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ART
- ART: African
- ART: American
- ART: Asian
- ART: Collections, Catalogs, Exhibitions
- ART: Criticism & Theory
- ART: European
- ART: General
- ART: History
- ART: Individual Artists
- ART: Mixed Media
- ART: Popular Culture
- ART: Subjects & Themes
- African Art in Detail
- This book opens with the question: What is African art? The answer is a brilliantly colorful and detailed look at the myriad materials and genres, forms and meanings, cultural contexts and expressions that comprise artistic traditions across this vast and varied continent. Viewing artworks in their contexts—ancient and modern, urban and rural, western and eastern, decorative and functional—the book is nothing less than a virtual tour of African culture.
- Hardcover February 2010
- Gold
- In tracing the history of gold through the ages, this beautiful book showcases the multifarious uses to which the precious metal has been put. Drawing on her own long experience investigating the art and science of metallurgy, Susan La Niece guides readers through the rich history of gold. In detailed images and descriptive text, her book shows us gold over the millennia as coinage, jewelry and ornamentation, high-status vessels, and grave goods; as gifts of distinction, and as radiant symbols in rituals of magic and worship.
- Hardcover December 2009
- Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics, 55/56, Absconding
- Paperback December 2009
- Silver
- The curious course of silver through human history unfolds in this rich and engaging book, accompanied by striking illustrations from the British Museum. From the practical aspects of working silver to its role in magic, myth, and ritual in cultures as disparate as the Vikings and the Bedouins of North Africa, this exquisite book offers a full and fitting reflection of this precious metal’s power to move us.
- Hardcover December 2009
- Dumbarton Oaks Papers 62
- This volume begins with a substantial investigation of the murder of several members of the imperial family during the summer of 337, following the death of Constantine. Among others, are two major articles devoted to well-known Byzantine illustrated manuscripts, the ninth-century Sacra Parallela and the fourteenth-century collection of theological works by the emperor John VI Kanta-kouzenos.
- Hardcover November 2009
- Beyond Surface Appeal
Two essays and a set of original diagrams consider the parameters of the “something beyond” in James Carpenter’s projects. Photographs and extended captions from Carpenter complete this book’s documentation of key projects.
- Paperback November 2009
- Sassetta
- Sassetta, the subtle genius from Siena, revolutionized Italian painting with an altarpiece for the small Tuscan town of Borgo San Sepolcro in 1437–1444. This book solves the three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of this masterwork’s reconstruction and, on a firm scientific foundation, restores it to its vivid historical context.
- Hardcover October 2009
- Ancient American Art in Detail
This latest title in a strikingly beautiful series of collectable books turns our attention to the rich variety of art from the Ancient Americas. Beginning by asking what constitutes Ancient American art, Colin McEwan contextualizes this art in its complexity of form and meaning. The beauty of the smallest details is magnified and contextualized through accompanying essays written by experts in Ancient American art.
- Hardcover June 2009
- Cleopatra and Rome
- In this beautifully illustrated book, we experience the synthesis of Cleopatra's and Rome's defining moments through surviving works of art and other remnants of what was once an opulent material culture. This culture best chronicles Cleopatra's legend and suggests her subtle but indelible mark on the art of imperial Rome at the critical moment of its inception.
- Paperback May 2009
- Catalogue of Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg Museum of Art, Volume 6
The combined Dumbarton Oaks and Fogg collection of Byzantine seals is one of the largest in the world, containing 17,000 specimens. Volume 6 in the catalogue presents the seals of emperors and patriarchs of Constantinople. More than 250 seals are illustrated and accompanied—where appropriate—by a full commentary regarding each specimen’s date, biographical information on its owner, peculiarities of orthography, and iconographic features.
- Hardcover April 2009
- Lighting in Early Byzantium
- This book is the first general survey of lighting in Byzantium. The first part of the book discusses the technology and types of lighting devices and explains their decorative symbolism and social function. The second half illustrates this narrative by drawing on a Dumbarton Oaks exhibition.
- Paperback March 2009
- Arab-Byzantine Coins
- This illustrated handbook presents a concise history of the development of the coinage of the early Arab caliphate in the seventh century. The historical introduction, which includes descriptions of all the basic types, is followed by a summary catalogue of the recently acquired collection of Arab-Byzantine coins at Dumbarton Oaks.
- Paperback February 2009
- The Naked Gaze
- This volume focuses on tropes of visuality and gender to reflect on shifting understandings of the significance of Chineseness, modernity, and Chinese modernity. Through detailed readings of narrative works by eight authors of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the study identifies three distinct constellations of visual concerns corresponding to the late imperial, mid-twentieth century, and contemporary periods, respectively.
- Hardcover January 2009
- Dogs
- The juxtaposition and explanation of images as diverse as Greek pottery, Victorian jewelry, Assyrian sculpture, and Japanese netsuke, illuminates our understanding of the place of dogs in human society around the world. This book explores these cultural expressions and reflections of our deep and long-standing interest in dogs.
- Hardcover December 2008
- The Economy of Prestige
- This is a book about one of the great untold stories of modern cultural life: the remarkable ascendancy of prizes in literature and the arts. James F. English documents the dramatic rise of the awards industry and its complex role within what he describes as an economy of cultural prestige.
- Paperback December 2008
- Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics, 53/54, Spring and Autumn 2008
- Among other articles, this double volume includes: The value of forgery, Jonathan Hay; Affective operations of art and literature, Ernst van Alphen; Betty’s Turn, Stephen Melville.
- Paperback December 2008
- Harvard Art Museum Handbook
- With some 280,000 objects, the Harvard Art Museum is the largest university art museum in the United States. This first handbook of the collections surveys their full scope, from early-Egyptian bronzes and Chinese ceramics to contemporary paintings and prints.
- Paperback November 2008
- Leaves from Paradise
- A pair of leaves recently acquired by Houghton Library presents an opportunity to examine the illuminated sequence composed in honor of John the Evangelist. The richly decorated fragments promise to transform our understanding of the special place of Christ’s “beloved disciple” in 14th-century art, liturgy, theology, and mysticism.
- Paperback November 2008
See also: All Books in ART.