IKEA Hemnes Bookcases do not sag!

This is an update on my previous posts about the introduction of IKEA Hemnes Bookcases into my home last May.

• Hemnes Bookcase x 4 for "The Art Library" #1 - shows you what I bought - the Hemnes 90cm wide bookcase by IKEA. ie the naked version as per IKEA catalogue
• Hemnes Bookcase x 4 for "The Art Library" #2 - RESULT! - this shows you the top two thirds of the first one we made up - loaded with books
• Reviews: Hemnes Bookcases - after the carpentry! - This shows you what three look like together and screwed to the wall to avoid them toppling.  

One year on I continue to highly recommend these bookcases.  They are the most satisfactory purchase I've ever made in terms of quality and cost and housing books.

The bookcases are made of robust wood and have shown absolutely no signs of sagging due to the very heavy weight of my art books during the last 12 months since I got them.

Here's a picture of the top five shelves of a couple of them.  We are talking seriously heavy weight art books.  I stagger just shifting a small pile of them!  As you can see there is absolutely no sagging after a year doing a good job.

Hemnes bookcases do not sag when used for heavyweight art books

It is worth noting that since many of books are oversized I've had to resort to lying them down on their sides so that I am can then make most effective use of the shelves and space available.  It just takes a little longer to get at the one at the bottom of the pile.

I'd rather do it this way than have yet another bookcase so it can look "smarter".  I'm a fan of shelves stuffed full of books and in case would continue to stuff books in them even if I tried being neater/smarter.

All I ask is that I can have a rigorous library categorisation system (I'm nearly there)

Almost a full size view of Bookcase 2
Shelf 1 (top) Botanical Art - Art history on left and instruction on right
Shelf 2: Design and Composition on left and Colour on right
Shelf 3: Coloured Pencils on left and Pastels on right
Shelf 4: Van Gogh and David Hockney - plus misc. small art history books
Shelf 5: Warercolour painting
Shelf 6: Drawing pads, large and small Moleskine and Daler Rowney sketchbooks plus some very big books

You can click the images to see larger images if you'd like to try and read the titles of my books!

Art Bookshop Review: Foyles (Charing Cross Road)

This is a review of the Art Bookshop area on the second floor within Foyles Flagship book store at 113-117 Charing Cross Road in central London. Below you will find a review including photographs of the bookshop.

Foyles Art Books
about half of the shelving in the art section on the 2nd floor of this bookshop

First a note for those who know the Foyles of old and have not visited for some time.

I first started going to Foyles when I was a student in the 70s when it was ran by Christina Foyle.  It was a complete and utter maze interspersed by book stacks on the floor as well as the shelves.  It had the most books of any bookshop in London but finding them wasn't easy and the process of paying for them was completely antiquated and very slow.  As a result, it's one of the few bookshops that has made it into Wikipedia.

Foyles was once listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's largest bookshop in terms of shelf area (30 miles/50 kilometres) and number of titles on display.[1] In the past, it was famed for its anachronistic, eccentric and sometimes infuriating business practices, so much that they made it a tourist attraction.[2]Wikipedia - Foyles Bookshop

However all that was swept away and the shop has enjoyed a complete and comprehensive makeover.  The shelving is now exemplary and shopping for books is a complete pleasure.


RECOMMENDED:  I'd go so far as to say this is probably my bookshop of choice for art books.  The only improvement I can think of would be the addition of a few comfy chairs and a rethink of the location of books on shelves relative to the demographics of its customers!

Name of Art Bookshop: Foyles Bookshop

(Branch) Address: 113-119 Charing Cross Road, London, WC2H 0EB conveniently located for people visiting Oxford Street / Tottenham Court Road / Covent Garden / Leicester Square area.  Two minutes from Tottenham Road Tube station (involves a walk around the CrossRail development between Centre Point and Tottenham Court Road Tube Station

Website: General http://www.foyles.co.uk/ Specific to Foyles Charing Cross Road http://www.foyles.co.uk/Public/Stores/Detail.aspx?storeid=1011 Twitter: @Foyles

Shop hours: Monday - Saturday 9.30am - 9.00pm Sundays 11.30am* - 6.00pm (*11.30am - 12.00pm browsing only) Public holidays 11.00am - 8.00pm: Closed on Easter Sunday and Christmas Day Easter Good Friday and Easter Saturday, normal hours apply; Easter Sunday, closed; Easter Monday, 11am - 8pm

Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7437 5660

Email: customerservices@foyles.co.uk

Of interest to: art students (beginners through to Higher Education); amateur artists; professional artists; art lovers; graphic designers; illustrators; typographers

Major section on Art Theory and Aesthetics Highlights very well laid out with good labelling;  includes a “new books” section specifically for art plus a section on catalogues for current exhibitions absolutely huge section devoted to art history and artists biggest selection of books on art theory that I’ve seen in a long time (this shop is close to a leading art school) good selection of books relating to art instruction targeted at amateur artists very extensive sections devoted to graphics, design, type, illustration and photography a selection of art DVDs - including fictionalised films about artists very wide range of specialist art journals lots of knowledgeable assistants and speedy processing of purchases a very good bookshop for other books as well (the music and history sections kept my other half absorbed for over two hours!) ART DVDs and Catalogues for Current and Future Art Exhibitions specialist shelving features not often seen in art bookshops

Think Again? not for those who like their art “dumbed down” you have to be able to bend down to see the art instruction books - Foyles might like to think about the fact that a lot of (less bendy) older people take up art in their retirement a visit could get expensive - because you see so many books you want! Art Instruction books a little too low for my liking A bit too low for those whose backs and knees don't bend as well as they used to

Art Instruction: Anatomy for Drawing and Portrait/Figure Drawing section Summary: This is the bookshop to go for art books if you like a good selection and you enjoy a better quality art book. I’ve got a very good awareness of art books in print and on offer and I was generally very impressed with the books they’d chosen to stock.  This is a very good place to start if looking for books on a particular art topic.

