Book of the Day Posted Nov 10, 2019

Book of the Day > Mitch Epstein: Sunshine Hotel

Book of the Day > Mitch Epstein: Sunshine Hotel. Published by Steidl/PPP Editions. "America, as a place and an idea, has occupied Mitch Epstein’s art for the past five decades. With the first photographs he made in 1969 at the age of 16, Epstein began confronting the cultural psychology of the United States. Although he started working in an era defined by the Vietnam War, civil rights, rock and roll, and free love, he responded hardily to each radically different era that followed—from Reaganomics to surveillance after 9/11, to the current climate crisis and resurgence of white supremacy. More than a single era or issue, it is the living organism of American culture that engages Epstein; no matter how much the country changes, he describes something mysteriously and persistently American. Conceived of and sequenced by Andrew Roth, Sunshine Hotel assembles 175 photos made between 1969 and 2018—more than half of them previously unpublished. Yet the book is not simply a retrospective. It traces both the evolution of an artist and the development of a country, revealing Epstein’s formal and thematic shifts in tandem with America’s changing zeitgeist and landscape. Sunshine Hotel is a visual immersion that forgoes linearity and a classical layout, as it sets forth Epstein’s evolving understanding of his country’s pathologies and promise."
Book of the Day Posted Nov 08, 2019

Book of the day and book signing/discussion tomorrow (11/9, 4-6 ) > SITE: MARMOL RADZINER IN THE LANDSCAPE

Book of the day and book signing/discussion tomorrow (11/9, 4-6 -- Event Details HERE) > SITE: MARMOL RADZINER IN THE LANDSCAPE. Published by Princeton Architectural Press. Site: Marmol Radziner in the Landscape is the brand new survey of the residential projects of one of Southern California's most creative architectural firms. Combining style with substance, this lavish monograph from Princeton Architectural Press is an engaging document of nineteen homes drawn from twenty years of work. For the event principal partners Leo Marmol and Ron Radziner - who maintain an envious reference library, even by our standards - will discuss the firm's history and projects, and the making of their new book with the West Coast editor of AD, critic and historian Mayer Rus. Come celebrate the publication of Site: Marmol Radziner in the Landscape with Leo, Ron, Mayer, and Arcana on November 9th. If you cannot attend but wish to purchase a signed copy, please place your order here, or call us at 310-458-1499.

"The spectacular houses of Marmol Radziner merge interior and exterior life as they engage the built and natural environment. With lush photography and an expansive format, Site: Marmol Radziner in the Landscape focuses on the evolving relationship between house and landscape, revealing what the architects describe as "the gradual erasure of boundaries between indoor and outdoor" spaces. This collection of nineteen houses, shown in over two-hundred full-color photographs that will make readers swoon, is organized by habitat - desert, urban, canyon, and woodland - and includes projects in Southern California, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and The Netherlands. A foreword by novelist Mona Simpson provides a personal reflection on her experiences in a Marmol Radziner house, while an interview with partners Leo Marmol and Ron Radziner and detailed descriptions of their projects offer insights into the architects' philosophy and process."

Book of the Day Posted Nov 07, 2019

Book of the Day > Lisa Yuskavage: Babie Brood, Small Paintings 1985-2018

Book of the Day > Lisa Yuskavage: Babie Brood, Small Paintings 1985-2018. Published by David Zwirner Books. "Lisa Yuskavage: Babie Brood is the first survey of the artist’s small-scale paintings. While Yuskavage is primarily known for larger canvases, these intimate works offer a new window into her transgressive paintings and complex and influential oeuvre. Based on the artist’s imagination, live models, maquettes, and found and staged photographs, the small paintings in this book demonstrate Yuskavage’s methodical exploration of how images are created and their sources. Some of the small works are studies for large paintings, while others revisit preexisting images. Yet others are one-of-a-kind compositions only created on this intimate scale. As places for experimenting with color, form, and characters as well as a variety of formats—including stretched and unstretched linen, canvas boards, wood, and paper—these paintings play a remarkably dynamic and pivotal role within her work. This catalogue presents the paintings to scale so readers can explore the works as if seeing them in person. Documenting the artist’s exhibition at David Zwirner, New York, in 2018, this catalogue includes an essay by Jarrett Earnest that illuminates Yuskavage’s early influences and explores the constant, often surprising themes that can be found throughout her art."
Book of the Day Posted Nov 06, 2019

