Alex Potts

Winckelmann's writing has a richness and density that take it well beyond the bounds of the simple rationalist art history and Neo-classical art theory with which it is usually associated. He often seems to speak disturbingly directly to our present awareness of the discomforting ideological and psychic contradictions inherent in supposedly ideal symbolic forms.

Winckelmann and the Origins of Art History

Flesh and the Ideal

Potts also offers a detailed view of selected iconic works by sculptors ranging from Antonio Canova and Auguste Rodin to Constantin Brancusi, David Smith, Carl Andre, Eva Hesse and Louise Bourgeois - key players in modern thinking about the sculptural. The impact of minimalism features prominently in this discussion, for it disrupted accepted understanding of how a viewer interacts with a work of art, thereby placing the phenomenology of viewing three-dimensional objects for the first time at the center of debate about modern visual art."--Jacket.

Figurative, Modernist, Minimalist

The Sculptural Imagination

J. Paul Getty Museum

Vinzenz Brinkmann

Jan Stubbe Ostergaard

Marco Collareta

There has been a persistent tradition of enlivening sculptures with color. This book presents five essays on polychromy in classical Greek through contemporary sculpture, along with discussions of over 40 extraordinary polychrome sculptures.

Polychromy in Sculpture from Antiquity to the Present

The Color of Life

Christoph Cox

Ulrich Loock

Peter Pakesch

Liz Kotz

Max Neuhaus

Branden W. Joseph

In 1977, Max Neuhaus turned a triangle of pedestrian space between 45th and 46th Streets in Times Square into an island of harmonic sound. The rich textures of that sound continue today, emanating from beneath the sidewalk grating, to anonymously reach an individual's ears as if one has stumbled upon a secret. Known as Times Square, the celebrated installation was restored in 2002 with support from Dia Art Foundation, which further commissioned a site-specific piece, Time Piece Beacon, from Neuhaus in 2006 for its museum in Beacon, New York. This stunning book--the only volume in print dedicated solely to the work of Neuhaus--takes these two projects as a point of departure from which to consider the singular impact this artist has had in establishing sound as a medium in contemporary art. An interview with Neuhaus is complemented with essays by multidisciplinary scholars who investigate and situate his work within a historical context. Distributed for Dia Art Foundation

Times Square, Time Piece Beacon

Alexander Nemerov

Celeste Olalquiaga

Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute

Ernst van Alphen

Mieke Bal

Serge Guilbaut

Joanne Morra

Akira Mizuta Lippit

Marc Gotlieb

Clark Conference

Sina Najafi

Reva Wolf

W. J. Thomas Mitchell

With essays by Ernst van Alphen, Mieke Bal, Marc Gotlieb, Serge Guilbaut, Michael Ann Holly, Akira Mizuta Lippit, W. J. T. Mitchell, Joanne Morra, Sina Najafi, Alexander Nemerov, Celeste Olalquiaga, Alexander Potts, and Reva Wolf The discipline of art history is in a moment of self-consciousness, and art historians are increasingly more self-reflexive about their practices. In this volume, thirteen authors address both the philosophical and practical issues now facing those in the visual arts field by investigating the ever-pressing issue of research. Their essays explore the remarkable nature of art historians' personal, political, aesthetic, creative, and emotive curiosity and the process of doing research in the archive, library, studio, gallery, museum, and beyond. As such, the book considers the pleasures and dangers of researchers' obsessions and encounters with the incoherence, chaos, and wonder that lie at the heart of searching for the not-yet-known. The volume is based on the 2007 Clark Conference of the same name.

Obsession, Archive, Encounter

What is Research in the Visual Arts?

Somewhere, in an isolated corner of Western Europe, Carl and Rita rent a house on stilts. Due to the pressures of spending so much time only in each other's company, cracks in their relationship start to appear. To relieve the pressure and secretly hoping to meet someone he can look up to who will take him on as an apprentice, Carl embarks on a search for the last remaining practitioner of an ancient local tradition. His quest brings him to a craftsman who is very different to the type of man he was hoping to find. Animator and illustrator Alex Pott's first long-form graphic novel is a psychological drama and a coming-of-age tale, where the protagonist is too old to come of age, doesn't experience any personal growth and is instead pushed to the brink of his sanity...

It's Cold in the River at Night

Alex Potts

Books

Your next favorite book is out there