A New Bookshop and a Move for Foyles


Foyles is due to move to a purpose-built bookshop in the adjacent former Central St Martins building in late 2013 or early 2014. They are now actively involved in planning the design of the new bookshop.

Their leasehold for site of this original bookshop is and other adjacent properties are being marketed for a very considerable sum. One can only surmise that this relates to taking advantage of the development of the new Crossrail station and retail hub at Tottenham Court Road

Other art bookshops

You can read other reviews of Art Bookshops in London in the following posts:

• Botanical Art Bookshop Review - Kew Gardens
• Art Bookshop Review: Waterstones (Covent Garden)
• Art Bookshop Review: Tate Britain Millbank Shop
• Art Bookshop Review: Thomas Heneage Art Books
• Art Bookshop Review: The National Gallery Bookshop

Plus good art bookshops in the UK are listed in Art Bookshops - Resources for Artists

Hemnes Bookcase x 4 for "The Art Library" #2 - RESULT!

This is my review of the Hemnes 90cm wide bookcase by IKEA - bought for my ever increasing library of art books.  In this review, I'm focusing on:

• quality of the bookcase, 
• ease of construction
• whether the art books fit!

This post follows on from Hemnes Bookcase x 4 for "The Art Library" #1 which shows you what the bookcase looks like without any books.

Below you can see the top half of the first of my four new Hemnes Bookcases from IKEA. Three are still in their cardboard packaging and will be erected one at a time over the course of the next week.

IKEA Hemnes Bookcase loaded with art books and sketchbooks
Three more to construct - was it easy?  Yes!
click the image to see a larger image

Summary recommendation

If you've got an extensive library of art books like me, then you also need bookcases.  If you're planning to move and/or prefer non-built in bookcases, I highly recommend the IKEA Hemnes Bookcase on the basis of my experience to date.

For the reasons why see below.

Makingamark's Top 10 Fine Art Books - March 2012

Here's the link to my website - Makingamark's Top 10 Fine Art Books - which has been wholly revised to list the top rated and best selling fine art books in March 2012.

Here are the links to the top rated and best selling books in each of the five sections

• How this list is compiled each month

• *** TOP DRAWING BOOKS ***
• DRAWING - Top Rated Drawing Book in March 2012
• DRAWING - Best Selling Drawing Book in March 2012

• *** TOP PAINTING BOOKS ***
• PAINTING - Top Rated Painting Book in March 2012
• PAINTING - Best Selling Book in March 2012

• ***TOP BOOKS ABOUT ARTISTS***
• ARTISTS: Top Rated Book in MARCH 2012
• ARTISTS - Best Selling Book in March 2012

• *** TOP BOOKS ABOUT ART HISTORY ***
• ART HISTORY: Top Rated Book in MARCH 2012
• ART HISTORY - Best Selling Book in MARCH 2012

• *** TOP BUSINESS BOOKS FOR ARTISTS ***
• THE ART BUSINESS: Top Rated Art Book in March 2012
• THE ART BUSINESS - Best Selling Art Book in MARCH 2012

Makingamark's Top Ten Fine Art Books in January 2012

Find out about the the Top Ten Fine Art Books sold in January 2012 - and which new art books were published.  You can see more about:

• the Top Ten art books in January 2012 in Makingamark's Top 10 Fine Art Books
• the best NEW books in January 2012 in The Best NEW Art Books
• NEW books about drawing in 2012: NEW Books About Drawing
• NEW books about painting in 2012: NEW Books about Painting

Below you can find notes about:

• changes in where I post about the best and newest art books each month
• changes in the marketplaces for book publishing and book retail
• changes in the categories of best and top rated books

Changes to postings about my book listings

Over on Making A Mark, I've highlighted the fact I'm planning a new project on that blog which will focus on the production of books by artists or those working in the art field.

As a result I'm switching the regular monthly posts about art books to Making A Mark Reviews - and this is the first.

Changes in the marketplace

The book market continues to change.  It's very evident that it's now absolutely impossible to ignore the power of Amazon which seems to have ambitions way beyond its present set-up.

Morris Rosenthal has been writing the Self-Publishing 2.0 blog since 2005.  He indicates in Marketplace Sellers Provide 2011 Profit For Amazon (3 January) three important conclusions.  I've provided sub-heads for my readers

#1  Who's the biggest bookseller

 Amazon is now the biggest book retailer, both in North America and overseas,

That's partly because a lot of their business is now done via third party book retailers.

#2  What type of book sells most?

on January 2nd, 2012, the top 20,000 paid Kindle eBooks were outselling the top 20,000 paper books by a wide margin

It's no wonder that the book publishers are pricing their ebooks at a level far in excess of what they cost to produce ie with bigger margins to the publishers.  It would be interesting to know if those margins are being shared with the authors - although I suspect not.  My guess is they're mopping up the cost of the bottom falling out of the printed book market.  However there is a sting over which they have no control........

#3  How important are free ebooks?

In the middle of the range for the top 1,000 Kindle books, it appears that free eBooks “outsell” paid eBooks by a ratio of more than 5:1 .

Free is fine so long as it is also good quality.  Free which is dross only serves to downgrade the listings and submerge the better quality books so they never surface in the Amazon listings.

