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.On Painting (Classics)

by: Leon Battista Alberti

February 28, 1991
This is effectively a textbook for Renaissance artists. It is split into three sections, the first dealing predominantly with issues of composition and perspective, the second with light and shade, colour and the artist's duty to his art and his public, and the third predominantly with what qualities one must bring to the job of being an artist.

If you are only loosely interested in art as a pragmatic practice, and you don't have some mathematical knowledge which will steer you through the first section it may be rather impenetrable in places. I am one of these people and found myself really struggling with the first section.

It is however fascinating as a glimpse into the mindset of a humanist scholar and as someone ... Read More:
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.Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy: A Primer in the Social History of Pictorial Style (Oxford Paperbacks)

by: Michael Baxandall

May 19, 1988
This is the kind of book that History of Art departments throw at you early on in their courses to instil the right respect and awe for the whole academic ritual.

When I first saw this book at Birkbeck College (2003 History of Art MA) I was duly impressed and intimidated into thinking this was somehow a classic. In this work Baxandall is the exemplary academic, slowly building up a case from painstaking research and cleverly interpreted trivia.

This approach is fine and dandy until you reflect that at the end of it the conclusions Baxandall has laboured so hard to arrive at are perhaps a little banal -- i.e. Renaissance painting was influenced by such contemporary phenomenon as religious practices, dancing, and the ability ... Read More:
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.Art in Renaissance Italy, 1350-1500 (Oxford History of Art)

by: Evelyn Welch

September 14, 2000
This book is a well researched and a thorough introduction to the art of renaissance Italy. It contains lots of full-page colour illustrations and has a nifty timeline at the back of the book. The author talks about how the art was created and its purpose.
I was expecting a headache after the second chapter but I was surprised to find it lucid and not migraine inducing at all.
It would provide anyone with a reliable introduction to this subject.
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.Critical Terms for Art History

by: RS Nelson

April 25, 2003
This book is a well researched and a thorough introduction to the art of renaissance Italy. It contains lots of full-page colour illustrations and has a nifty timeline at the back of the book. The author talks about how the art was created and its purpose.
I was expecting a headache after the second chapter but I was surprised to find it lucid and not migraine inducing at all.
It would provide anyone with a reliable introduction to this subject.
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.Renaissance Art Reconsidered: An Anthology of Primary Sources

from: WileyBlackwell

December 22, 2006
This book is a well researched and a thorough introduction to the art of renaissance Italy. It contains lots of full-page colour illustrations and has a nifty timeline at the back of the book. The author talks about how the art was created and its purpose.
I was expecting a headache after the second chapter but I was surprised to find it lucid and not migraine inducing at all.
It would provide anyone with a reliable introduction to this subject.
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.The Story of Art

by: E.H. Gombrich

September 30, 1995
He loves a neat linear narrative.
Insisting all western art (and there's nothing non-Western) follows a first there was this, then artists thought that, then artists thought that is way too simplistic.

Yes it's a classic but is only useful in the classroom for school-age kids to grasp what a wide range of Euro-centric art looked like but nothing beyond that.
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.Giotto to Durer: Early Renaissance Painting in The National Gallery: Early European Painting in the National Gallery (National Gallery of London)

by: J Dunkerton

July 01, 1991
This is a beautiful, sumptuous book, crammed with detail and excellent colour reproductions. Other readers mightn't go for all the technical information but I can't get enough of it. I also prefer the discussions of individual works which occupy a large part of this volume -- its companion, 'Dürer to Veronese', takes a more synoptic view, which tends to obscure the fact that these are surveys of a collection.

That's my only quibble, and it isn't really with the book, which is about as accomplished at it could be -- so good, in fact, that it's tempting to read it as a textbook of the whole period. Much of the material is of general relevance, of course; but don't forget that many of the major works from this period aren't in galleries at all: they're ... Read More:
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.Art in Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas

from: WileyBlackwell

September 23, 2002
This book is filled to the brim with 371, yes 371 individual sources/texts each with an introduction to contextualise each one. Using it for an essay or dissertation will provide you with quotes that you would not be able to find in other books as well as giving you some of the more obvious source which are great too. It is a big book at 1250 pages which was intimating at first when it dropped through the door but really quickly I discovered that its as good as having a whole library in one book which is just about portable.

This is a great book and when you start using it you will realise what a bargain it is too. Worth its weight in gold
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.The Northern Renaissance (Art & Ideas)

by: Jeffrey Chipps Smith

2004-05
I have had to buy this book whilst studying for a degree in Art History but would highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in art and particularly in fourteenth to sixteenth century Netherlandish and German art.

Beautifully illustrated and written in an easy to follow format.

I will read this again and again just for its sheer beauty.
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.The Art of Art History: A Critical Anthology (Oxford History of Art)

from: Oxford Paperbacks

April 30, 1998
The New Oxford History of Art represents the first massive effort to rethink this field in detail since Nikolaus Pevsner launched the Pelican History fifty years ago. The volumes are well printed, advantageously priced, and generally refreshing in their point of view. Preziosi's volume is sui generis in that instead of dealing with a period or theme, it is a second order study--of the study of art history. It combines an anthology with interspersed commentary. Unfortunately, the Preziosi commentary, demonstrating the author's effort to find a new approach, is marred by opaque language and a sketchy presentation of ideas. For example, he says that one of his approaches will be based on the principle of the anamorphic image. Although he reproduces one ... Read More:
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