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Australian-born art critic Robert Hughes, author of the highly acclaimed study of modern art, The Shock of the New has made his home in the United States for the last 20 years. His latest undertaking, which he calls "a love letter to America," is his most massive: a 350-year history of art in America. Published in association with an eight-part PBS series of the same name, this is no scholarly text. With the same voracious wit and opinionated brilliance that have characterized his criticism for Time magazine, this tour-de-force spans three centuries of events, movements, and personalities that have shaped American society and its art. The reproductions are outstanding; 323 out of 365 are in rich, vivid color. Infinitely entertaining and perceptive, this superb book makes readers feel as if they have discovered a truer, hidden America. It seems certain to become one of the most important works in the art-historical canon.
Book Description
Writing with all the brilliance, authority, and pungent wit that have distinguished his art criticism for Time magazine and his greatly acclaimed study of modern art, The Shock of the New, Robert Hughes now addresses his largest subject: the history of art in America.
The intense relationship between the American people and their surroundings has been the source of a rich artistic tradition. American Visions is a consistently revealing demonstration of the many ways in which artists have expressed this pervasive connection. In nine eloquent chapters, which span the whole range of events, movements, and personalities of more than three centuries, Robert Hughes shows us the myriad associations between the unique society that is America and the art it has produced:
"O My America, My New Founde Land" explores the churches, religious art, and artifacts of the Spanish invaders of the Southwest and the Puritans of New England; the austere esthetic of the Amish, the Quakers, and the Shakers; and the Anglophile culture of Virginia.
"The Republic of Virtue" sets forth the ideals of neo-classicism as interpreted in the paintings of Benjamin West, John Singleton Copley, and the Peale family, and in the public architecture of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Latrobe, and Charles Bulfinch.
"The Wilderness and the West" discusses the work of landscape painters such as Thomas Cole, Frederick Church, and the Luminists, who viewed the natural world as "the fingerprint of God's creation," and of those who recorded America's westward expansion--George Caleb Bingham, Albert Bierstadt, and Frederic Remington--and the accompanying shift in the perception of the Indian, from noble savage to outright demon.
"American Renaissance" describes the opulent era that followed the Civil War, a cultural flowering expressed in the sculpture of Augustus Saint-Gaudens; the paintings of John Singer Sargent, Mary Cassatt, and Childe Hassam; the Newport cottages of the super-rich; and the beaux-arts buildings of Stanford White and his partners.
"The Gritty Cities" looks at the post-Civil War years from another perspective: cast-iron cityscapes, the architecture of Louis Henri Sullivan, and the new realism of Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, the trompe-l'oeil painters, and the Ashcan School.
"Early Modernism" introduces the first American avant garde: the painters Arthur Dove, Marsden Hartley, Joseph Stella, Charles Demuth, Charles Sheeler, and Georgia O'Keeffe, and the premier architect of his time, Frank Lloyd Wright.
"Streamlines and Breadlines" surveys the boom years, when skyscrapers and Art Deco were all the rage . . . and the bust years that followed, when painters such as Edward Hopper, Stuart Davis, Thomas Hart Benton, Diego Rivera, and Jacob Lawrence showed Americans "the way we live now."
"The Empire of Signs" examines the American hegemony after World War II, when the Abstract Expressionists (Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko, et al.) ruled the artistic roost, until they were dethroned by Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, the Pop artists, and Andy Warhol, while individualists such as David Smith and Joseph Cornell marched to their own music.
"The Age of Anxiety" considers recent events: the return of figurative art and the appearance of minimal and conceptual art; the speculative mania of the 1980s, which led to scandalous auction practices and inflated reputations; and the trends and issues of art in the 90s.
Lavishly illustrated and packed with biographies, anecdotes, astute and stimulating critical commentary, and sharp social history, American Visions is published in association with a new eight-part PBS television series. Robert Hughes has called it "a love letter to America." This superb volume, which encompasses and enlarges upon the series, is an incomparably entertaining and insightful contemplation of its splendid subject.