What I need right now are listings that separate out the free ebooks from the paid or very low priced ebooks.  This is possible on Amazon UK but not amazon.com

Changes to the Amazon listings

Amazon.com continues to present challenges with respect to how to make sense of that site's listings.  As I see it there are three problems

Art swamped by music/entertainment:  Changing the category on Amazon.com to include music and entertainment has done art books no favours whatsoever.  A lot of books which gained a good profile by being included in the top 100 art books now have no chance of getting on the list

The Amazon charts favour new books:  Amazon's focus is sales and they obviously think that the emphasis needs to be on new books.  However rankings which favour latest sales are worthless within the context of the bigger picture.  My analysis of the available data in the past suggests that there are some art books which continue to sell well for a very long time - as well as selling much better than new books.  However it's now far more difficult to identify these due to the way books are now listed.

Which I guess makes my listings a bit more important than I anticipated they might become when I started.

Self-publishing:  The Amazon charts are beginning to become swamped by author driven books - which might be good but for the fact that they are of extremely variable quality - and not necessarily written by the author! I cannot over-emphasise how much complete and utter dross now inhabits the listings!

Those that are being priced very cheaply seem to sell well. That doesn't mean to say they're any good or that they will sell well in the longer term. Some are complete rubbish - take a look inside this one. However cheap and free books seem to be successful at submerging books which deserve to do well - but now find it much more difficult to get into the lists. That just spells more and more problems for the traditional printed book produced by the traditional publisher.

New formats: The charts are also being swamped by the production of old books in new formats. There is no new book only a new format.

In general I'm finding that the Amazon.UK listings are lot less adulterated than the Amazon.com listings, plus they enable me to screen out the free Kindle books. I anticipate that my listings for 2012 might well draw more heavily on the UK pages than hitherto. The listings for January 2012 certainly have a more mid-Atlantic flavour.

Best and Top Rated Books

You can see the Top Ten art books in January 2012 in Makingamark's Top 10 Fine Art Books

I've changed the categories of best and top rated books.  For 2012 they will be:

• Drawing
• Painting
• Artists
• Art History
• Art business

Drawing:  The major story of January 2012 is the way The Art of Urban Sketching: Drawing On Location Around The World has topped both the drawing and painting charts but since it can only top one in my charts, I've gone for drawing.  It also rides high in art history charts but how it justifies that is beyond me!

Painting: James Gurney's Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter continues to be the top rated painting book.  However finding the best seller (given that the urban sketching book could only be top in one category) proved to be a tad more difficult.  In the end I selected a book which was doing well in charts on both sides of the Atlantic.

Artists: Having changed the categories because I was finding books about an artist were straying into painting and art history, I then find that January is not awash with popular or top rated books about individual artists.  There's many more fantasy artists and photographers getting good ratings compared to books about fine artists.

Art History:  I've retired the Hare.  I can't cope with the idea of yet another variation on this theme.  I am BORED with a very small hare with an amber eye.  Interestingly I think people are now buying it because people have bought it and it's a best seller - because when you look at the "wished for" books it's not quite so high!

The Louvre: All the Paintings now becomes the top rated art book in recent times.  I think however it's a book which is ultimately destined for the shelves of libraries.

Art Business:  This section has been home to a curious turn of events.  A new art business book has stormed the rankings for one month only.  Last month's top rated book now languishes at #78 in the best selling art business books - and there have been no more reviews.  I've been thinking why this might be and the only explanation I can come up with is that the glowing reviews did not translate to sales.  I have to say I'm always very wary of books which suddenly have a vast number of 5 star reviews - it never seems quite real to me - unless the individual has a strong and well known track record.

New Art Books

Check out The Best NEW Art Books in January 2012.

It's getting really difficult picking out good new art books is the main conclusion this month.  It's been getting progressively worse each month but it seems to have gone up a notch this month.  The main problem is wading through the books which I won't include in my listings.

However there are LOTS of new drawing and painting books published in January 2012 - some in ebook format for the first time.

I've also updated for

• NEW books about drawing in 2012: NEW Books About Drawing
• NEW books about painting in 2012: NEW Books about Painting
• changes in The Best Art Business Books

Book Review - The Illustrated Herbal by Wilfred Blunt

The Illustrated Herbal by Wilfrid Blunt

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

For those interested in the history of the development of The Illustrated Herbal this is an excellent reference book. Initial indications (from skim reading it on the way home from the RHS Autumn Show at the Horticultural Show where I bought it) are that this book has amazing illustrations from a wide range of herbals - many of which are hundreds of years old. It also has in-depth coverage of the development of the herbal.

The authors are Wilfred Blunt - who wrote the much acclaimed book The Art of Botanical Illustration" - and Sandra Raphael

Very much recommended for all those interested in the history of the development of botanical art - and the the development of the illustrated herbal in particular

View all my reviews on Goodreads
View my resource site A History of Botanical Art

Book Review: 100 Great Artists

Title: 100 Great Artists: A Visual Journey from Fra Angelico to Andy Warhol

Synopsis: A list of 100 artists through the ages. Each artist gets a double page spread, a timeline, two images and a short narrative.  Recently published in the UK

Summary review:  This book is good introduction to great artists for a reasonable price.  There is no definitive list of 100 great artists but this one is a good effort.  It's also a good place to start for those wanting to learn more about the leading artists over time.  Their importance is distilled down to a potted version - but it's a good book for getting a sense of who the artist was, when and where they created art, what their paintings look like and for some - why they were important.

