Ebooks de arte

Welcome to The Independents new ebook series The Great Composers, covering fourteen of the giants of Western classical music. Extracted from Michael Steens book The Lives and Times of the Great Composers, these concise guides, selected by The Independents editorial team, explore the lives of composers as diverse as Mozart and Puccini, reaching from Bach to Brahms, set against the social, historical and political forces which affected them, to give a rounded portrait of what it was like to be alive and working as a musician at that time. That Mendelssohn was phenomenally gifted is beyond question. Born into a wealthy German Jewish family at the beginning of the 19th century, he was a boy prodigy of the piano, he wrote poetry, painted well, played several instruments, spoke several languages, and was an excellent athlete. At only sixteen he composed the celebrated Octet for Strings, one of the finest pieces in the chamber repertoire. He made friends with Goethe, whom he met as a boy of twelve when the poet was in his 70s, and at twenty was a prime mover in the revival of Bachs music to which we owe so much. Not only an inspiring conductor who did much to raise the standards of performance, he also wrote many works which found enduring fame: his Violin Concerto in E minor, his oratorio Elijah (particularly beloved of the English), his Italian Symphony, his 48 miniatures, Songs Without Words, and his incidental music for A Midsummer Nights Dream, which contains the famous Wedding March. Michael Steen follows Mendelssohns progress from his cultured and cosmopolitan background to the years of relentless travelling (he went ten times to England and became friends with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert), and his directorship of music at Dusseldorf and at Leipzig years that would see him exhaust himself until his early death just six months after the death of his adored sister, Fanny.

A ROUGH TRADE and PITCHORK BOOK OF THE YEARA guide to rediscovering the joys of creating that we all felt as children.NEW YORK TIMES One of the centurys most feted singer-songwriters, Wilcos Jeff Tweedy, digs deep into his own creative process to share his unique perspective about song-writing and offers a warm, accessible guide to writing your first song, championing the importance of making creativity part of your everyday life and experiencing the hope, inspiration and joy that accompanies it.Fascinating.ROUGH TRADEEloquent.INDEPENDENTNourishing.PITCHFORKA proselytiser for the act of songcraft.FINANCIAL TIMESA smart, funny, relentlessly practical guide.GQDelightful.ESQUIREIncisigve.VULTUREA book written by a musician that doesnt relay autobiographical details in some form of (even loose) chronology is unusual; they typically have their own story to tell and thats it, good or bad. Writing a book that goes some way to explaining the process behind their songwriting is something else altogether. Jeff Tweedy, in How to Write One Song, achieves this.IRISH TIMES

THE FRENCH DISPATCH brings to life a collection of stories from the final issue of an American magazine published in a fictional 20th-century French city. It stars Bill Murray, Benicio del Toro, Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton, Lea Seydoux, Frances McDormand, Timothee Chalamet, Lyna Khoudri, Jeffrey Wright, Mathieu Amalric, Stephen Park, and Owen Wilson.

The events of your life, from local walks to exotic trips, can provide endless inspiration for textile art. This inspiring book shows you how to record your experiences, using sketchbooks, journals and photography, to create personal narratives that can form a starting point for more finished stitched-textile pieces.Acclaimed textile artist and teacher Cas Holmes, whose work is often inspired by her life and the journeys she makes, helps you find inspiration through your own life and explains how to record what you see in sketchbooks and journals, which can often become beautiful objects in themselves. She explains how you can use photography, both as documentation and as inspiration, and sometimes incorporate it into the work itself, along with found objects and ephemera.Throughout the book are useful techniques that can be harnessed to add extra interest to your work, such as methods for making layered collages, how to sketch with stitch, and advice on design and colour. If you want to create beautiful, unique work inspired by your life and travels, this is the perfect book for you.

