Parkstone Press

The climax to the act of love casts an indefinable expression on the face--an expression of urgent intensity. A women, a man, in that moment experiences an ecstasy that for an instant is visible in the eyes and on the lips. A wave of pleasure runs through the body, marking the transition between desire and orgasm. For this fleeting second, when just how violent the sense can be is laid bare, the person immediately before or the person immediately after. With the help of prints and etchings from former centuries, author Hans-Jurgen Dopp looks for an explanation of this very personal mystery that leads to fulfillment.

Bonnard, Vuillard, Roussel and Denis were the most distinguished of the Nabis, a Post-Impressionist artistic group that formed in the late 19th century. However, an increasing individualism in their art often threatened the groups unity, and their work started to diverge. This publication lets readers compare and put into perspective the artists within this fascinating group. Magnifying everyday scenes and landscapes in harmonious compositions, the paintings of the Nabis will appeal to art students and art lovers, but also to a wider audience.

Arts &, Crafts was a unique movement which triggered a veritable reform in the applied arts in England. Founded by John Ruskin, then put into practice by William Morris, the Arts &, Crafts Movement promoted revolutionary ideas in Victorian England. The work of artisans and designers thus became the heart of this new ideology, which influenced styles throughout the world, translating the essential ideas of Arts &, Crafts into design, architecture and painting.

  At the end of the 19th century, Alphonse Mucha created a sensation throughout the streets of Paris through his posters representing the French actress Sarah Bernhardt. It was an overnight sensation and announced the new artistic style and its creator to the citizens of Paris, Art Nouveau. This brought fame and reputation to the poster artist. However, Mucha’s talent was never confined to lithography. Shading the world with a colorful sensuality, Mucha’s art expresses itself as much on the monumental decorative panels of a living room as on small delicate China pieces. The author enables us to discover all the richness and variety of this fin-de-siècle artist.

  According to the defined canons of art technique, a portrait should be, above all, a faithful representation of its model. However, this gallery of 1000 portraits illustrates how the genre has been transformed throughout history, and has proven itself to be much more complex than a simple imitation of reality. Beyond exhibiting the skill of the artist, the portrait must surpass the task of imitation, as just and precise as it may be, to translate both the intention of the artist as well as that of its patron, without betraying either’s wishes.Therefore, these silent witnesses, carefully selected in these pages, reveal more than faces of historic figures or anonymous subjects: they reveal a psychology more than an identity, illustrate an allegory, serve as political and religious propaganda, and embody the customs of their epochs. With its impressive number of masterpieces, biographies, and commentaries on works, this book presents and analyses different portraits, consequently exposing to the reader, and to any art lover, a reflection of the evolution of society, and above all the upheavals of a genre that, over 3 centuries of painting, has shaped the history of art.

From the cave paintings of Lascaux to the Madonnas of the Renaissance Italians, to the caustic canvases of the Pop Art movement, manifestations. Punctuated by extended commentaries of the paintings and biographies of the most influential artists, this work, with its thousand reproductions, contains virtually all of the history of art within its pages. The traditional and the controversial, the mythic and the understated, the quietly subversive and the deliberately challenging-all are presented in this guide, offering a fascinating view of the evolution of painting.