Highlights covers different periods in art history over eight centuries from Giotto in the 13th century to Hockney in the 21st. includes artists from a range of countries useful for a skim review of artists who played a significant role in the development of some aspect of art good quality publication - although not all reproductions first rate however..... ....this is NOT an expensive book (less than £10 from Amazon)

Think Again? artists listed alphabetically rather than chronologically - latter might have been more helpful limited coverage of the twentieth century - probably limited by the publishers budget for images for modern and contemprary artists leans towards a European perspective of art (but does also include non Europeans eg Hopper, Hokusai and Hiroshige) a few odd choices of artists I've never heard of with a limited claim to the top 100 / does not explain the reasons behind all the choices

Who should buy this?: new students of art history those wanting to learn more about leading artists across the ages

Who should not buy this? of limited interest to those wanting specialised information about specific artists unlikely to impress those who know quite a bit about art history

Author: Charlotte Gerlings Publisher / Publication Date: UK - Arcturus Publishing (31 July 2009)  Originally published 2006. USA - Published by Gramercy (February 7, 2006) Amazon link Technical data: Paperback -  208 pages

Book Review: Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico

Title: Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico: A Sense of Place by: Barbara Buhler Lynes, Lesley Poling-Kempes, Frederick W. Turner

Synopsis: Beautifully illustrated, the book accompanies an exhibition of the same name at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico. It reproduces the exhibition's 50 paintings and includes striking photographs of the sites that inspired them as well as diagrams of the region's distinctive geology. The book examines O'Keeffe's work through essays by the three noted authors

Summary review: HIGHLY RECOMMENDED The landscape of New Mexico is just a strong motif in Georgia O'Keeffe's work as her popular flowers.  This book explores the locations she painted in and analyses her approach to her landscape work in New Mexico.  It provides insight into both the character of the place, the painter and the person.

Highlights extremely well researched - the text is as interesting as the images of the places and the paintings comparisons of paintings with photographs of current geology - identifies how little she changed and what elements she emphasised an example of how to 'see' paintings and distill and strip down to something very simple excellent catalogue of the details of all the images included in the book illuminating essays on different topics by the three authors very interesting explanation of the geology of northern New Mexico and the different motifs in O'Keeffe's landscape  excellent reproduction of images high quality production values evident throughout

Think Again? If you like your landscapes green and verdant this may not be for you the geology does not dominate - but if you're not in the least interested in landforms you may find it tedious

Who should buy this? fans of Georgia O'Keeffe's work artists exploring 'place' in their landscape painting people who love the eccentric landforms and landscapes of New Mexico

Who should not buy this? the landscapes are about the geology of the 'badlands' - and may not appeal to people who like their landscapes lush and green

Authors: Barbara Buhler Lynes, Lesley Poling-Kempes, Frederick W. Turner (Publisher)Princeton University Press; 3rd edition Technical data: Publication Date: May 4, 2004 Hardcover (with dust jacket) -  140 pages; ISBN-10: 0691116598 ISBN-13: 978-0691116594

[  See also my post today about Georgia O'Keeffe's landscapes of northern New Mexico on my The Art of the Landscape blog. ]

When Georgia O'Keeffe first visited New Mexico in 1917, she was instantly drawn to the stark beauty of its unusual architectural and landscape forms. In 1929, she began spending part of almost every year painting there, first in Taos, and subsequently in and around Alcalde, Abiquiu, and Ghost Ranch, with occasional excursions to remote sites she found particularly compelling. Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico is the first book to analyze the artist's famous depictions of these Southwestern landscapes.
Princeton University Press

I love books which compare the place 'as is' with the paintings produced by an artist.   I'm also a huge fan of geomorphology and geology so any artist who enjoys landforms always catches my eye.  When they are as accomplished a painter as Georgia O'Keeffe, it would be fair to say I was 'sold' on this book as an idea from the off!

Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico: A Sense of Place by: Barbara Buhler Lynes, Lesley Poling-Kempes, Frederick W. Turner delivered to my expectations and more.

This exhibition catalogue is a really marvellous example of the homework that went into the 2004 exhibition of O'Keeffe's painting of New Mexico at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe - Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico: A Sense of Place.  I'd have loved to have seen this exhibition but unfortunately paid my visit to the Museum some two years later in 2006.

It's extremely well researched and makes the experience of looking at the paintings that much more rewarding.  The locations were tracked down and photographs were taken of the current geology - at which you point you begin to realise how faithful her paintings are to the contour and how wonderfully she extracts and simplifies to produce her wonderful paintings of New Mexico.

The book also includes three essays by people covering different aspects of her life and work.  All of them bring to life the experience of the environment both as a stimuli and as a context for O'Keeffe's paintings.

• Barbara Buhler Lynes, Curator of the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum and organizer of the exhibition, discusses the relationship of the artist's paintings to the places that inspired her and how she reduced and simplified forms to abstract the essence of the place while retaining its inherent beauty.  The juxtaposition of photos and paintings is simply stunning.
• Lesley Poling-Kempes provides a chronology of her years in New Mexico.  She also explains the geology and why there are such intense colours and dramatic shapes within the landscape. As an amateur geologist I found the explanation of the 225 million years of geology in the layers of rocks in the mountains at the back of Ghost Ranch to be absolutely fascinating.   Her explanations of what produced the warm and cool colours will interest anybody who likes to understand the formation of a landscape.
• Frederick W Turner covers her relationship with the land in New Mexico and her somewhat uneasy relationship with locals around Abiquiu and the art communities of both Taos and Santa Fe.  New Mexico is a place to which many artists gravitate however he recalls that when he and his wife first went to live in Santa fe in the mid-1970s there was never any talk of Georgia O'Keeffe who, at the time, was still living at Ghost Ranch.  He explored what he terms "the wall of silence".  It appears O'Keeffe liked her seclusion, belonged to "another world" and had very strict rules about her contacts with the rest of the world.  He speculates also about how O'Keefge developed a strategy for dealing with painting the landscape of the place she found herself in.  Ultimately he finds himself in awe of her work when faced with the motifs she painted

O'Keeffe's style was like walking out on a rocky ledge, I thought, with no room for misstep: either she would estblish dominion or she'd be defeated and the paintings would be botches in which viewers wouldn't be able to sense what she'd dared.....and whatever your ultimate judgement of O'Keeffe's work work might be, there could be no cailing with the profound sincerity of her engagement, here, the danger of it.  For her this had been no playground.

