Book of the day > Ecologies of Power: Countermapping the Logistical Landscapes and Military Geographies of the U.S. Department of Defense. Published by The MIT Press. “This book is not about war, nor is it a history of war. Avoiding the shock and awe of wartime images, it explores the contemporary spatial configurations of power camouflaged in the infrastructures, environments, and scales of military operations. Instead of wartime highs, this book starts with drawdown lows, when demobilization and decommissioning morph into realignment and prepositioning. It is in this transitional milieu that the full material magnitudes and geographic entanglements of contemporary militarism are laid bare. Through this perpetual cycle of build up and breakdown, the U.S. Department of Defense -- the single largest developer, landowner, equipment contractor, and energy consumer in the world -- has engineered a planetary assemblage of "operational environments" in which militarized, demilitarized, and non-militarized landscapes are increasingly inextricable.

In a series of critical cartographic essays, Pierre Bélanger and Alexander Arroyo trace this footprint far beyond the battlefield, countermapping the geographies of U.S. militarism across five of the most important and embattled operational environments: the ocean, the atmosphere, the highway, the city, and the desert. From the Indian Ocean atoll of Diego Garcia to the defense-contractor archipelago around Washington, D.C.; from the A01 Highway circling Afghanistan's high-altitude steppe to surveillance satellites pinging the planet from low-earth orbit; and from the vast cold chain conveying military perishables worldwide to the global constellation of military dumps, sinks, and scrapyards, the book unearths the logistical infrastructures and residual landscapes that render strategy spatial, militarism material, and power operational. In so doing, Bélanger and Arroyo reveal unseen ecologies of power at work in the making and unmaking of environments -- operational, built, and otherwise -- to come.”

Book of the day > See Red Women’s Workshop: Feminist Posters 1974-1990. Published by Four Corners Books. "A feminist silkscreen poster collective founded in London in 1974 by three former art students, the See Red Women’s Workshop grew out of a shared desire to combat sexist images of women and to create positive and challenging alternatives. Women from different backgrounds came together to make posters and calendars that tackled issues of sexuality, identity and oppression. With humor and bold, colorful graphics, See Red expressed the personal experiences of women as well as their role in wider struggles for change.
Written by See Red members, detailing the group’s history up until the closure of the workshop in 1990, and with a foreword by celebrated feminist historian Sheila Rowbotham, See Red Women’s Workshop features all of the collective’s original screenprints and posters. Confronting negative stereotypes, questioning the role of women in society, and promoting women’s self-determination, the power and energy of these images reflect an important and dynamic era of women’s liberation—with continued relevance for today.”

Book of the day > The Uses of Photography: Art, Politics, and the Reinvention of a Medium. Published by University of California Press and Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. “The Uses of Photography examines a network of artists who were active in Southern California between the late 1960s and early 1980s and whose experiments with photography opened the medium to a profusion of new strategies and subjects. These artists introduced urgent social issues and themes of everyday life into the seemingly neutral territory of conceptual art, through photographic works that took on hybrid forms, from books and postcards to video and text-and-image installations. Tracing a crucial history of photoconceptual practice, The Uses of Photography focuses on an artistic community that formed in and around the young University of California San Diego, founded in 1960, and its visual arts department, founded in 1967. Artists such as Eleanor Antin, Allan Kaprow, Fred Lonidier, Martha Rosler, Allan Sekula, and Carrie Mae Weems employed photography and its expanded forms as a means to dismantle modernist autonomy, to contest notions of photographic truth, and to engage in political critique. The work of these artists shaped emergent accounts of postmodernism in the visual arts and their influence is felt throughout the global contemporary art world today.”

Book of the day > Make Art Not War: Political Protest Posters from the Twentieth Century. Published by Washington Mews Books. “Two of the most recognizable images of twentieth-century art are Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica” and the rather modest mass-produced poster by an unassuming illustrator, Lorraine Schneider “War is Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things.”  From Picasso’s masterpiece to a humble piece of poster art, artists have used their talents to express dissent and to protest against injustice and immorality. 

