Isms: Understanding Art - Hardcover

Little, Stephen

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0789312093 ISBN 13: 9780789312099

Publisher: Rizzoli Universe, 2004

Synopsis

Revised Edition, Updated 2017

Isms: Understanding Art is the perfect pocket-sized guide for gallery and museum lovers who have a general interest in the arts, but not necessarily any formal education in the visual arts. With this portable and indispensable tool in hand, anyone can guide themselves through the world's prestigious museums and major art collections and recognize and intelligently discuss the significant movements that have shaped the world of art.
Using an informative and engaging style with informal and direct tone, each of the numerous "isms" that are used to define-but often misleadingly cloud-art movements are explained in simple terms and made accessible to the casual art lover. Readers are encouraged to think of styles as useful tools for conversation and exploration rather than as hard and fast academic definitions, and to relate to the art itself rather than to a merely conceptual idea.
Each spread is devoted to a single art historical period and begins with an introduction that explains when the movement first emerged, the historical period to which it applies, and the principal disputes over its applicability, usefulness, or significance. The rest of the chapter is divided into several sections illustrating the most important artists and works within the period, related key words, and illustrations that best represent the distinctive features. This comprehensible structure makes it possible for any reader to gain a clear understanding of Classicism or Cubism while sitting in a cafe or visiting a gallery.

About this title

About the Author

Steven Little contributes articles and reviews to a number of fine art magazines and journals. He specializes in postwar British art and sculpture and is currently Web Editor for The Royal Academy of Arts in London.

Reviews

Art history is divided into schools and movements, or "isms"--a suffix meaning practice or process--from classicism to naturalism to conceptualism, categories even the most informed of art lovers would be hard pressed to list or define. Enter Stephen Little of the Royal Academy of Arts in London and . . .Isms, a welcoming and cogent primer of Western art trends. Little helpfully identifies four types of isms: trends specific to the visual arts (perspectivism), broad cultural trends (romanticism), artist-defined movements (cubism), and retrospectively named movements (mannerism). He then moves forward chronologically, deftly defining more than 50 isms, naming key artists, and showcasing splendid examples. Donna Seaman
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Edition details

• Publisher: Rizzoli Universe
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0789312093
• ISBN 13: 9780789312099
• Binding: Turtleback
• Number of pages: 160