You can buy from Amazon UK by clicking this link 
Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico: A Sense of Place

Book Review: Botany for the Artist

Title: Botany for the Artist: An Inspirational Guide to Drawing Plants

An In-depth Book Review of this book was first published here on 13th April 2010. 
The complete text has now been moved to my new website 
- see Book Review: Botany for the Artist on Botanical Art and Artists

Synopsis: The emphasis of this book is on understanding the botany of plants and their different parts - roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, cones and seeds - and how to draw the botanical aspects of plants. Its focus is on finding ways to unpick and illustrate the functionality of the plant - how it's constructed and how it works.

Summary review: HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. I value the fact this book is written by an artist, writer and lecturer who is an expert in drawing and communicating rather than a botanical artist. It means she brings a fresh and expert eye to the challenge of how to draw plants from a botanical perspective and an excellent approach to communicating the key messages. The quality of the text and illustrations is first class and the whole book provides a fresh perspective on botany for the artist while losing none of the fundamental and enduring truths of what's required of botanical illustration.

Author / (Publisher) Sarah Simblet / Dorling Kindersley
Technical data: Publication Date: February 2010
Hardcover (with dust jacket) - 256 pages; Full retail price £25

The Best Books about Landscape Art - A Review

As part of my new project - The Art of the Landscape - I'm going to be reviewing books about landscape art.
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You are very welcome to collaborate with this project and also contribute book reviews about landscape art books.

Subject to the quality and relevance of any book reviews submitted - via a comment to one of the blogs - the book review post and blog will receive a link from one or more websites - as detailed below:

• The Art of the Landscape Blog - my new blog set up specifically for this project
  
• The Art of the Landscape Ning community - membership is invitation only at present. One of the learning aims is to create a database of relevant links to good quality information.
  
• Making A Mark reviews
  Close
  - where I summarise the book reviews done by other people
• The Best Books about Landscape Art which is developing a list about the best books about landscape art
  

Please note that spam will not be published.

One of the most popular art instruction books for landscape artists
Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting
by: John F. Carlson

Book Review - Two main themes

This Book Review of Books about Landscape Art has two main themes:

1. art instruction books - which are targeted at people who want to learn more about how to create landscape art
2. art history books - which focus more on the development of landscape art and famous landscape artists (past and present)

Review and rate - things to highlight and do in your book review

This is intended to be a collaborative project - and you are invited to review your favourite landscape art books.

You can read about lots of different approaches to reviewing books in my suggested guide to reviewing books which you can find here - How to write a book review

This is my suggested framework for a very basic system to use when reviewing. Do leave me a comment if you think it can be improved

If possible, it would be helpful if every review covers the following:

Review the book

1. Basics: State basic facts about the book: title, author, publisher; the intended target audience for the book.
   
2. Content: Express your opinion about the content and give reasons for your views.
3. Communication: Say how well the author gets the main messages across. Bottom line - Is it a good read? Did you absorb what s/he had to say?
4. Presentation: Does it look good / does it feel good / does the binding do a good job?
   
5. Value for Money: Is it good value for money?
6. Overall quality: Would you recommend it? If not, why not? If yes, who would most benefit from reading the book?
   

Rate your book!

Finally, after making it clear who you think the book is aimed at, try and decide whether it rates:
5 stars - go out and buy this book right now if you have the money. In your opinion, an essential book for anybody seriously interested in drawing and/or learning more about landscape art
4 stars - a seriously good book about landscape art; definitely one you want to own at some point - maybe one for the Christmas present list if you're broke
3 stars - good effort but nothing which really distinguishes it from other books. It's just this author's take on the basics. The sort of book which is good while you are reading it but doesn't stick in your memory.
2 stars - undistinguished in your view. For example: content may be a rerun of previously published books and/or remixed with a new front cover; presentation may not be particularly noteworthy.
1 stars - buying this book would damage your wallet but is unlikely to enhance either your knowledge, skills or enjoyment. It may also hurt your eyes! (Unfortunately there are a few of these out there - although I'm assuming we've probably weeded through a few of these without buying!)

At the end of all this we'll have a poll and try and work out which are the very best of the best books about landscape art!

Please leave a comment and share your views if:

• you've done a book review. (Please highlight your blog post and the relevant URL below.)
  
• You want to also highlight a relevant book review done by somebody else. (Please highlight your blog post and the relevant URL below.)
• If you've got a view about which is the best book about landscape art

The Best Books about Landscape Art

Do you want to learn about landscape art? Do you want to find out which which are the best books about painting landscapes? Do you want to know more about famous landscape artists? This site covers books - and book reviews - for people wanting to learn more about landscape art.

Book review: Private Lives of the Impressionists

Title: Private Lives of the Impressionists

Synopsis: This is a group biography; it provides a narrative of the story behind the famous paintings. It's a book which covers the lives of the Impressionists - Monet, Manet, Pisarro, Cézanne, Renoir, Degas, Sisley, Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt before, during and after the creation of their group. It charts the development of Impressionism within the context of contemporaneous development in Paris and the Parisian art world. The focus is very much on the birth of Impressionism and finishes in 1883 with the death of Manet.

Summary review: RECOMMENDED This is a very dense book covering a large number of artists and has lots going on. It's scholarly and knowledgeable but a light read at the same time. I found it took a little getting into until I was clear about all the relationships between the different artists. Charting the overall relationships is also what marks this book out as being different from other biographies of the individual artists. However the author writes well, I enjoyed reading the book, didn't want to finish and would happily read it again. Knowing more about the circumstances in which artists produced their paintings helped me look at both artists and paintings in a new light. I would have liked to have been able to read more about how the artists developed during the rest of their artistic careers after 1883. Maybe that's another book?

