustrated book brings together expert voices from the key Scottish collections (National Museums Scotland, National Galleries of Scotland, Royal Collection Trust) to explore the making, meaning and function of such jewellery in sixteenth century Scotland, and features an interpretation of the Fettercairn Jewel by the jewellery expert Geoffrey Munn. It reveals hitherto underappreciated evidence of goldsmithing in Scotland while considering significant continental influences in the design and production of jewellery. Given the ephemeral nature, and rare survival of Renaissance jewellery, its authors also suggest alternative ways of tracing the gems that have gone, in the portraits and inventories of Scottish men and women.

George Lucas is an innovative and talented director, producer, screenwriter, and filmmaker whose prolific career spans decades. While he is best known as the creative mind behind the Star Wars franchise, Lucas first gained notoriety with his 1973 film American Graffiti, which received five Academy Award nominations, including Best Director and Best Picture. When Star Wars (1977) was released, the groundbreaking motion picture won six Academy Awards, became the highest grossing film at the time, and started a cultural revolution that continues to inspire generations of fans. Three decades and countless successes later, Lucas announced semiretirement in 2012 and sold his highly successful production company, Lucasfilm, to Disney. His achievements have earned him the Academy's Irving G. Thalberg Award, the American Film Institute's Life Achievement Award, induction into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame and the California Hall of Fame, and a National Medal of Arts presented by President Barack Obama. Lucas: His Hollywood Legacy is the first collection to bring a sustained scholarly perspective to the iconic filmmaker and his legacy beyond the Star Wars films. Edited by Richard Ravalli, this volume analyzes Lucas's overall contribution and importance to the film industry, diving deep into his use and development of modern special effects technologies, the history of his Skywalker Ranch production facilities, and more. With clearly written and enlightening critiques by experts consulting rare collections and archival materials, this book is an original and robust project that sets the standard for historical and cultural studies of Lucas.

For more than fifty years, George Kenney has dedicated himself to the study of European art, demonstrating a profound passion for works on paper, including etchings, drypoints, and lithographs. George authored a Catalogue Raisonné titled 'The Illustrated Bartsch, Vol. 51' for Abaris Books in 2017. This comprehensive work explores the etchings of Ferdinand Bol, a prominent 17th-century artist and student of Rembrandt. In 1990, George embarked on a 35-year journey, passionately studying and cataloging Belleroche's captivating lithographs, many of which were unpublished. In 2001, he collaborated with Steven Kern, curator of European art, to facilitate a significant exhibition of Belleroche’s lithographs at the San Diego Museum of Art, where he concurrently held a position as a Trustee. Additionally, George has a keen interest in 17th century English clocks and has contributed articles to Antiquarian Horology on Daniel Quare, a renowned clockmaker of that era. George attributes his early love for art to his mother, Marguerite Shirley Kenney, who took him to many museums during his childhood. Now residing in San Diego, California, George's entrepreneurial spirit has driven him through diverse careers, including roles as an engineer, inventor, venture capitalist, and business coach. Alongside his wife, Olga, he actively participates in the Small Group and Marriage Ministries at Saddleback Church.

For over thirty years, celebrated painter Callum Innes (b. 1962, Scotland) has created his lushly painted and subtly nuanced abstractions in a rectilinear format. In 2022, he added a striking new element to his repertoire: the tondo. To do so required mastering an entirely new set of technical and aesthetic challenges, confronting a form with abundant, historical resonances. This striking volume, richly illustrated with carefully selected images of Innes’s Tondos, and installation views of key exhibitions, explores how Innes has challenged traditional perceptions of shape and form to create dynamic and immersive visual experiences. A pivotal essay by art historian Éric de Chassey traces the artist’s encounters with this form and its progenitors in the history of art, firmly cementing Innes’s breakthrough in the pantheon of significant works rendered in this distinctive formation.Callum Innes was born in Edinburgh in 1962. He lives and works in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Oslo, Norway. He studied drawing and painting at Gray’s School of Art from 1980–84 and completed a post-graduate degree at Edinburgh College of Art in 1985. In 1992, Innes had major exhibitions at the ICA London, and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh. In 1995, he was shortlisted for the Turner Prize and was awarded the NatWest Prize in 1998 and the Jerwood Prize for Painting in 2002. His critically acclaimed museum exhibition, From Memory, travelled throughout Europe and Australia from 2006–08. In 2012, Innes was commissioned by the Edinburgh Arts Festival to transform the Scottish capital’s Regent Bridge with a changing sequence of coloured light, and in 2016, he was the subject of a major retrospective survey exhibition and accompanying monograph, I’ll Close My Eyes, at the De Pont Museum in Tilburg, the Netherlands. In 2018, his first major solo exhibition in France, In Position, took place at Chateau la Coste in Provence, with an accompanying publication. Innes debuted his new series of Tondo paintings at Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, in 2022; this was followed by exhibitions of the Tondo series at Frith Street Gallery, London; Parra & Romero, Ibiza; Galerie Tschudi, Zurich; and Kerlin Gallery, Dublin in 2023. He will have exhibitions at Sean Kelly, Los Angeles, and Kode – Lysverket Museum, Bergen, Norway, in 2024.

Adam Bruce Thomson (1885-1976) was one of the most quietly impactful artists of his generation. Born in Edinburgh, he was among the earliest intake of students to train at the newly established Edinburgh College of Art. He went on to have a long-running teaching career at the College, supporting and encouraging successive cohorts. In his own practice, Thomson worked across a range of media, producing etchings, drawings, watercolours and oil paintings. A committed member of several artist-led societies, he exhibited widely and was well-respected by his peers. To date, however, his contribution to twentieth-century Scottish art remains largely unexplored.Adam Bruce Thomson: The Quiet Path celebrates the achievements of this talented yet modest figure. It provides an in-depth account of his life and career, charting his creative development and examining his role as a teacher, mentor and friend to other artists. The book is fully illustrated, and draws from previously unseen archival material. It accompanies a major exhibition at Edinburgh’s City Art Centre in 2024.

Augustus John & the First Crisis of Brilliance tells the story of a remarkable generation and its artistic achievements. Accompanying Piano Nobile’s exhibition of the same title, the publication explores the artistic networks around Augustus John before the First World War. John was closely acquainted with many of his highly talented contemporaries and this publication considers his relationship to Jacob Epstein, James Dickson Innes, Gwen John, Henry Lamb, Derwent Lees, Wyndham Lewis and William Orpen. The publication includes an introductory essay by Dr David Boyd Haycock discussing Augustus John and the notion of genius. A selection of over forty paintings, drawings and sculptures illuminates some of the key themes at play in John’s milieu, and each work is accompanied by thoroughly researched catalogue entries by Dr Haycock. Themes and subjects include friendship and family portraits, the muses Dorelia McNeill and Euphemia Lamb, and the landscapes of Wales, Provence and Ireland.

Evocative photographs and essay illuminate early American gravestones.Gravestones are colonial America's earliest sculpture and they provide a unique physical link to the European people who settled here. Carved in Stone book is an elegant collection of over 80 fine duotone photographs, each a personal meditation on an old stone carving, and on New England's past, where these stones tell stories about death at sea, epidemics such as small pox, the loss of children, and a grim view of the afterlife. The essay is a graceful narrative that explores a long personal involvement with the stones and their placement in New England landscape, and attempts to trace the curious and imperfectly documented story of carvers. Brief quotes from early New England writers accompany the images, and captions provide basic information about each stone. These meditative portraits present an intimate view of figures from New England graveyards and will be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in early Americana and fine art photography.