As the face of many political movements, posters are essential for fueling recruitment, spreading propaganda, and sustaining morale.  Disseminated by governments, political parties, labor unions and other organizations, political posters transcend time and span the entire spectrum of political affiliations and philosophies. 

Drawing on the celebrated collection in the Tamiment Library’s Poster and Broadside Collection at New York University, Ralph Young has compiled an extraordinarily visceral collection of posters that represent the progressive protest movements of the twentieth Century:  labor, civil rights, the Vietnam War, LGBT rights, feminism and other minority rights.   

Make Art Not War can be enjoyed on aesthetic grounds alone, and also offers fascinating and revealing insights into twentieth century cultural, social and political history.”

Book of the day > All Power: Visual Legacies of the Black Panther Party. Published by Minor Matters. In 1966 Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, two law students at Laney College in Oakland, California, launched The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. Officially active for less than twenty years (1966–1982), the Panthers indelibly pierced the public consciousness, and for many its legacy remains controversial—witness the virulent responses to Beyonce Knowles’ 2016 Super Bowl performance that included an homage to the Panthers through dancers in berets and black leather outfits. That visual—gun-toting, well-dressed black men with berets and gun-toting, well-dressed women with Afros—is what most of mainstream America, if they know anything at all, think of with regard to the Black Panther Party.

This book, All Power: Visual Legacies of the Black Panther Party, evolved from correspondence and conversation with a select list of contemporary black artists who answered the call and submitted work that was from their perspective related to the Party. They include emerging and internationally acclaimed practitioners from around the nation, women and men spanning thirty to seventy years of age.

At a time when the United States feels anything but, this book demonstrates art’s ability to cut through rhetoric, and communicate varying perspectives. The goal of this volume is not so much to add to the study of the Black Panther Party’s history—though it clearly highlights the persistence of its sophisticated visual communication—but to look to its present influence among a variety of significant cultural contributors, and to acknowledge what could still be achieved to the benefit of American society as outlined in their Ten Point program fifty years ago. @minormattersbooks

Book of the day is back for 2017. Book of the day > This is a Calendar with Images of Jumping Cats: By Daniel Gebhart de Koekkoek. Published by Verlag fur Moderne Kunst. " During his travels in recent years, photographer Daniel Gebhart de Koekkoek made a remarkable discovery: It is astonishing how swiftly otherwise unspectacular house cats take off into the air if they think no one is watching them. His images document the sheer acrobatic talent of flying cats in the form of an eternal calendar. " Please note: the word "calendar" is used loosely by the publishers - each page has a month, but the days are not indicated. @verlag_fuer_moderne_kunst

Book of the day > Loewe: Past Present Future. Published by Loewe. “Limited edition book self-published by Loewe; phonebook-size visual history spanning its past, present and future.  The book is edited by fashion and magazine expert Luis Venegas, who was given creative freedom for the project by Jonathan Anderson.

Anderson sees the new Loewe Book as a useful reference tool. ‘It´s not a book to be precious with, it´s a hefty block of paper that´s meant to be used and engaged with, documenting the entire universe of the brand until now, indicating where it stands today and where it might go next’ ". Comes complete with a tiny book of Loewe-logo’d post-it notes to mark your favorite pages (of which there will be many – it’s a beauty). 

Book of the day (and available on the West Coast exclusively at Arcana) > Bruce Weber All-American XVI Wild Blue Yonder. Little Bear Press For the past fifteen years, photographer and filmmaker Bruce Weber has published the independent arts journal “All-American”. During this time, the series has evolved as a celebration of work by photographers, painters, actors, essayists, poets and personalities of note. “All-American” is motivated equally by a desire to connect and to inspire.