Highlights comprehensive overview of the birth of Impressionism includes all the main artists associated with Impressionism identifies all the various relationships between the different artists a huge amount of detail suggesting lots of meticulous research details the impact on the artists of current events in France - such as the Franco-Prussian war

Think Again? Is Manet an Impressionist? Discuss.........

Who should buy this?: Artists interested in Impressionism Art Historians Teachers of art history - to find out how to make art history come alive! Students of art history

Who should not buy this? People with no interest in art history or Impressionism

Author / (Publisher): Chatto Windus (Hardback)

Technical data: Technical data: Publication Date 2006 (hardback); 2007 (paperback): Hardover - 368 pages Paperback 352 pages; ISBN-10 0099458349: ISBN-13 978-0099458340: I read the paper back version. Covers vary depending on editions.

What the book covers

• it covers the lives of all the Impressionists - Manet, Monet, Pisarro, Cézanne, Renoir, Degas, Sisley, Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt before, during and after the creation of their group

Timeline of the Impressionists - Wikimedia

• it also highlights the other people who are important to the story of the Impressionists - such as painters Caillebotte and Bazille, the art dealer Durand Ruel (who established the market for Impressionism in the United States as well as in Europe) and the paint merchant Tanguey also get pretty good coverage.
• it describes the environment of the places where they lived, frequented and painted as they were at the time which has provided for me a whole new perspective of certain of the works.
  
• This is also a story of the Paris which had been transformed by Baron Haussman and of the impact of the Franco-Prussian war - which had a major impact on more than one of the painters - the siege of Paris in 1870-71, the establishment of the Paris Commune and the emergence of the Third Republic.
  
• it tells the stories of the Salon des Beaux Arts and the first Salon des Refuses in 1863 and exhibitions by the Impressionists (minus Manet) starting in 1874, 1876, 1877, 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882 and 1886 and the relative success of each of the painters in different contexts
  
• you gain insight into their familial and fraternal relationships - and the very many difficulties associated with the class system of the time without having to read a detailed biography of individual painters. This highlights some of the oddities such as the fact that both Manet and Cezanne had wives and children who were not known to their families.
• For Americans, there is an interesting chapter towards the end of the book which tells the story of how Durand Ruel opened up the market for Impressionist paintings in New York.
  
• The focus of the book is on the birth of Impressionism rather than about everything that happened to the Impressionist Painters. It more or less finishes in 1883 around about the time of the death of Manet - however this it does leave scope for another book! At the moment, an epilogue provides a very abbreviated summary of what happened next for each if the painters
  

UK Paperback Book Cover (Vintage House)
detail from Self Portrait in his Atelier by Claude Monet

Why I recommend this book

This book covers a critical period for a number of the different painters who became known as the Impressionists. It's incredibly dense and covers a huge amount of detailed information in a way which speaks of comprehensive and meticulous research.

What makes this book different for me is the articulation of the various relationships between the different painters. So often books about the Impressionists tend to list them as individuals and comment on their works in the same way. This book focuses much more on the connections and the way they supported and influenced once another. It's an invaluable insight also into how a group with common motivations can support one another through different challenges and emotional and financial difficulties - and there were quite a few of those!

It also gives a very good insight into just how long it took some of these painters to become successful and just how financially stretched they were at times.

I am particularly enjoying the way in which Roe provides an insight into the incredibly different characters and personalities of the painters. I am repeatedly left wondering quite how some of them came to be members of the same group.

I like the way the book discusses how specific paintings came into being. The index is good because you can look up a specific painting by title and check out what it says - so it's good if you also want to use it as a reference source. Unusually for a paperback, this book also provides two sections of colour plates of paintings which feature in the text.

It's also a really great index for tracking down particular events. In fact the notes and index - which make up around 20-25% of the pages of my paperback persuade me that this is a very well read, well researched and well organised author! It's brilliant for providing you with references to sources if you want to pursue some particular aspect of one of the painters.

One of the surprising by-products of reading this book is that I now feel I understand far more about what happened in Paris and France in the second half of the 19th century than I ever did
while studying late 19th century European History at school!

Now I know I've succeeded in making it seem incredibly academic - but the reality is that this book is an incredibly easy read. Roe has a gift as storyteller. She has been able to take dry facts and convert them into a narrative which is always interesting - even when it takes you down paths you're not quite expecting.

I also think this book would be a terrific read for anybody currently facing challenges associated with the credit crunch and the recession. Reading about people facing very similar difficulties somehow helped to remind me of the enduring themes and challenges of life.

There really is nothing new under the sun - except when somebody has a bright idea about how to apply paint!

Note (1) A similar post first appeared on Making A Mark on 4th November 2008
Note (2) about the author: Sue Roe is a freelance writer and teacher. A former Lecturer at the University of East Anglia, she is the author of a novel, Estella, Her Expectation, a collection of poems, The Spitfire Factory, and Writing and Gender: Virginia Woolf’s Writing Practice. She is also co-editor of the Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, and her most recent book is the widely praised Gwen John: A Life. She lives in Brighton.

Book Review: The Art Atlas

Title: The Art Atlas

Author / (Publisher): John Onians (Laurence King)

Technical data: Publication Date: May 2008 352 pages; 300 illustrations and 300 maps in full color; CD-included ISBN-10: 1856695573 ISBN-13: 978-1856695572

Synopsis: The first work to treat the art of the whole world from prehistory to the present day through the extensive use of maps. It places an emphasis on art as a visual expression of the story of different cultures at different times. Covering painting, sculpture and architecture as well as other arts and artefacts, The Art Atlas provides an entirely new vision of the history of the world's art by showing how physical and political geography has shaped its developments.