Customer Reviews:
decide for yourself .......2006-03-18
"I don't listen to what art critics say. I don't know anybody who needs a critic to find out what art is." - Jean Michele Basquiat
For anyone who doesn't know, the profession of "art critic" is obsolete. That's why this book gets one star. I picked it up because I was made to believe it was an article of history, or fact if you will; instead what I got was someone trying to tell me what to believe about other people's work. I dictate my own feelings. Hughes' only way of making art is to criticize that of others, yet the very people he criticize, such as Arthur Rimbaud and Jean Basquiat will always have something Hughes will never comprehend, originality.
AMERICAN VISIONS 4 COLONIAL WAY OF THINKING.......2004-09-21
In short, Robert Hughes view on Graffiti Art and artist Jean Michel Basquiat in his book American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America are dismissive. first of all, Graffiti Art evolved outside of an art historical context and it wasn't meant to opperate in it. Hughes says Graffiti art was "short lived." After the 80's art world disposed of graffiti as a trend it still existed in urban environments and is now sadly "still" being appropriated by contemporary western artists today.
Hughes calls Basquiat a "Little Black Rimbaud" and speaks of his work as being "visual monotony of arid overstyling." I think Hughes was speaking about how the work didn't address him or include him and therefore he attacks the artist. By making racist comments such as the one mentioned above one has to consider that Hughes is not only wreckless in his writing but racist in intent!
I think time has also proven Robert Hughes incorrect about Jean Michel Basquiat and Graffiti Art.
New World Symphony.......2004-03-24
I have been a fan of Robert Hughes since I fist saw the television show "Ths Shock of the New" and also his criticism in Time Magazine. In this book, he takes as his subject the epic of the American artisitc experience. In lesser hands this could be a dull topic, but thanks to Hughes's enthusiasm and interesting takes on American life, this subject becomes quite fascinating indeed.
Hughes begins at the beginning and starts off with a discussion of Spanish colonial art of the old west before moving onto the East coast and the founding fathers of American Art (West Copley, Peale and Stuart). When discussing the paintings Hughes ties it in with the politics of the various periods, the literature and even the music, establishing that art does not exist in a vacuum.
I have seem many of the works discussed in this work and found Hughes's insights inspiring in some instances sending off to look up material on them. The strongest sections deal with aside from the early American artists, Cole's The Way of Empire series, the Eakins, Steiglitz, and Masden Hartley.
Although I rate this book with five stars, I did have one or two problems. I would have thought that he might have examined Sargent's technique more thoroughly. I have always noticed that he seems to have a problem drawing hands.
The most profound disagreement that I have with Hughes is over theRegionalist movement of the 1930s. I am afraid I do not share his view of Benton. Rather than put him in the context of socialist realism and nazi art, I would have thought a more natural point of departure would be the discovery (some might say invention) of an early American aesthetic. Benton, Grant Wood and John Curry were more part of this trend than any of the international movement of totalitarian art.
I also disagreed with the section on the abstract expressionists who Hughes likes and I do not, finding them sterile and self-indulgent.
The book concludes with a survey of the art work of the 1980s and 1990s. This is more about commerce and perception and is illustrated by a story of the purchase of Van Gough's Irises. Whether one agress or disagrees with Hughes's judgements, oneis sure to find this survey of American art history stimulating and thought provoking.
A panoramic view of American Art with vivid opinions.......2004-01-02
Dismissing a critic simply because you disagree with him, even violently disagree with him, is to miss the value a critic has. A critic's role is to spark your own thinking and investigation, to encourage us to formulate our own views and develop our arguments for them more explicitly. Letting a critic supply you with your views or to simply reject him because he doesn't confirm your pre-dispositions is a waste of your own reading time as well as the work the critic put into to his work.
Rejecting a critic's views is fine, if you do it with well-formed argument and facts or for explicit aesthetic views and tastes. The whole purpose of affirmation includes the idea of rejection. Just as accepting everything is to accept nothing, making choices on acceptance includes the statement, "No, not this."