The latest installment "includes long-form profiles of Fr. Michael Pfleger, the radical activist priest working to end poverty and gun violence on Chicago’s South Side, and Detective First Grade Terry McGhee, a member of the NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force. Bruce documented a recent road trip across West Texas, and broadens his reflections on the Lone Star State with photographic works by Sid Avery, Toni Frisell, Kelly Delay, Wim Wenders, James Evans, and Richard Miller. The late, great, and largely unknown American fashion designer Bill Whitten is celebrated in a tribute that includes interviews with Elton John, Lionel Ritchie, and an essay by his brother, the contemporary painter Jack Whitten. The environmentalist and artist Zaria Forman shares her process, Biaggio Ali Walsh reflects on the influence and legacy of his grandfather, Muhammad Ali, and Suzanne Myers writes about her architect father Barton Myers’ iconic Santa Barbara residence". As with all of the "All-American"s, the quality of the design, paper and printing is impeccable. Not unlike the previous books, there will be only one printing of this title. @bruce_weber

Jess and Whitney are going toe to toe over who has the best staff picks. In the white corner, wearing blue shoes is Jess. In the black corner, wearing gold shoes, is Whitney. You be the judge. Get ready to rumble in the @habituela v. @wsckaplan gift picks smackdown!

Jess’ picks are knock outs:  Foreigner: Migration Into Europe 2015-2016 / John Radcliffe Studio @johnradcliffestudio, Berenice Abbott: Paris Portraits 1925-1930 / Steidl @steidlverlag, Gerard Petrus Fieret / Ed. Xavier Barral @editionsxavierbarral, LE Bal Justine Kurland: Highway Kind / Aperture @aperturefnd, The Art and Life of Louise Bourgeois/ Monacelli Press @monacellipress,  Ken Price: Drawings / Matthew Marks Gallery @matthewmarksgallery, The Art of Ramiro Gomez: Domestic Scenes / Abrams, The Art of the Hollywood Backdrop / Regan Arts @regan.arts, Alexander Girard: A Designer's Universe / Vitra Design Museum @vitradesignmuseum, Experience / MIT Press, Manus X Machina / The Met. And because she fights dirty, she snuck one more in after the bout was started,  Mark Ruwedel Message from the Exterior / MACK @mack_books. @habituela with dosa-enhanced windows.

Whitney’s picks are the greatest of all time: Deanna Templeton: The Swimming Pool/Um Yeah Arts @deannatempleton @umyeaharts, The Moon 1968–1972 / T. Adler Books @tadler books, Animals That Saw Me Volume Two by Ed Panar / The Ice Plant @edpanar @the.ice.plant, Sar: The Essence of Indian Design / Phaidon, Game Changers: The Unsung Heroines of Sports History by Molly Schiot / Simon & Schuster @theunsungheroines, Gordon Parks: I Am You: Selected Works 1934–1978 / Steidl, Slash: A Punk Magazine from Los Angeles: 1977-1980 / Hat + Beard @hatandbeardpress, dosa glossary a-z, + dosa | Arcana utility pouch @dosaflyingfish, Everything I Want to Eat: Sqirl and the New California Cooking / Abrams @sqirlla, Todd Hido: Intimate Distance: Twenty-Five Years of Photographs, A Chronological Album / Aperture @aperturefnd.

Isabelle H’s taste tends towards the recherché – as her choice of headwear might indicate. Here are her esoteric picks for the cognoscenti in your life: Under The Clouds: From Paranoia To The Digital Sublime/ Serralves, Simone Forti: Thinking with the Body/ Hirmer Publisher , The Machine: As Seen at the End of the Mechanical Age/ Museum of Modern Art, The Course of Landscape Architecture: A History of our Designs on the Natural World, from Prehistory to the Present/ Thames & Hudson, RAVE: Rave and its Influence on Art and Culture/ Black Dog Publishing, Open Systems: Rethinking Art C. 1970/ Tate, Mind over Matter: Concept and Object by Richard Armstrong/ Whitney Museum of Art, Tacet 3 From Sound Space/ Les Presses Du Reel, Hacking Habitat: Art of Control, Information Arts: Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Science, and Technology/ NAi010 Publishers. You can dig into them here.