One of the attractions of painting outdoors is the challenge of capturing the spirit of a place changing light, weather and transient conditions demand particular painting skills if they are to be interpreted effectively. Leading painter David Curtis works on location, in all weathers, observing and capturing the subtle effects of light and mood. Oil paint is as good for painting on site as it is for large-scale painting in the studio; it is remarkably responsive; can be applied in many different ways; and it allows time to assess and modify work in progress. In this fascinating book, David Curtis shows how he achieves such expressive and original results using drawings, paintings and stage-by-stage examples. He gives detailed explanations of his two main working methods for plein-air paintings and for studio compositions as well as plenty of helpful guidance and advice on choosing materials, exploring techniques, selecting ideas, composition, colour and tone and associated topics. Drawing skills and interpreting the qualities of light are other key issues that he deals with, while his wonderfully evocative landscapes, coastal scenes, interiors and figure compositions provide much inspiration.

Stunning watercolour title new in paperback. Leading watercolourist reveals the secrets behind his atmospheric, light-filled paintings. Watercolour is ideal for capturing the transient effects of light and, with compact and lightweight materials, is the perfect medium for plein-air painting. Leading watercolour painter David Curtis is a strong advocate of working on site, observing and capturing changing conditions and effects. In this beautifully illustrated book, he explains in detail his two main methods for working on location for quick, loose studies and for more controlled and detailed paintings. He also shows how to collect reference material on the spot and develop this into resolved paintings back at the studio. He provides helpful instruction on interpreting light effects, with strong guidance on choosing materials, exploring techniques, composition, tone and colour and associated topics. This invaluable advice is complemented by a wealth of sketches, finished works and step-by-step demonstration paintings to illustrate different points and inspire further ideas. Reference Light and Mood in Watercolour hardback (9780713489552) Leading watercolourist reveals the secrets behind his light-filled paintings How to work en plein air to capture the transient effects of light How to collect reference material on location but paint in the studio Bestselling title new in paperback

"She is the most wonderfully inventive and brilliantly talented designer" Dame Judi Dench on Clancy.Deirdre Clancy is one of the most experienced and accomplished costume designers in the business. In this book, she gives her inside knowledge of designing for stage and screen, which includes television, film, theatre and opera. She includes a brief illustrated history of costume design from the Greeks to Lady Gaga an invaluable guide for students and current designers.Part Two takes the reader through the design process: how you go about doing it, and the different strands of costume design from contemporary clothes through to period costume, how to communicate with the audience, designing on paper and with Photoshop or on an iPad and how to share and communicate your ideas and well as mood boards and collages for inspiration. Part Three is about the world of costume design what it involves and how to get into the field, who does what and the differences between working for stage and screen productions. Clancy advises on budgets and improvisation and covers all the practicalities and behind-the-scenes tips. Part Four looks at period costume from the Dark Ages up to the twentieth century, encompassing authenticity and feasibility. Finally, Part Five looks at individual case studies in depth, including opera and Shakespeare productions.Packed with great drawings and case studies, this is an essential book for any student or professional costume designer looking for additional inside advice. Whether you are a designer for the stage or screen, this book has something new for you with advice from one of the best in the business.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh was an innovator.He is undoubtedly one of Scotlands most celebrated architects. His astounding buildings creatively reinterpreted the past and opened the way for the Modern Movement. Architecture was his first love, though he was also a highly accomplished artist and designer of interiors, furniture, metalwork, glass and textiles. In addition his graphic design work, using nature and organic plant forms, made him an early exponent of Symbolism and Art Nouveau. In the later years of his life he produced watercolour paintings of intense power and subtlety. His extraordinary work is still regarded today as innovative and modern, and continues to astonish and delight art lovers everywhere.

Where is Charles Simonds? Throughout the 1970s, his diminutive Dwellings, tiny architectural ruins of an imaginary civilization, could be found throughout the crumbling infrastructure of downtown New York. Preoccupied with the relationship between the grown and the built, the archaeological and the urban, Simonds shared friendship and ideas with Gordon Matta-Clark and Robert Smithson. Like Lucy Lippard, with whom he lived during that decade, Simonds believed in combining art and activism, always preferring what he called the "real world" to the art world. Yet despite taking part in many of the seminal exhibitions and art events of 1970s New York, Simonds has left few traces on art history. In order to explain Simondss absence while simultaneously arguing for his central place within it, Jules Pelta Feldman reconsiders the decades self-conception, finding that Simonds exemplifies much of what has been ignored in 1970s artand much of what establishes it as a unique period of experimentation and possibility.