Robert Hughes has strong views and has the talent for stating them forcefully. Whether or not you agree with him is almost beside the point. This book is a wonderful tour of American Art from Colonial times through the mid 1990s.
While I don't want to try and state Mr. Hughes' views for him, my reading of this book tells me that when architecture, painting, and sculpture comes from an artist honestly trying to come to grips with his or her views of the world and our living in it, Mr. Hughes considers that a good thing. Whenever that is compromised in favor of social acceptance or whenever an artistic establishment forms to enforce an orthodoxy and muzzle expression he considers that a bad thing.
He also tends to favor actual skill, facility, and even virtuosity in expression (if not necessarily technique) over posing and demanding acceptance. The artist must be able to communicate to others and win an audience and hold them over time to win the author's admiration. Influencing others and having resonance with other artists and other times is also a plus.
The sorry state of art in our time with the dominance of a self-reinforcing elite art establishment in the museums, the shows, and the galleries comes in for a heavy beating later in the book. It isn't a blanket rejection of current art, rather it is a large pin the balloon of recent pretension and I think this is very valuable.
I see this in the book and hope I am saying this correctly in part because I agree with this view. Not every conclusion Mr. Hughes makes is one I find myself endorsing, but as I say, that is beside the point. He has mastered a lot of information, presents us with hundreds of wonderful works to consider, and challenges us to think for ourselves about the issues he raises. I think this is a wonderful service and that this is a wonderful book. I am glad to have it on my shelf to dip into again and again.
What I think is important in American art by R. Hughes.......2001-04-24
In American Visions, Robert Hughes takes on the rather daunting task of summing up the history of American art. While he does not entirely succeed it is a valiant effort. By using nine time periods, Hughes attempts to make the understanding of the art he believes is important easier to digest. The inherent problem lies with the concept of what Hughes deems important. Art is not easily criticized, one man's masterpiece is often someone else's waste of time, and although I admire Hughes' willingness to put himself on the line time after time, I often disagree with his emphasis. Artists like Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper get their due, but many others like Alexander Calder get a fleeting mention. Sculpture and photography are ignored and architecture is dealt with in huge sections and then forgotten until the next period Hughes feels is worth discussing. Hughes also has the annoying habit of referencing a painting and then not have it shown, an example being the Warhol "Electric Chair" pieces that are not presented although they are discussed in some detail. Hughes' vocabulary will have you reaching for a dictionary at some points and wincing at the use of crude descriptions at others ( "Charles Demuth was not a flaming queen" "Mabel Dodge Luhan ...an intolerable b----) Overall this book frustrates as it educates and the combination is irritating to say the least. It just appears that Hughes has just bitten off more than the reader can chew. While it is a starting point for those of us whose art history is sorely lacking it just doesn't satisfy as a reference work; it is more of a critical review of art in America, not the same thing as a history.
Average customer rating:
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100 Great Watercolour Tips
Miranda Fellows
Manufacturer: B.T. Batsford Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Board book
 General
| Instructional & How-To
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Watercolor
| Painting
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0713475234 |
Book Description
This book highlights "mundane" practices that increasingly influence our schools, homes and communities; cameras, "pagers", electronic monitoring instruments, the digital "paper trail" of "cashless" transactions, random drug testing, and "integrity tests". The author journeys back and forth between the justice system and the everyday life of the postmodern to illustrate how the lines between these two spheres of social life are increasingly blurred by the use of new surveillance technologies. Taken together, these surveillance rituals constitute the building blocks of a rapidly emerging society of discipline, one increasingly stripped of personal privacy, individual trust, and a viable public life that supports and maintains democratic values and practices.
