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Showing 161 - 180 of 1273 items
The lonely city: adventures in the art of being alone
By Olivia Laing. 2016
Writer recounts her own experiences in moving to New York City in her mid-thirties and interweaves those with analyses of…
depictions in art of solitude and loneliness in a city setting. Discusses the lives of the artists behind the works and the ways solitude influenced their art. 2016Seeing is forgetting the name of the thing one sees: over thirty years of conversations with Robert Irwin
By Lawrence Weschler. 2009
Author of Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder (DB 41918) recounts decades of conversations with artist Robert Irwin (born 1928), discussing…
Irwin's personal history, artistic process, and the business of art. Highlights Irwin's transformation from painter to installation artist specializing in light and light-distorting media. 2008Contemporary Cartoon Creators series: Books 1-4 (Contemporary cartoon creators)
By Stuart A. Kallen. 2016
Four cartoon artist biographies. Highlights their personal and professional challenges and successes, and how their animated creations emerged as popular-culture…
icons. Includes: Matt Groening and The Simpsons, Seth MacFarlane and Family Guy, Stephen Hillenburg and SpongeBob SquarePants, and Trey Parker, Matt Stone, and South Park. For grades 6-9. 2015Letters to Véra
By Vladimir Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov. 2015
Collection of letters between writer Vladimir Nabokov and his wife Véra, covering the period of their first meeting in 1923…
to the year before his death in 1977. The letters are full of the man's love for his wife, but also the sharp observations of the novelist. Translated from the Russian. 2014The trip: Andy Warhol's plastic fantastic cross-country adventure
By Deborah Davis. 2015
Profile of artist Andy Warhol (1928-1987) and an account of the road trip he took from New York to California.…
Describes artistic and business influences of Warhol, his personal relationships, and the works he accomplished. Argues that this trip was a pivotal point in his career progression. 2015Listening to stone: the art and life of Isamu Noguchi
By Hayden Herrera. 2015
Author of Frida (DB 55556) profiles Japanese-American sculptor and landscape architect Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988). Describes the influence of his dual…
heritage and childhood in Japan on the development of his art, his family and personal relationships, and his major works of art and architecture. 2015It's what I do: a photographer's life of love and war
By Lynsey Addario. 2015
Memoir by winner of the Pulitzer Prize and MacArthur Foundation "Genius Grant" for her work in photojournalism. Addario (born 1973)…
details her early life and how an off-hand present from her father led to her career. Describes ways she found recognition by capturing conflicts across the world. Violence. Bestseller. 2015Elsa Schiaparelli: a biography
By Meryle Secrest. 2014
Biography of fashion designer Schiaparelli (1890-1973). Details her childhood in Italy as the daughter of an aristocratic and intellectual family,…
her personal and professional relationships, the development of her fashion career between World Wars I and II, and her legacy. 2014Michelangelo: a life in six masterpieces
By Miles J. Unger, Miles Unger. 2014
Journalist examines the life of Renaissance Italian artist Michelangelo Buonarotti (1475-1564) through the lens of six of his works: the…
Pietà, his statue of David, the Creation of Adam ceiling fresco in the Sistine Chapel, the Medici tombs, The Last Judgment, and the Basilica of St. Peter's in Rome. 20141000 years of joys and sorrows: A memoir
By Ai Weiwei. 2021
NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS &’ CHOICE • In Ai Weiwei&’s widely anticipated memoir, &“one of the most important artists working…
in the world today&” ( Financial Times ) tells a century-long epic tale of China through the story of his own extraordinary life and the legacy of his father, the nation&’s most celebrated poet. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Time • BookPage • Kirkus Reviews • &“With uncommon humanity, humbling scholarship, and poignant intimacy, Ai Weiwei recounts a life of courage, argument, defeat, and triumph. His is one of the great voices of our time.