Books
Yves Klein: Japan
How Yves Klein’s formative period in Japan formed his dual pursuits of art and judo.
Yves Klein (1928-62) first traveled to Japan as a young man in 1952, motivated primarily by his interest in judo. During his 15 months abroad, Klein had numerous important creative and philosophical revelations that culminated in the launch of his artistic career upon his return to Paris.
Prepared in collaboration with the Yves Klein Archives, this volume details Klein’s relationship with Japan through nearly 150 archival documents, photographs and letters, inviting the reader on his journey from martial arts to fine art at the very beginning of his career. Along the way we learn of Klein’s important encounters with art critic Takachiyo Uemura, painter Keizo Koyama and design professor Masaki Yamaguchi. Yves Klein: Japan provides essential insight into the origins of Klein’s oeuvre as both a groundbreaking visual artist and prolific writer whose short-lived career helped to transform postwar art.
Helio Oiticica: Parangolé
“De adversidades vivimos, sea marginal sea héroe.” — Hélio Oiticica
Hélio Oiticica: Parangolé is a conceptual art’s discourse around Hélio Oiticica’s parangolés. The tension generated between euro-centric and peripheral conceptualisms is put into question, in order to insert the work of Oiticica in the international Neo-Avantgarde logic, where life transits into art, and art into life. The research carried out by Delmari Romero Keith and Marc Pottier validates the idea that vindicates art’s power as a social denunciation vehicle and a poetic-politic complaint. This proposal re-dimensions Oiticica’s work and positions it beyond conceptual and performative trends. Parangolés rekindle the postmodern allegorical impulse that activates fragments which manifest structures of cancelled imaginary. They are manifestations of atavistic referents, ancestral rituals, and residual memory—appropriated from the Brazilian favelas and the carnival—and links between the rhythms of the body and those of nature. Performative action, which covers the sensorial aspects of a human being—a radical elaboration of Neoconcretism connected to Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology. Hélio Oiticica’s Parangolés are a manifestation of canons different to the euro-centric ones. In them, we find the crossing between the cult and the vernacular, a strategy of artistic renovation. They incorporate a multi-disciplinary proposal—dance, movement, contortions, music, rhythm, poetry and, above all, exuberant colors—to stage the displacement of a fluid and hybrid identity that harasses, agitates, and protests against social inequalities. Hélio Oiticica’s Parangolé devours autochthonous customs and mainstream aesthetic influences. This genre hybridization, this anthropophagic awakening, revealed the centripetal force of the movement that, in the end, meant a criticism of the time’s statu quo.
Texts by Delmari Romero Keith and Marc Pottier
2023
English / French / Spanish
204 pages
Softcover, 16.5 x 23 cm
ISBN 9788867495658
A Way of Living: The Art of Willem de Kooning
A Way of Living: The Art of Willem de Kooning
Judith Zilczer
The bestselling and critically acclaimed monograph on one of the most influential painters of the twentieth century
Willem de Kooning was a leading exponent of Abstract Expressionism. MoMA’s 2011 de Kooning retrospective drew record crowds, and his prodigious achievements continue to provoke and inspire subsequent generations of artists such as Cecily Brown, Rebecca Warren, and Jonathan Lasker.
This is the most wide-ranging and comprehensive monograph available on this artist. Sumptuously illustrated and produced, the book encompasses his major works and periods, including his controversial ‘Woman’ paintings, as well as a wealth of accompanying sketches and preparatory drawings.
An illustrated chronology maps de Kooning’s life, career, and work, with photographs from the artist’s archive interspersed throughout the book, enriching the reader’s understanding of the wider art-historical context of his paintings. Judith Zilczer’s critically acclaimed monograph is an essential addition to the libraries of a new audience of readers and de Kooning enthusiasts, offering an unprecedented and compelling examination of his body of work.
Format: Hardback
Size: 302 × 330 mm (11 7/8 × 13 in)
Pages: 288 pp
Illustrations: 300 illustrations
ISBN: 9781838666552
Judith Zilczer, Curator Emerita of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, organized more than two dozen exhibitions in her twenty-nine years at the museum, where she served as Historian, Curator of Paintings, and Acting Chief Curator. Her exhibition publications include Willem de Kooning from the Hirshhorn Museum Collection (1993), Richard Lindner: Paintings and Watercolors, 1948–1977 (1996), and Visual Music: Synaesthesia in Art and Music Since 1900 (2005). A 1975 graduate of the doctoral program of the University of Delaware, she has received numerous awards, including the 2006 George Wittenborn Memorial Book Award of the Art Libraries Society of North America. Dr Zilczer has written and lectured widely on modern and contemporary art and is recognized as the leading authority on the art of Willem de Kooning.
Soft Minimal, Norm Architects
Soft Minimal
A Sensory Approach to Architecture & Design
Norm Architects
We are a product of our environment. The spaces we inhabit and the objects we live with influence the way we feel, think, and behave, while they create the framework for our lives to unfold within. Guided by the purpose of wellbeing, Norm Architects’ approach to architecture and design is therefore based entirely on the idea that spaces and furniture should, first and foremost, serve its user rather than merely be a means of artistic expression.
Through insightful essays and tactile imagery collected in Soft Minimal, we share the principles that underpin a human-centric design philosophy honed over 15 years. The artful balance of light and shadow is reflected in a Swedish retreat, while a Japanese house quietly professes the calming effect of natural materials; a Sri Lankan residence makes the case for bringing the landscape inside and a Danish retail space celebrates tactility.
With an intention to share what we have learnt and achieved as designers thus far, we want to contribute to the ongoing dialogue about human-centric design, with a broader goal to re-sensualize the built environment. We believe design should be sensory, simple, and functional, and this book published by gestalten is a manifesto-come-monograph outlining what these ideas mean to us and how we work with them. Serving as a sourcebook and aesthetic inspiration for design professionals and enthusiasts, Soft Minimal offers a nuanced perspective on minimalism that is warm, sensory and enduring.
Authors Norm Architects
Publisher Gestalten
304 pages
Linen hardcover, stitch bound
24.5x33cm,93/4x13inches
ISBN 978-3-96704-055-5
Faye Toogood: Drawing, Material, Sculpture, Landscape
Faye Toogood: Drawing, Material, Sculpture, Landscape
Edited by Alistair O’Neill
The first in-depth look at the work of the globally celebrated and multidisciplinary London-based designer Faye Toogood – this book covers all aspects of her work, from clothes and furniture, to installations and interior design
Faye Toogood is unlike any other designer. Her impressive creative output encompasses not only furniture, but sculpture, fashion, interiors, and homeware.
This book is the first to explore Toogood’s unique approach to design across disciplines through the studio’s guiding principles: drawing, material, sculpture, and landscape.
In doing so it not only reveals the fascinating creative process behind Toogood’s beautiful designs, but also illustrates the interconnectedness of her design across a range of practices together with the poetry that flows throughout her work.
The book also features her collaborations with (and commissions by) such brands as Birkenstock, Carhartt WIP, Comme des Garçons, Dover Street Market, Hermès, Mulberry and National Gallery of Victoria.
Format: Hardback
Size: 290 × 250 mm (11 3/8 × 9 7/8 in)
Pages: 280 pp
Illustrations: 275 illustrations
ISBN: 9781838664046
Faye Toogood is a British artist working in a diverse range of disciplines, from sculpture to furniture and fashion. Toogood’s works have been acquired for the permanent collections of institutions worldwide, and she has exhibited internationally. She is represented by Friedman Benda in New York.
Alistair O’Neill is professor of Fashion History and Theory at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, and writes on contemporary fashion.