Book of the Day > Black Lives 1900: W.E.B Du Bois at the Paris Exposition

Book of the Day > Black Lives 1900: W.E.B. Du Bois at the Paris Exposition. Published by Redstone Press. "At the 1900 Paris Exposition the pioneering sociologist and activist W.E.B. Du Bois presented an exhibit representing the progress of African Americans since the abolition of slavery. In striking graphic visualisations and photographs (taken by mostly anonymous photographers) he showed the changing status of a newly emancipated people across America and specifically in Georgia, the state with the largest Black population. This beautifully designed book reproduces the photographs alongside the revolutionary graphic works for the first time, and includes a marvelous essay by two celebrated art historians, Jacqueline Francis and Stephen G. Hall. Du Bois' hand-drawn charts, maps and graphs represented the achievements and economic conditions of African Americans in radically inventive forms, long before such data visualization was commonly used in social research. Their clarity and simplicity seems to anticipate the abstract art of the Russian constructivists and other modernist painters to come. The photographs were drawn from African American communities across the United States. Both the photographers and subjects are mostly anonymous. They show people engaged in various occupations or posing formally for group and studio portraits. Elegant and dignified, they refute the degrading stereotypes of Black people then prevalent in white America. Du Bois' exhibit at the Paris Exposition continues to resonate as a powerful affirmation of the equal rights of Black Americans to lives of freedom and fulfilment. Black Lives 1900 captures this singular work."
Book of the Day Posted Nov 05, 2019

Book of the Day > From Above; The Story of Aerial Photography

Book of the Day > From Above; The Story of Aerial Photography. Published by Laurence King. "Since the birth of photography, photographers have been taking images of the earth from the air – with spectacular visual results. Celebrating over 150 years of these incredible images, From Above tells the fascinating story of how these pictures were created and the photographers that have propelled image-taking to bold new heights. Taking advantage of the amazing sense of perspective that aerial photography offers, this incredible collection of images also offers a unique overview of the events, challenges, and changes of the past 150 years of human history."

Book of the Day Posted Oct 31, 2019

Book of the Day > Art of the Devil: An Illustrated History

Book of the Day > Art of the Devil: An Illustrated History. Published by Cernunnos. "The Art of the Devil is a beautiful book showcasing the past and present portrayal and manifestations of the Evil One in Western and Eastern art and a richly illustrated account of the history, symbols and manifestations of the devil in the collective imagination of the past and the present. The book features artistic masterpieces, engravings, ancient documents, books, posters, postcards, tarots, album covers, comics, objects and plenty of oddities related to the world of demons, the occult, and evil. See the devil in art from artists ranging from Hieronymus Bosch and Giotto to Keith Haring and Matt Groening."
Book of the Day Posted Oct 30, 2019

Book of the Day > Long Story Short

Book of the Day > Long Story Short. Published by Fraenkel Gallery. "A surprising and unconventional slice of photography’s history, Long Story Short is also an abbreviated tour of Fraenkel Gallery’s approach to photography. Published to mark the gallery’s 40th (and still counting) year, this sumptuously designed and printed volume presents work by photography’s masters alongside that of little-known artists and anonymous thrift shop finds. Among the images to be discovered here are Eadweard Muybridge’s 1887 study of a contortionist performing extreme body movements; Man Ray’s 1923 ghostlike rayograph of an irradiated banjo; and a female impersonator applying her lipstick backstage, as seen by Diane Arbus in 1959. Interwoven among these are anonymous photographs of a tornado touching ground near Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts, in 1896; astronaut Buzz Aldrin standing beside an American flag on the moon in 1969; and a lawn mower flying inexplicably over a meadow in 1974. Presented in approximate chronological order, the unconventional flow of images conveys a profound sense of photography’s infinite riches, and is a meditation on the inexhaustible possibilities of the medium itself."
Book of the Day Posted Oct 29, 2019

