Edina Adam

Julian Brooks

A richly illustrated, comprehensive introduction to the visionary artist William Blake. William Blake (1757–1827) is a universal artist—an inspiration to musicians, poets, performers, and visual artists worldwide. By combining his poetry and images on the page through radical printing techniques, Blake created some of the most striking and enduring images in art. His personal struggles in a period of political terror and oppression; creativity, inventiveness, and technical innovation; and vision and political commitment keep his work relevant today. Featuring over 130 color images, this accessible yet comprehensive introduction to Blake’s achievements and ambition includes discussions of his legacy in America; relationship to the medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque artists who preceded him; visionary imagination; and unparalleled skill as a printmaker.

Visionary

William Blake

Why is a cross-eyed man from the small town of Cento in northern Italy now regarded as one of the greatest draftsmen of the seventeenth century? Featuring important Guercino drawings from the Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery, London, and the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, this volume looks deeply into the nature of the artist’s extraordinary talent for drawing.

Mind to Paper

Guercino

Ashmolean Museum

Artistic activity was high during the Florentine Late Renaissance as drawings came again to be revered on their own.

Drawing in Florence C.1600

Graceful and True

One of the most important series of drawings in late-sixteenth-century Italian art--the twenty large sheets by Federico Zuccaro (ca. 1541-1609) showing the early life of his older brother, Taddeo (1529-1566)--was acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1999. Never fully published, the series shows Taddeo's trials and tribulations as a young artist trying to achieve success in Renaissance Rome, and his eventual triumph. The drawings contain charming details of the life of a struggling artist and reveal much about the younger brother, Federico, a successful artist in his own right. This volume--published to coincide with an exhibition at the J. Paul Getty Museum to be held from October 1, 2007, to January 6, 2008--presents Federico Zuccaro's twenty drawings and accompanying poems in their historical and artistic context and will be of interest to art historians and general readers alike. Of particular importance is its examination of the role of the copying of masterworks in the training of young Renaissance artists.

Artist-brothers in Renaissance Rome

Taddeo and Federico Zuccaro

Xavier F. Salomon

Denise Allen

The great Renaissance artist Andrea del Sarto (1486–1530) rivals Leonardo da Vinci as one of history’s most accomplished draftsmen. Moving beyond the graceful elegance of his contemporaries, such as Raphael and Fra Bartolommeo, he brought unprecedented realism to his drawings through the rough and rustic use of chalk in his powerfully rendered life and compositional studies. With an immediacy few other Renaissance artists possess, del Sarto’s work has proven to be inspirational and compelling to later audiences, with admirers such as Degas and Redon. This lavishly illustrated book reveals del Sarto's dazzling inventiveness and creative process, presenting fifty core drawings on paper together with a handful of paintings. The first publication to look to del Sarto’s working practice through a close examination of his art from across all the world’s major collections, this volume analyzes new studies of his panel underdrawings as well. The depth and breadth of its research make this book an important contribution to the study of del Sarto and Florentine Renaissance workshop practice. This volume is published to accompany an exhibition on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum from June 23 through September 13, 2015, and at the Frick Collection in New York from October 6, 2015, though January 10, 2016.

The Renaissance Workshop in Action

Andrea del Sarto

Emily J. Peters

Carel van Tuyll

Marjan Scharloo

A new perspective on the brilliance of one of Western art's most celebrated visionaries through an esteemed collection of drawings The works of Michelangelo (1475-1564) remain an enduring source of awe and fascination more than 500 years after his death. Michelangelo:Mind of the Master offers a new context for understanding the drawings of one of art's greatest visionaries. Through a group of drawings held since 1793 in the Teylers Museum and once in the eminent collection of Queen Christina of Sweden (1626-1689), this book sheds new light on Michelangelo's inventive preparations for his most important commissions in the realms of painting, sculpture, and architecture. Among other works, the volume features preliminary designs for some of the artist's best-known projects, including the Sistine Chapel ceiling and the Medici Chapel tombs. Essays in the volume further explore the history and fate of Michelangelo's drawings during his life, as well as the role of Queen Christina and her heirs in amassing a group of drawings that are among the best preserved by the master today.

Julian Brooks

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