Whitford, Frank. Livres

Mit seinem einzigartigen zeichnerischen Stil und der Ablehnung konventioneller Schönheitsideale war Egon Schiele (1890-1918) ein Vorreiter des Wiener Expressionismus und zählt zu den beeindruckendsten Porträtmalern des 20. Jahrhunderts. Unter dem Einfluss seines Mentors Gustav Klimt begann Schiele zunächst im glitzernden Jugendstil, entwickelte jedoch bald eine raue, provokante Ästhetik mit harten Linien, grellen Farben und ausgezehrten Figuren. Seine Porträts und Selbstporträts schockierten die Wiener Gesellschaft durch erotische Posen und eine bis dahin unerreichte psychologische und sexuelle Intensität. Oft kauern er oder seine Modelle, die sowohl klapperdürr als auch stark und sinnlich sein konnten, mit gespreizten Beinen und sichtbaren Genitalien am Boden und starren den Betrachter an. Viele Zeitgenossen empfanden seine Werke als nicht nur hässlich, sondern auch moralisch verwerflich, was zu einer kurzen Inhaftierung wegen „Verbreitung unsittlicher Zeichnungen“ führte. Heute wird Schiele für seine revolutionäre Menschendarstellung und seinen unverkennbaren, fieberhaften Zeichenstil gefeiert. Dieses Buch beleuchtet anhand ausgewählter Werke seine kurze, aber intensive Karriere und seinen enormen Einfluss auf die moderne Kunst, der sich auch in den Arbeiten zeitgenössischer Künstler wie Tracey Emin und Jenny Saville widerspiegelt.

Reproduces Bauhaus designs alongside writings of the group members themselves, including Klee, Kandinsky, Gropius and Breuer. Tracing the development of the movement, it provides insights into the theories and practices of these artists, as well as a picture of a period in Germany's history.

Introducing the concepts and techniques of art as well as the work of some of history's most celebrated artists, this book is a triumph of paper engineering, using flaps, pop-ups and 3D models to demonstrate key ideas. Including a separate activity book, the set is ostensibly aimed at older children but is an entertaining look at the history of art for people of any age. Age 9+

Gustav Klimt's work brilliantly negotiates the borders between the traditional and the modern, the figurative and non-figurative. His subtly erotic portraits, richly patterned landscapes and enigmatic allegorical compositions are at once sensuous and refined, while his extravagant, ornamental style verges on abstraction. Obliged to go his own way when he was denied public commissions, Klimt became the leader of the modernists in Vienna, perhaps the greatest portraitist of his age, a landscape painter of dazzling originality and, above all, the creator of extraordinary decorative schemes. Frank Whitford examines the artist's work against the background of his time - the tragic final years of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In the light shed by political and cultural history, Klimt's paintings and personality emerge with new clarity.

An accessible history of the Bauhaus, tracing the ideas behind its conception and its highly influential teaching methods. The aesthetic of our contemporary environment, including everything from housing estates to furniture and newspapers, is partly the result of a school of art and design founded in Germany in 1919, the Bauhaus. While in operation for only fourteen years, shut down by the Nazis in 1933, the school left an indelible mark on design and the practice of art education throughout the world. Placing Bauhaus into its sociohistorical context, Frank Whitford traces the ideas behind the school’s conception and describes its teaching methods. He examines the activities of the teachers—who included eminent artists such as Paul Klee, Josef Albers, and Wassily Kandinsky—and the daily lives of the students. Reissued and revised to mark the centenary of the founding of the Bauhaus, this is an accessible introduction to perhaps the most significant design movement of the last hundred years.