Customer Reviews:
A worthwhile and englightening read.......2003-07-09
Though you may not like what you find out. Staples manages to weave sociological theory effortlessly through this engaging book, which details our surveillance culture. His analysis is clear, thoughtful, and full of examples from each of our every-day lives. His ideas have a solid theoretical grounding, but offer an original assessment of what is actually behind all those cameras, all-to-frequent drug tests, rising prison populations and the knowledge that someone is always watching us. Without paranoia or exaggeration, Staples evokes perfectly the surveillance situation in which we are living, explaining how it came about, what it really does for (and to) us, and what's likely to happen in the future.
Book Description
This book suggests that the 'single most important concept is that the photograph is a multiplicity of different things: a way of speaking, a way of showing, a recorded point of view, a piece of visible architecture, a force that is exerted on the viewer, a seduction, a coercion, an exercise of power that has an effect on how the self is fashioned.' Because of all these aspects it provides opportunities for struggle, resistance and change. He argues that photography and institutions that make use of the image as an integral part of their work in a modern culture. Towards this end, he discusses the different uses of photography in this book: advertisement, hoarding-painting, newsphotography, identification, documentary, and 'as a method of interrogating history.'
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Economic Citizens: A Narrative of Asian American Visibility
Christine So
Manufacturer: Temple University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Asian American
| United States
| World Literature
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
Cultural
| Anthropology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Asian American Studies
| Special Groups
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 1592135846 |
Book Description
Economic Citizens argues that Asians have been traditionally imagined as the threat of capitalism gone awry and demonstrates that the logic of economic exchange has been an overlooked but critical means for Asian Americans to negotiate political and cultural equivalence.
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'Poor visibility' : An article from: Boulder County Business Report
Doug Storum
Manufacturer: Boulder Business Information Corporation
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
| Automotive
| Books on CD
| Books on Cassette
| Crime & Criminals
| Current Events
| Economics
| Education
| Foreign Language Nonfiction
| Government
| Holidays
| Law
| Philosophy
| Politics
| Social Sciences
| Transportation
| True Accounts
| Urban Planning & Development
| Women's Studies
General
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| e-Docs
| Formats
| Books
General
| Nonfiction
| HTML
| Formats
| e-Docs
| Formats
| Books
ASIN: B000BCSLSK
Release Date: 2005-09-09 |
Average customer rating:
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Visibility and Power: Essays on Women in Society and Development
Claude Meillasoux ,
Anny Tual ,
Margaret Stephens , and
Soheila Shahshahani
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Marriage & Family
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Women
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Social Groups
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Women's Studies
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0195616820 |
Book Description
Written by scholars from around the world, these nineteen articles--all of which focus on gender relations--provide an international perspective on the anthropology of women. The first section, "Visibility and Invisibility," examines the various social mechanisms used to silence women, with
special attention given to the situation in Iran. "Women, Power and Authority" looks at societies that grant considerable power and authority to women. The concluding segment, "Women and Development," considers the problems faced by women working in development in such countries as Malaysia, India,
Brazil, and Yugoslavia.
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Women and the City: Visibility and Voice in Urban Space
Manufacturer: Palgrave Macmillan
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Rural
| Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Feminist Theory
| Women's Studies
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Women's Studies
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 033377485X |
Book Description
Using case-studies from Oxford to Beijing and Chicago, Women and the City shows women constructing their lives in the urban environment, sometimes working against a system where needs are marginalized. Women are shown as community activists, homeless women, career women, patients, travelers, rock musicians, and workers. The book emphasizes women as active agents, and the contributors include women working in urban management as well as academics from diverse backgrounds.
Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Accident Analysis and Prevention, published by Elsevier in 2007. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Description:
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration web site reports that rear-end collisions in the United States exceed 1.5 million per year, or approximately 23% of all vehicle crashes. Car following behavior and the decision-making habits of drivers seem fundamental to understanding how to avoid these rear-end crashes. The present research aimed to reveal factors that govern car following under conditions of reduced visibility. It employed a KQ-Vection high-fidelity driving simulator to measure the behavior of automobile drivers following a lead vehicle at 13.4m/s (30MPH) or 22.4m/s (50MPH) under three visibility conditions-clear or one of two densities of simulated fog. At the higher speed, fog conditions separated participants into a group that stayed within visible range of the lead car, even though the headway time violated the NHTSA recommendations for the speed involved, and another group that lagged beyond the visible range. Data were compared to the model of Van Winsum for car following (The human element in car following models. Transportation Research Part F 2, 1999). Contrast and image size measurements allowed comparison to a standard contrast sensitivity function and allowed estimation of the JND term in the Van Winsum model.
Book Description
This digital document is an article from National Defense, published by National Defense Industrial Association on February 1, 2003. The length of the article is 1790 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Digital visual-aid technology helps pilots 'own the weather'.(synthetic vision aids landings in poor visibility conditions)(Brief Article)
Author: Sandra I. Erwin
Publication:
National Defense (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 1, 2003
Publisher: National Defense Industrial Association
Volume: 87
Issue: 591
Page: 48(3)
Article Type: Brief Article
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
This digital document is an article from Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association, published by Thomson Gale on September 1, 2006. The length of the article is 6097 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Validation of the Digital Opacity Compliance System under regulatory enforcement conditions.
Author: Michael J. McFarland
Publication:
Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association (Magazine/Journal)
Date: September 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 56
Issue: 9
Page: 1260(7)
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
This digital document is an article from Trial, published by Association of Trial Lawyers of America on February 1, 2003. The length of the article is 4210 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: When poles in the right-of-way are wrong: some utility poles present an unreasonably dangerous condition to drivers. Lawyers can raise the problem's visibility, moving the government and utility companies to take corrective actions.
Author: Dan Christensen
Publication:
Trial (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 1, 2003
Publisher: Association of Trial Lawyers of America
Volume: 39
Issue: 2
Page: 36(7)
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
"Heard any good jokes lately?" You certainly will from Jimmy Pritchard, who has been tending bar in popular New York City establishments for years. He's heard them all. From New York natives to tourists, from professionals to college kids, everyone in the bar has to bring a joke when Jimmy's on. Here is Pritchard's riotously funny collection of more than 400 jokes that is sure to have everyone laughing.
Customer Reviews:
not worth a penny.......2006-12-27
if your over 21 you know every joke in this book,and if you don't it's because it's a dumb joke,and don't even get me started on how long it took to get the thing in the mail,it was sent to me via 4th class even though i paid enough to have it sent 1st class.
Prepare to search.......2006-03-04
There are some very good jokes in this book. However, most of the jokes are very old and are ofpoor quality. If you have the time to go through it, you may find it worth your while because some are good.
NO LAUGHS.......2004-01-17
Wanted to give some laughs to a friend but after reading quite a few pages did not find anything funny. Then, past the book to another friend and did not find it funny either. Sorry!
So maybe he has Elmer's Glue instead of ear wax...........2002-06-22
This is a great collection of jokes, new and old. And even the old ones are presented in a lively, fresh format. The author knows how to spin a yarn, and even make the corniest puns seem funny. Yes, this is a glowing review. The only negative I can think of is that one can flip through the book all too quickly. More, please!
A riot!.......2002-05-09
This is the best collection of jokes I've read! It takes a lot for me to laugh out loud and this book did it! Very difficult to put down!
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- ART OF POCAHONTAS, THE
- Arte Povera: In Collection
- Arts and Learning: An Integrated Approach to Teaching and Learning in Multicultural and Multilingual Settings (2nd Edition)
- Auguste Rodin: Images of Desire, Erotic Watercolors and Cut-outs
- Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, and the Renaissance of Venetian Painting (National Gallery Of Art, Washington)
- Birds and Butterflies Stained Glass Pattern Book: 94 Designs for Workable Projects
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![Car following decisions under three visibility conditions and two speeds tested with a driving simulator [An article from: Accident Analysis and Prevention]](http://g-ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/21R4BR1Z6TL.jpg)
