The Artist and the Garden (The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art) - Softcover

Strong, Roy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0300111169 ISBN 13: 9780300111163

Publisher: Paul Mellon Centre BA, 2005

Synopsis

This extraordinarily beautiful book gathers together and examines for the first time a delightful collection of English gardens rendered by artists from 1540 to the early nineteenth century, many of which are unknown. Sir Roy Strong, widely recognised for his expertise in both art history and garden history, surveys garden pictures ranging from Elizabethan miniatures to eighteenth-century alfresco conversation pieces, from suites of paintings of a single garden to amateur watercolours. He inquires into the origin of the English garden picture genre, its development prior to the invention of photography, its greatest exponents, its reliability as historical evidence of actual gardens, and its place within the larger European tradition of picturing the garden.

About this title

About the Author:

Sir Roy Strong is former director of the National Portrait Gallery in London and of the Victoria and Albert Museum. He is now a full-time writer, broadcaster, consultant and gardener. Among those he has assisted in his capacity as a garden consultant are the Prince of Wales, Gianni Versace and Elton John.

From Booklist:

Strong offers a bounty of fascinating, beautifully reproduced images of gardens both real and fanciful as he surveys and elaborates upon the significance of engravings, paintings, and drawings that depict English gardens up to the time of John Constable's masterful landscapes. He begins his scholarly yet accessibly study with an exploration of the representation of the garden as an aristocratic status symbol, then considers the emblematic meaning of gardens. Ultimately, Strong reveals how the literature and culture, horticultural styles and artistic trends of the times effected changes in both garden design and in art. Alice Joyce
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About this edition

• Publisher: Paul Mellon Centre BA
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0300111169
• ISBN 13: 9780300111163
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304