Book of the Day > Isabel Toledo: Fashion From the Inside Out. Published by Yale University Press. "One of the most exciting fashion designers in the United States, Cuban-born Isabel Toledo has been honored with a National Design Award from the Cooper- Hewitt Museum and a Couture Council Award for Artistry of Fashion, given by The Museum at FIT. Yet her name and work are recognized only by fashion insiders. This ravishing book brings Toledo’s creations to a wider audience, places them within the context of contemporary fashion, and examines her creative process. Interviewing Toledo, her husband (fashion illustrator Ruben Toledo), and other colleagues, clients, and critics, Valerie Steele gives an account of Toledo’s career and explains that while she has been heralded by leading fashion magazines and featured in stores in New York and Europe, she has not had the long-term financial backing to break out of the niche market. Patricia Mears investigates the artistic and cultural influences on Toledo’s work and analyzes her unusual methods of construction, noting that she designs in three dimensions in her mind and then begins working directly with fabric. Displaying garments Toledo has created since her first show in 1985, this book is a revelatory exploration of a fashion innovator in a mass-market industry. Out of Print."

Book of the Day > Kathy Butterly: ColorForm. Published by Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art. “ColorForm is the first major monograph on the work of New York sculptor Kathy Butterly (born 1963). Encompassing 60 sculptures and 20 drawings from throughout Butterly’s career, all of which are reproduced here, it focuses mainly on the last ten years of her work. Butterly is well known for her sculptures that challenge the conventions of ceramic tradition through oblique figurations of the body, with shapes that evoke mouths, feet and genitalia. Her work, which stands in historical dialogue with that of Ken Price, Viola Frey and Robert Arneson, engages with the politics of 20th-century femininity even as it leans ever closer to abstraction. The works collected here chart the evolution of Butterly’s sensibilities and philosophical stance, tracking the development of her highly personal yet immediate and accessible ceramic language from explorations of the body to personhood and autobiography.”

Book of the Day > The Secret Language of Flowers: Notes on the Hidden Meanings of the Louvre’s Flowers by Jean-Michel Othoniel. "To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Louvre pyramid, French artist Jean-Michel Othoniel was invited to create a work about the presence of flowers in the museum's eight art departments. Visiting the Louvre’s collections of paintings, drawings, sculptures, embroidery and enamel, the artist photographed the flowers that appeared there. Using these images, Othoniel composed his own original herbarium, accompanied with notes on the secret language of flowers and their symbolism in the history of art. Among the 70 flowers Othoniel compiled in this volume, you will find the thistle in Dürer's self-portrait, the poppy in the Paros funerary stele, the apple sitting on a stool in The Lock by Fragonard and the peony attached to the unfastened blouse of the young woman in Greuze's Broken Pitcher. Also included are lesser-known details in lesser-known works—concealed treasures, hiding in plain sight at the museum. Following a similar format to Othoniel’s previous book about flowers, this volume intersperses photographs and drawings with short texts in a luxurious, eminently giftable book."

Book of the Day > Hildegard von Bingen: A Journey into the Images. Published by Skira. "The illuminations of Hildegard, multitalented visionary and the great predecessor of Hilma af Klint and Emma Kunz Before Hilma af Klint and Emma Kunz, there was Hildegard von Bingen (1098–1179)—the German abbess, composer, writer, artist and mystic, who until now was probably best known, in the English-speaking world, for her music and her writings. Von Bingen completed her first visionary work of art around 1152: Scivias, taken from the Latin phrase Sci vias Domini, or “Know the Ways of the Lord.” Describing 26 of Hildegard’s religious visions in text and a series of 35 miniature illustrations, this series narrates the journey of the humanity in Eve’s womb, represented as bright stars, as it joins with the stars in the sky: a possibility offered to each soul, to return back to the Light. In obedience to the voice of God, von Bingen wrote down her visions in a precious manuscript, with images added to make the story come alive. This volume brings Hildegard's visionary text, in all its dense symbolism and prophetic sweep, alive to contemporary readers. At the core of the book are the manuscript’s 35 miniatures, reproduced at their original size alongside an accompanying key. Each element of the images—colors, frames, forms, numbers—was precisely chosen and leads deeper into the meaning of the work; the key decodes these symbols in each image and concisely describes each vision. A text by musician and scholar Sara Salvadori crosses the entire work, highlighting these interlinking details and revealing Hildegard’s dense, unified design. This volume presents Hildegard von Bingen’s endlessly compelling prophetic text in all its inspired beauty."

Book of the Day > Living with Charlotte Perriand. Published by Skira. "Living with Charlotte Perriand presents a catalog of the great designer’s work, object by object. Her chairs, tables and bookshelves in all their different iterations are seen here both up close and "at home," as installed in the living spaces of collectors. Photographs of both historical and contemporary settings show how Perriand’s furniture stands the test of time and taste. Essays by François Laffanour and Cynthia Fleury provide a deeper insight into Perriand's work and retrace her life and collaboration with other great artists, designers and architects of her time, such as Le Corbusier and Jean Prouvé. Additionally, quotes from Perriand and the collectors who live with her designs are interpersed throughout the book. "