Where is Charles Simonds? Throughout the 1970s, his diminutive Dwellings, tiny architectural ruins of an imaginary civilization, could be found throughout the crumbling infrastructure of downtown New York. Preoccupied with the relationship between the grown and the built, the archaeological and the urban, Simonds shared friendship and ideas with Gordon Matta-Clark and Robert Smithson. Like Lucy Lippard, with whom he lived during that decade, Simonds believed in combining art and activism, always preferring what he called the "real world" to the art world. Yet despite taking part in many of the seminal exhibitions and art events of 1970s New York, Simonds has left few traces on art history. In order to explain Simondss absence while simultaneously arguing for his central place within it, Jules Pelta Feldman reconsiders the decades self-conception, finding that Simonds exemplifies much of what has been ignored in 1970s artand much of what establishes it as a unique period of experimentation and possibility.

Stopgap Measures presents an exciting selection of essays, interviews and shorter pieces on the work of American artist Mike Kelley (19542012) written over more than three decades by the noted art historian and cultural critic John C. Welchman. Kelleys provocative career gave rise to some of the most conceptually and materially diverse work of recent times in performance, writing, painting, drawing, sculpture, banners, multimedia installation, appropriated objects and images and video, as well as numereous collaborations. This volume includes reflections on specific works, and features a signature series of pathbreaking essays on Kelleys innovations in photography and writing as well as explorations of major themes in his practice, research and thinking: physical comedy and verbal humor; memory; popular culture, dress-up and Americana; the uncanny; imaginative projection and dark fantasy; appropriation and giving; authorship and self-construction; and the artists littleremarked upon negotiation with the histories of and ideas about Asia. The book concludes with new essays on Kelleys engagement with animals and the nonhuman; and on the refrain disappearances that punctuate Kelleys career set in relation to specters of social catastrophe and nuclear annihilation.

Stopgap Measures presents an exciting selection of essays, interviews and shorter pieces on the work of American artist Mike Kelley (19542012) written over more than three decades by the noted art historian and cultural critic John C. Welchman. Kelleys provocative career gave rise to some of the most conceptually and materially diverse work of recent times in performance, writing, painting, drawing, sculpture, banners, multimedia installation, appropriated objects and images and video, as well as numereous collaborations. This volume includes reflections on specific works, and features a signature series of pathbreaking essays on Kelleys innovations in photography and writing as well as explorations of major themes in his practice, research and thinking: physical comedy and verbal humor; memory; popular culture, dress-up and Americana; the uncanny; imaginative projection and dark fantasy; appropriation and giving; authorship and self-construction; and the artists littleremarked upon negotiation with the histories of and ideas about Asia. The book concludes with new essays on Kelleys engagement with animals and the nonhuman; and on the refrain disappearances that punctuate Kelleys career set in relation to specters of social catastrophe and nuclear annihilation.

When Abdul Rahman Munif embarked on the first extensive study in Arabic about Marwan Kassab Bachi, he mailed the artist asking about how his art emerged, its contextual influences, and timely interpretations. Marwan recorded his answers on seven audio tapes and sent them to Munif, but also started writing his memoirs in Arabic. This book is an anthology of the letters exchanged between two friends, Marwan in Berlin and Munif in Damascus, from 1990 to 2004.

When Abdul Rahman Munif embarked on the first extensive study in Arabic about Marwan Kassab Bachi, he mailed the artist asking about how his art emerged, its contextual influences, and timely interpretations. Marwan recorded his answers on seven audio tapes and sent them to Munif, but also started writing his memoirs in Arabic. This book is an anthology of the letters exchanged between two friends, Marwan in Berlin and Munif in Damascus, from 1990 to 2004.