Book of the Day > Sneakers X Culture: Collab

Book of the Day > Sneakers X Culture: Collab. Published by Rizzoli Electa. "The ubiquitous sneaker is the canvas upon which so many defiers of convention--artists, musicians, athletes, and celebrities--have sought to make their mark and through the sneaker contribute to a unique identity and attitude among sneakerheads everywhere. Collected here are the best sneaker collaborations with the biggest makers--Adidas, Converse, Nike, Puma, Reebok--featuring nearly one hundred famous, infamous, and lesser-known partnerships. Museum-quality photographs of each sneaker are accompanied by visuals collected from the archives of sneaker makers, as well as ephemera such as design sketches and drawings illustrating the creative process. Author Elizabeth Semmelhack has conducted interviews with many collaborators, including an extensive Q&A with Chris Hill, design manager of Reebok, who has worked with Pyer Moss, Cam'ron, and many others.In her introduction, Semmelhack explores the history of collaborations, starting at the beginning with Jack Purcell, whose sneakers remain virtually unchanged today. More than eighty sneaker collaborations are featured, including Virgil Abloh (ten styles!), KAWS, Pharrell Williams, Bobbito Garcia, Damien Hirst, Jeremy Scott, Eminem, Supreme, Chanel, Missoni, Rihanna, Missy Elliott, Dr. Woo, and Fear of God.
Book of the Day Posted Oct 27, 2019

Book of the Day > Sandy Skoglund

Book of the Day > Sandy Skoglund. Published by Silvana Editoriale. "Jersey City–based photographer and installation artist Sandy Skoglund (born 1946) constructs sets featuring handmade sculptures and human characters, achieving the idea of a total work of art. In this way, her works are at once installations, sculptures, collages and, finally, photographs. Edited by the great Italian curator Germano Celant, this comprehensive monograph, comprised of more than 400 images, compiles Skoglund’s photography, a discipline she broached in the 1970s, while in New York, in order to document her work. Ranging from the earliest photographic series of the mid ’70s (which already feature the characteristic themes of the domestic setting and its transformation into a place of apparitions between the comical and the unsettling) to previously unpublished photographs that the photographer has recently created. Also included are specimens of the strange creatures that inhabit her photographs, the colorful sculptures of foxes, fish and other animals that play as foils to the otherwise everyday scenes of her tableaux."
Book of the Day Posted Oct 25, 2019

Book of the day and book signing tomorrow, Sat 10/26, 3-5! > California Romantica by Diane Keaton

Book of the day and book signing tomorrow, Sat 10/26, 3-5! > California Romantica by Diane Keaton.  Published by Rizzoli. “California Romantica features the most important, yet rarely seen, residential exemplars of the California Mission and Spanish Colonial styles, by such noted architects as George Washington Smith, Wallace Neff, Richard Requa, Lilian Rice, and Paul R. Williams, among others. From whitewashed stucco walls and cloistered patios to tile roofs and sumptuous gardens, each house shown is a rare masterpiece, splendidly appointed with authentic Monterey furniture, California tile, and Navajo rugs. Among the magnificent seaside estates, canyon villas, and courtyard bungalows shown is Diane Keaton’s former home in Beverly Hills, which she thoughtfully restored with noted designer Stephen Shadley, and for which she has been recognized as a committed preservationist. She brings her cinematic eye, a keen sense of natural drama, and a profound appreciation for the nuances of shadow and light to the elucidation of these buildings, through the selection of specially commissioned photography. Authoritative text by D. J. Waldie lucidly explicates the architecture and provides an intimate tour of a historic and distinctly Californian lifestyle.”

 

Please note that at the publisher's request:  Ms. Keaton will only be signing copies of California Romantica purchased from Arcana for the event. We trust you understand and not bring along other treasures you may have to be signed.  Photographs with Ms. Keaton behind the signing table will not be permitted. ales will be limited to two books per customer.

 

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