A Dictionary Of Arts

"Excellent, concise . . . highly recommended." —Choice This extensively illustrated dictionary provides information on over 2,500 artists, paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints, schools and movements throughout the world, including entries on contemporary art and artists, techniques, materials, terms, and writers who have influenced artists.

With the advent of abstract expressionism in the 1940s, America became the white hot center of the artistic universe. Now, in The Oxford Dictionary of American Art and Artists, the first such volume to appear in three decades, Ann Lee Morgan offers an informative, insightful, and long overdue resource on our nation's artistic heritage. Featuring 945 alphabetically arranged entries, here is an indispensable biographical and critical guide to American art from colonial times to contemporary postmodernism. Readers will find a wealth of factual detail and insightful analysis of the leading American painters, ranging from John Singleton Copley, Thomas Cole, and Mary Cassatt to such modern masters as Jackson Pollack, Romare Bearden, and Andy Warhol. Morgan offers razor-sharp entries on sculptors ranging from Alexander Calder to Louise Nevelson, on photographers such as Berenice Abbott, Man Ray, Walker Evans, and Ansel Adams, and on contemporary installation artists, including video master Bill Viola. In addition, the dictionary provides entries on important individuals connected to the art scene, including collectors such as Peggy Guggenheim and critics such as Clement Greenberg. Morgan also examines notable American institutions, organizations, schools, techniques, styles, and movements. The range of coverage is indeed impressive, but equally important is the quality of analysis that appears in entry after entry. Morgan gives readers a wealth of trustworthy and authoritative information as well as perceptive, well-informed criticism of artists and their work. In addition, the book is thoroughly cross-referenced, so readers can easily find additional information on any topic of interest. Beautifully written, filled with fascinating historical background and penetrating insight, The Oxford Dictionary of American Art and Artists is an essential one-volume resource for art lovers everywhere.

The first reference work devoted to their lives and roles, this book provides information on some 200 artists' models from the Renaissance to the present day. Most entries are illustrated and consist of a brief biography, selected works in which the model appears (with location), a list of further reading. This will prove an invaluable reference work for art historians, librarians, museum and gallery curators, as well as students and researchers.

More than 4000 entries on furniture, glass, rugs, porcelain, pottery, silver, pewter, brass, ivory, jade, tapestries, leatherwork, plastics, basketry, wallpapers, semi-precious stones, etc.