This is a marvelPublishers WeeklyCompelling and dramaticBooklist...the allure of an opera legend is rendered with humanizing gritForeward ReviewsMaria Callas, called La Divina, is widely recognised as the greatest diva who ever lived. Jerome Charyns Callas springs to life as the headstrong, mercurial, and charismatic artist who captivated generations of fans, thrilling audiences with her brilliant performances and defiant personality.Callas was one of the first divas to come from an impoverished background. As an outsider, she was shunned by the Italian opera houses, but through sheer force of will and the power and range of her voice, she broke through the invisible wall to sing at La Scala and headline at the Metropolitan Opera, forging an unforgettable career. Adored by celebrities and statesmen, the notable and notorious alike, her every movement was shadowed by both music critics and gossip columnists until, having lost her voice, she died alone in an opulent, mausoleum-like Paris apartment.In Charyns inimitable style, Maria La Divina humanizes the celebrated diva, revealing the mythical artist as a woman who survived hunger, war, and loneliness to reach the heights of acclaim.

For more than three decades, South African artist William Kentridge has created a vast body of work comprising drawings and multimedia installations that have been exhibited worldwide.Here he immerses us in the artistic, intellectual and production processes of his creations, providing philosophical, autobiographical, technical and practical commentary and giving intimate insight into the studios where he has created throughout his life.A Natural History of the Studio is not only a must-read for admirers of Kentridges work, but also a vibrant personal and philosophical exploration of the creative process and a critical look at the world and the human condition.

Hatties down on her luck. Shes collected enough enemies in high places that the only work she can find is a one-night-only vanity project being mounted by an extremely unlikely impresario, and beyond that things are looking bleak. However her career concerns must be put aside when an old friend appears, in serious trouble and asking for a big favour. Hattie tries to help, but things swiftly go awry and she finds herself thrown into a cat-and-mouse game with some very shady types who pursue her across London all the way to (where else?) backstage in the theatre on opening night.

Many of us are drawn to a life in the arts but daunted by how to balance that ambition with the very real need to pay rent and put food on the table. It is impossible to become an accomplished painter, composer, or novelist without spending time experimenting, making false starts, absorbing criticism, reading, talking, and moping about the house. All this time must be purchased, one way or another. Is the history of art and ideas just a history of rich kids?The answer, of course, is no. William Carlos Williams was a family doctor. Franz Kafka was an insurance man, as were Charles Ives and Wallace Stevens. Grace Hartigan temped. James Joyce mooched off his brother; Christopher Isherwood ingratiated himself with a wealthy uncle. Virginia Woolf and Louisa May Alcott were determined to make their writing pay no matter what. And their material circumstances had an impact on all of their creative outputs.From family money to jobs to colorful schemes, Mason Currey, author of the acclaimed Daily Rituals, explores both the well-worn and unlikely paths forward for the up-and-coming artist. Making Art and Making a Living is an entertaining and thought-provoking examination of the collision of creative ambitions with real-world necessities and of the messy, glorious, torturous compromises that gifted individuals have patched together when facing the eternal dilemma of an artistic life.

Downtown NYC of the mid-1970s and early 80s was the perfect landscape for reinvention. If the Lost Generation writers telegraphed the death of the American dream, the No Wave era, led by artists including Teenage Jesus & The Jerks, Nan Goldin, Sonic Youth and the Contortions, challenged that dream by howling "NO" while creating a counterculture that brought punk, rock, jazz, funk, the art world, hip hop, and outlaw literature together into an international explosion of creativity. Why was this scene so compelling, and remains so today? What set this confluence of time, place, and people apart from the rest? The answer, in a word: women. Women, resisting stereotypes. Reinventing themselves according to their individual artistic visions. Adele Bertei was a pivotal figure in the No Wave movement. She was an original member of the Contortions and Brian Enos fascination with the band resulted in the seminal No New York record, released in 1978. NO NEW YORK: A Memoir of No Wave and the Women Who Shaped the Scene will provide an uncompromising testimony to the first significant, international movement of women artists creating work on an equal footing with the men, the fruits of which were some of the most striking and unique of this era.

Antique furniture restoration is more than a technical pursuit its a conversation with history. Each piece tells a story fashioned by time, craftsmanship and countless hands. This book invites conservators and woodworkers, amateur or professional, into the nuanced world of furniture conservation, where technique is shaped by an understanding of history, materials and the use for generations to come. Whether youre restoring a treasured family heirloom or a museum-quality piece, this book will help you approach your work with clarity, sensitivity and a respect for the past.