Who should buy this?: Art Historians and teachers and students of art history. People (like me) who love art AND maps.

Who should not buy this? Those with no interest in art history or how art has developed over time and in different cultures. People who don't like maps and/or cannot read a map.

Highlights Maps showing how art flowed between towns, countries and cultures. Expert comment from art historians, archeologists, anthropoligists and people expert in a particular region Very well illustrated provides an excellent context for studying different artists, different art movements and the art of different cultures and countries A reference book forever! Comes with a CD which includes a searchable form of the entire book

Think Again? Not a book you are ever going to digest in a hurry!

Summary: This is a large tome for people who want to get to grips with a geographical and cultural overview of how art has developed across cultures, countries and over time. What I like about the book is that it does try to embrace all of art. What makes it unsatisfactory is that in so doing it inevitably has to skim across the surface of some of the artists and aspects of art with which we might be more familiar. In doing this it made me realise just how much I didn't know! Which, as I indicated earlier, means I can see this book being around as a reference book for some years to come. I recommend people read what interests them and then see where that takes them.

This is a summary of my comprehensive book review posted on Making A Mark earlier this year. See Book review: The Art Atlas for more information and detail about this book.

Here's a flavour of what my book review talks about

What I have how ever grasped is that this book appeals to the geographer in me (all those maps - heaven!) and that it tries to get to grips with explaining the flows between different parts of the world at different times in world history in visual terms. Thus it conceptualises art as a global phenomenon rather than something which is totally discrete and tidy (like "European Art") which is often the way art history can tend to be presented at times - even if this can be rather inaccurate.

Note
Professor John Onians, BA, PhD, FSA. specialises in architecture, especially the architectural theory of the Italian Renaissance; painting, sculpture and architecture in Ancient Greece and Rome; material culture, metaphor and thought; perception and cognition, and the biological basis of art. His publications include Art and Thought in the Hellenistic Age (Thames & Hudson) and Bearers of Meaning. The Classical Orders in Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Cambridge University Press, 1988), which was awarded the Sir Banister Fletcher Prize in 1989. He is also the founding editor, in 1978, of the prestigious journal Art History.

Book Review: The Art of Impressionism

Title: The Art of Impressionism: Painting Technique and the Making of Modernity

Author: (Publisher): Professor Anthea Callen (Yale University Press Published: 15 November 2000)

Technical data: ISBN 13: 9780300084023 ISBN 10: 0300084021

Physical properties Format: Hardback; Number of pages: 240; Width: 245.00 mm; Height: 310.00 mm; Thickness: 27.00 mm; Weight: 2010.00 g

Synopsis: This magnificent book is the first full-scale exploration of Impressionist technique. Focusing on the easel-painted work of Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, Cezanne, Cassatt, Morisot, Caillebotte, Sisley, and Degas in the period before 1900, it places their methods and materials in a historical perspective and evaluates their origins, novelty, and meanings within the visual formation of urban modernity. Browse the contents page here and here.

Who should buy this?: People who like the Impressionists a lot and/or are really interested in how they painted

Who should not buy this? people who aren't willing to search high and low for it! people who aren't interested in the Impressionists

Highlights well researched detail about context and practice in the past details what the Impressionist artists used for paint, what sort of canvases and grounds they painted on, how they applied their paint, where and in what sort of conditions they painted and finally whether and how they varnished and framed their works the very best photography of Impressionist paintings and small sections of them that I have ever seen in a serious art book many reproductions of paintings I've never seen before in any other book an opportunity to really examine the nature and quality of the mark making corrects the views some people have of Impressionist painters a fantastic glossary and very detailed bibliography and endnotes

Think Again? academic language used - typical of a university level text now apparently out of print and may be very difficult to get hold of the price you may now need to pay to get hold of a copy

Summary / Recommendation: I highly recommend The Art of Impressionism: Painting Technique and the Making of Modernity for anybody who, like me, likes the work of Impressionist painters and is also fascinated by the preparation and process behind the making of their art.

My purpose in posting is to update a post in February 2008 on my Making A Mark blog - The Art of Impressionism and associated painting techniques. Click the link to read my detailed book review - which is summarised above.

The painting on the front cover is part of "Boulevard des Capucines" by Claude Monet painted in 1873.
80.4cm x 60.3 cm
Nelson-Atkins Museum collection
According to Prof. Callen it was painted
on a 'horiziontal landscape no 25' canvas.

Drawing on scientific studies of pigments and materials, artists’ treatises, colormens’ archives, and contemporary and modern accounts, Anthea Callen demonstrates how raw materials and paintings are profoundly interdependent. She analyzes the material constituents of oil painting and the complex processes of “making” entailed in all aspects of artistic production, discussing in particular oil painting methods for landscapists and the impact of plein air light on figure painting, studio practice, and display. Insisting that the meanings of paintings are constituted by and within the cultural matrices that produced them, Callen argues that the real “modernity” of the Impressionist enterprise lies in the painters’ material practices. Bold brushwork, unpolished, sketchy surfaces, and bright, “primitive” colors were combined with their subject matter—the effects of light, the individual sensation made visible—to establish the modern as visual.

UPDATE

This very worthwhile book is now out of print and apparently copies are difficult to locate. Personally I think it is a book which is well worth owning. However if you want to acquire a copy you need to buy it now or you might not be able to buy it at all.

These are the libraries in the UK which have a copy.

If you want to purchase a copy then:

• EITHER you may need to try hunt it down off the Internet - and this may take some time
• OR you could be paying very high prices on the Internet - Amazon for example has book sellers in the US quoting prices from $400-600+. In the UK it was originally priced at £45.
  

