Bones of the earth, spirit of the land

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Frank Maresca and Roger Ricco

"This book, the most comprehensive survey ever assembled, takes America's rich heritage of vernacular art out of the antiques arena and the specialty museum and into today's art world. A book that crosses over conventional art historical categories, American Vernacular presents hundreds of newly identified and never before published objects, from carnival figures to religious totems, from antique trade signs to the most spectacular examples of carved canes. The book reveals the powerful strains of imagination that have shaped the American visual landscape and continue to nourish cutting-edge artists today." "With over four hundred color photographs and insightful commentary by leading experts, American Vernacular is a thorough and engaging exploration that is essential reading for collectors, artists, and anyone interested in the instinctive creative process."--BOOK JACKET.

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Eduard Hüttinger

"The Swiss artist, designer and architect Max Bill (1908-1994) remains a key figure in Europe's applied arts and is one of Concrete and Constructive art's most influential exponents. Bill's 100th birthday offers the occasion to cast a new glance at his versatile oeuvre; several of the sculptures, paintings, furnishings, use objects and typographies in this book have only rarely been available for viewing. The texts additionally shed light on Bill's artistic environment and document his influence on other artists."--Jacket.

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essays by Dena Merriam and Eleanor Munro

Carole A. Feuerman's sculpture combines superrealist technique with a humanist approach to her subjects. This first monograph on her work is filled with David Finn's dramatic photographs covering two decades of her work, including many enlarged details and multiple views, providing a cinematic, almost three-dimensional experience. The work - in resin, cast marble, bronze, and other materials, often painted - ranges from early erotic reliefs through full-scale sculptures of athletes and nudes. Her women at their toilette are sculptural tours-de-force, yet their intimacy recalls Degas's works on similar themes. Recent fragments and body mappings are experiments with abstraction, deconstruction and conceptualism, at the same time that they explore the emotional life of their subjects penetrating to their spirit. All of Feuerman's work reflects the two aspects of her vision. Her work is motivated by questions about the nature of reality, and her remarkable skill as an artist leads the viewer to the same questions. Yet beyond the simulacrum of reality, Feuerman also manages to convey the feeling behind the intense physicality, the passion and sensuality behind the seemingly mundane pose.

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Mireille Blanchet-Douspis

L'influence de l'histoire contemporaine dans l'¿uvre de Marguerite Yourcenar propose de montrer que, loin d'e tre seulement un e crivain classique qui s'inte resse a l'histoire du passe , Marguerite Yourcenar ne cesse d'e voquer l'histoire contemporaine et en subit nettement l'influence. La confrontation avec les historiens re ve le que Le Labyrinthe du monde refle te avec fide lite les e ve nements politiques, les re alite s sociales et les mentalite s du XIXe me et du de but du XXe me sie cles. Dans la repre sentation des sie cles passe s se profilent tre s fre quemment les pre occupations que vivent les contempora.