San Antonio College Library

"From humans' first impulses to create form out of raw materials to the most modern of gallery installations, people around the world have always been drawn to image-making. Styles and periods have come and gone, and yet intriguing links between seemingly unconnected traditions remain to be discovered. The author uses a wide range of objects - both familiar and less well known - to reveal how part is a product of our shared experience; how, like a...

"In Dark Mirror, Sara Lipton offers a fascinating examination of the emergence of anti-Semitic iconography in the Middle AgesThe straggly beard, the hooked nose, the bag of coins, and gaudy apparel--the religious artists of medieval Christendom had no shortage of virulent symbols for identifying Jews. Yet, hateful as these depictions were, the story they tell is not as simple as it first appears. Drawing on a wide range of primary sources, Lipton...

"Focusing on the thirty-three paintings Philip Guston exhibited at the Marborough Gallery in 1970, this in-depth account reconsiders the history of postwar American art and the conception of figuration in modern art history. Through a myriad of cultural touchstones, including evidence from literary and musical vogues of the period, this book examines the role of history as both artistic medium and creative catalyst to Guston's practice as a painter....

"Thomas Crow's paradigm-changing book challenges existing narratives about the rise of Pop Art by situating it within larger cultural tides. While American Pop was indebted to its British predecessor's insistence that any creative pursuit is worthy of aesthetic consideration, Crow demonstrates that this inclusive attitude also had strong American roots. Folk becomes Crow's starting point in the advance of Pop. The folk revival occurred chiefly in...

"Highlighting an enduring interest in natural history from the 16th century to the present, this gorgeous book explores depictions of the natural world, from centuries-old manuscripts to contemporary artists' books. It examines the scientific pursuits in the 18th and 19th centuries that resulted in the collecting and cataloguing of the natural world. It also investigates the aesthetically oriented activities of self-taught naturalists in the 19th...