&”—Andrew Solomon Hailed as &“an eloquent and seemingly unsilenceable voice of freedom&” by The New York Times, Ai Weiwei has written a sweeping memoir that presents a remarkable history of China over the last hundred years while also illuminating his artistic process. Once an intimate of Mao Zedong and the nation&’s most celebrated poet, Ai Weiwei&’s father, Ai Qing, was branded a rightist during the Cultural Revolution, and he and his family were banished to a desolate place known as &“Little Siberia,&” where Ai Qing was sentenced to hard labor cleaning public toilets. Ai Weiwei recounts his childhood in exile, and his difficult decision to leave his family to study art in America, where he befriended Allen Ginsberg and was inspired by Andy Warhol. With candor and wit, he details his return to China and his rise from artistic unknown to art world superstar and international human rights activist—and how his work has been shaped by living under a totalitarian regime. Ai Weiwei&’s sculptures and installations have been viewed by millions around the globe, and his architectural achievements include helping to design the iconic Bird&’s Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing. His political activism has long made him a target of the Chinese authorities, which culminated in months of secret detention without charge in 2011. Here, for the first time, Ai Weiwei explores the origins of his exceptional creativity and passionate political beliefs through his life story and that of his father, whose creativity was stifled. At once ambitious and intimate, Ai Weiwei&’s 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows offers a deep understanding of the myriad forces that have shaped modern China, and serves as a timely reminder of the urgent need to protect freedom of expressionHotel Florida: truth, love, and death in the Spanish Civil War
By Amanda Vaill. 2014
Traces the intertwined destinies of three influential couples in the turmoil of Madrid in 1936: author Ernest Hemingway and journalist…
Martha Gellhorn; photographers Robert Capa and Gerda Taro; and the Spanish Foreign Press Office's Arturo Barea and Ilsa Kulcsar. Violence. 2014Flappers: six women of a dangerous generation
By Judith Mackrell. 2014
Profiles six notable women who personified the changing mores of the 1920s: actresses Tallulah Bankhead and Diana Cooper, poet and…
heiress Nancy Cunard, painter Tamara de Lempicka, author Zelda Fitzgerald, and dancer Josephine Baker. 2013The inventor and the tycoon: a Gilded Age murder and the birth of moving pictures
By Edward Ball. 2013
Author of The Genetic Strand (DB 66508) examines the intertwining lives of photographer Edward Muybridge (1830-1904) and San Francisco railroad…
baron Leland Stanford (1824-1893). Details the events surrounding Muybridge's trial for killing his wife's lover and his collaboration with Stanford on early motion pictures. Some violence. 2013American mirror: the life and art of Norman Rockwell
By Deborah Solomon. 2013
Author of Jackson Pollock: A Biography (DB 27937) examines the life and work of Norman Rockwell, preeminent illustrator for the…
Saturday Evening Post. Examines Rockwell's struggles with depression and the ways the disorder influenced his work. Chronicles the evolution of visual journalism from illustration to photography and television. 2013Hanging man: the arrest of Ai Weiwei
By Barnaby Martin. 2013
Profile of artist Ai Weiwei (born 1957), who consulted on the Beijing National Stadium--a.k.a. the Bird's Nest--for the 2008 Summer…
Olympics. Details his April 2011 arrest by Chinese officials and subsequent eighty-one-day incarceration, during which he was held without charges. Discusses his artistic and political influences. Some strong language. 2013English professor details the lives of Joe Shuster (1914-1992) and Jerry Siegel (1914-1996), the creators of the first comic book…
hero. Explores their early years in Cleveland, creation of the famous character during the Great Depression, and lives post-Superman. 2013Caravaggio: a life sacred and profane
By Andrew Graham-Dixon. 2011
Biography of painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610). Chronicles his formative years in Milan, time in Rome, exile to the…
island of Malta, and his death at the age of thirty-eight. Examines his preferred subjects of religious scenes using everyday models, including prostitutes and the poor. Some violence. 2010Banksy: the man behind the wall
By Will Ellsworth-Jones. 2013
Biography of the graffiti artist known as Banksy details his early work in Bristol, England; the success of his Oscar-nominated…
film Exit through the Gift Shop; and his efforts to maintain his anonymity. Explores the culture of outsider art and Banksy's place in it. Young adult appeal. 2012Biography of Seattle photographer Edward Curtis (1868-1952), who in 1900 became enamored of Native American culture. Sponsored by J.P. Morgan,…
Theodore Roosevelt, and others, Curtis spent three decades living with different tribes, creating films, and producing the twenty-volume publication The North American Indian. Discusses Curtis's legacy. National Book Award. 2012Historian examines the life of William Francis Gibbs (1886-1967), who designed some of the most famous ships in American naval…
history. Details his development of World War II Liberty ships and refitting of military ships for commercial service. Relates the creation of Gibbs's greatest achievement: the SS United States. 2012