This is also an excellent book to use as an example for telling your nearest and dearest why very good art books - packed full of information and expert comment - are a really a very worthwhile investment! :)

Plus we also need to let publishers know which books need to be reprinted! I'm off to write a note to the Yale University Press!

Note: Many thanks to Caroline Oakley, who's an Adult and Community Learning Tutor, who wrote to let me know that this book is now out of print.

Book Review: Art - the definitive visual guide

Title: Art: The Definitive Visual Guide

Author: by Andrew Graham-Dixon (Author, Editor) (Dorling Kindersley 1 October 2008)

Technical data: Hardback, 252 x 301mm, 62 pages ) ISBN-10: 1405322438 ISBN-13: 978-1405322430 Robust production values indicate this is a book which is not about to fall apart - which is very reassuring given the number of pages!

Synopsis: Covers 700 artists in a 540 page chronological overview of the history of art relating to different cultures and the main periods of art history from prehistory to the present day. According to the author/editor, the purpose of this book is as straightforward as its "does-what-it-says-on-the-tin" title. Its aim is to open, to the general reader, a thousand doors into a thousand different experiences of art - and by doing so, to make the wold of the museum and art gallery, church and cloister, temple and mosque, both more enjoyable and more accessible.

Who should buy this?: People who want to know more about the history and development of art

Who should not buy this? Those bored by art history or any art from unfamiliar lands and cultures

Highlights includes an introduction about how to look at art a book which is packed full of high quality reproductions of 2,500+ paintings and sculptures artists grouped into different genres or movements enabling a better understanding of the wider context individual and important paintings examined in depth provides an overview and timeline of the lives of notable artists summary reviews of how different artists have tackled specific genres of painting

Think Again? some major gaps in the art covered - eg very little mention of Russian artists lacks a section on 'how to look' at contemporary art lacks a decent index of all the artists covered by the book - by section would benefit from an overview of the best museums to see the art highlighted in the book

Summary: This is essentially a visual guide. The text is informative and succinct but does not provide an in-depth discussion of art in different periods. In 600+ pages, this book succeeds in giving a very good flavour of each art movement, art period, art culture and an awful lot of artists. It's a very good book for introducing people to art across the ages and different cultures. A primer for those wanting to learn more about the history of art and suitable for all students - young and old. Andrew Graham Dixon suggests it can be used as a work of reference, a bluffer's crib or a guide and companion on a path to exploring art.

You can read my detailed review Book Review: Art - the definitive visual guide which was first published on Making A Mark

Art Bookshop Review: Thomas Heneage Art Books

Lots of excellent art history books
all photos copyright Katherine Tyrrell

This is a review of a shop selling art history books. It's also a shop which I shall definitely be going back to. Yesterday I visited Thomas Heneage Art Books and walked away with two excellent books - one a Tate Publishing catalogue of the 1998 retrospective exhibition of John Singer Sargent at the Tate Gallery and a 1984 book providing an overview of Pastels and pastel artists from the 16th to the 20th century by Genevieve Monnier.

Name of Art Bookshop: Thomas Heneage Art Books

Address: 2 Duke Street, St James's, London SW1Y 6DJ

Website: Thomas Heneage Art Books http://www.heneage.com

Shope hours: Monday to Friday 9.30am to 6pm, otherwise by appointment (closed public holidays).

Telephone: +44 (0)20 7930 9223

Of interest to: art lovers, students of art history, gallery owners, art dealers, art exhibition visitors, art students and art teachers

Highlights: my idea of a good bookshop - three rooms with books everywhere! an excellent range of high quality art history books about various artists - published at various dates and in various languages ad hoc selection of international exhibition catalogues from past exhibitions; strong on 'landmark' exhibitions all books in excellent condition new publications focus on very specialised topics very helpful staff

Think Again? not for those seeking a cheap book - although prices are fair no art instruction books

Summary: This is the bookshop to go to if: you love art history books you're trying to track down an art history book or catalogue that you want.

Exterior of shop at 42 Duke Street

Thomas Heneage Art Books was founded in 1977. The business focuses on selling art books. We specialize in books for the art market, our core business being in catalogues raisonnés, monographs and international exhibition catalogues. It is our policy to stock the most authoritative book on any subject and in any language, irrespective of its being new or second hand.

I'm never averse to stepping over the threshold of an art bookshop. However shops in the "very posh" St Jame's area of London can be a bit intimidating. However this one is very relaxed - there are books everywhere and you sometimes have to watch your step!

This shop also has extremely friendly and very helpful staff. For example, after I asked whether I could take photographs and explained why, I was given a complete tour of the bookshop - and the coverage of topic areas within art hsitory is extensive - including I then asked about a book I've been trying to get hold of Wilfrid Blunt's The Art of Botanical Illustration and one was located in a very short space of time and I had a price for it. Reader - I was impressed!

Lucian Freud on paper'
surveys what's on offer

Most of the books are about artists and painting - however there is also a set of shelves just devoted to the history of drawing. Extensive shelving is also given over to specialised areas of antiques and artifacts and the art associated with specific countries.

This is the sort of bookshop which is a recommended visit for serious art bibilophiles, art historians, art teachers and students of art history - not to mention the art dealers - many of whom get their reference books here.

The books are authoritative and the best quality. Some are new (the type which only get published in limited numbers for not insignificant prices) but the majority are secondhand. That said they are all in good condition. Some even come with some added extras inserted by their previous owners - always a small joy to find! I opened up my Pastels Book to find an item from the Galerie Camoin on the Quai Voltaire in Paris.

If you like art history and you really like books I recommend a visit.