December 12–19, 1996

book quarterly|Book Quicks

Art Books

When selecting Christmas gifts, let us recall the words of Groucho Marx, who said, "Outside of a dog, a man's best friend is a book; inside of a dog, it's very dark." You scarcely need to be literate to appreciate the following picture-oriented books, but light is recommended.

 

Artistic Trickery: The Tradition of Trompe l'Oeil Art

By Michael Capek, Lerner, 64 p., $21.50

Seemingly written for the younger reader, this compact, cleverly designed volume is bursting with magical examples of trompe l'oeil. Many pages with text are embellished with borrowed deceptions: a dog-eared corner, a coffee ring or a half-eaten cookie. Capek discusses important European and American illusionistic painters from Charles Willson Peale to Audrey Flack and even manages to drag in Cy Twombly by the seat of his pants.

 

The Twelve Days of Christmas

Designed by Robert Sabuda, Simon and Schuster, $19.95

"Paper Engineer" Robert Sabuda's pop-up Twelve Days of Christmas is the most inventive little book of the season and may be the best series of pop-ups ever. The vignettes — some in folded half-pages — are all executed in white textured stock with strong but simple color accents. A music box with "eleven ladies dancing" includes a Mylar mirror reflecting the entire corps de ballet and a wind-up key in back. Irresistible.

 

Doing Business

By David Ross, Andrews and McMeel, 76 p., $14.95 (paper)

Funny surreal paintings of men in suits by former architect David Ross depict an anxious robotic world where the eraserhead is the "pessimist" and the pencil point is the "optimist." Negotiators shake hands with baseball bats hidden behind their backs. Cynical but rarely descending to absolute ferocity (though you'll note a nervous edge to your laughter).

 

The Peale Family: Creation of a Legacy, 1770-1870

Edited by Lillian B. Miller, Abbeville Press, 320 p., $42 (only available in softcover)

The Cadwalader Family: Art and Style in Early Philadelphia. The Bulletin, Fall, 1996

By Jack L. Lindsey and Darrel Sewell, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 48 p., $10 (paper)

The Peales are America's first and most prolific artistic family. Though they weren't titillatingly scandalous (except for the still-life painter Raphaelle), they are a wonderful microcosm of the nation's first century. The catalogue to the Peale show organized by the National Portrait Gallery and currently at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Feb. 2, 1997, is the perfect gift for American history buffs to pore over beside the crackling yule log. In the companion Bulletin published by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Cadwalader Family, the influence of European styles on portrait painting is nicely documented. And the decorative arts in Philadelphia society were the most sophisticated in the nation. Both publications plus tickets to the exhibition ($7 general/ $4 student, senior citizen or child) would be a cool family gift.

 

I Live In Music

Poem by Ntozake Shange and paintings by Romare Bearden, Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 32 p., $15.95

In this slim, gorgeous recapitulation of Ntozake Shange's poem, each line captions a full-page artwork from Bearden's oeuvre of collage, print and painting. It's the quintessential exercise in synesthesia: vision and words into music. Supposedly for children, the person who can resist this book is dead to music, poetry and painting: give the pathetic creature ashes and a lump of coal.

 

Recycled Re-Seen: Folk Art from the Global Scrap Heap

Edited by Charlene Cerny and Suzanne Seriff, Abrams, 208 p., $29.95 (paper)

Recycled is a serious book about the creative re-use of trash, from Senegalese briefcases fashioned of flattened tin cans to a Mexican adobe house faced with a mosaic of thousands of colored bottle caps and an American house covered with license plates. Serious, yes, but also fun and inspiring. Eleven scholarly essays include one on artful recycling in India, written by local folklorist Frank Korom (currently curator of Asian and Middle Eastern Collections, Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe, NM). For example, New Delhi recycling artist Vinod Kumar Sharma weaves folded cigarette packs and molds bowls from plastic phonograph records.

 

Eros

Photographs curated by Linda Ferrer, text edited by Jane Lahr, designed by Gregory Wakabayashi, Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 192 p., $60

If you have more than one person on your list to whom you can give a copy of Eros, a book of classic quotes and tastefully sexy photos from Man Ray to Mapplethorpe, you have a complicated life. However, this middle-of-the-road erotica for the '90s could be the perfect gift for the right person or maybe a couple.

 

Tile

By Jill Herbers, photographs by Roy Wright, Artisan, 192 p., $35

Redecorating? Or do you just enjoy beautiful design? From the blue and white Chinese-inspired tiles of the harem in the Topkapi Palace to the pink Art Nouveau flowers on the facade of Vienna's Majolica Haus to the earth tones of the Hearst Castle in California, tile adds enduring brilliance to architecture. Roy Wright's photos capture it well. Your eyes will glaze with envy at contemporary and antique tiled dwellings. Specific info on buying and using tile make Jill Herbers' text practical as well as entertaining.

 

Ettore Sottsass: Ceramics

Edited by Bruno Bischofberger, Chronicle Books, 180 p., $65

A superb poetic text illuminates equally rich ceramics. Ettore Sottsass' work exemplifies the love of form, color and texture. Sottsass is the founder of Memphis, Milano and instigator of an international design revolution. Ceramics chronicles his designs for that medium beginning with the '50s. Sottsass finds the justification for "designing objects... in the performance of a kind of therapeutic act, an act that would enable objects to heighten the awareness all human beings have, or can have of their own adventure." This book might also do that.

 

The Brain Pack

By Ron Van der Meer and Ad Dudink, Running Press, includes pop-up diagrams, pull-outs, an audio tape, several booklets and many other interactive elements, $40

So cleverly designed that you're halfway through before you realize. The Brain Pack is a brain full of information organized under pop topics like emotion, sex and psychic ability. It's not as sophisticated as The Art Pack, Running Press' original hit in book-packaged non-linear knowledge. And that may be a plus in appealing to young readers. Some bright grade-school kids can surely relate. However, one wonders about the source of some "facts," especially in the section on sex differences.

 

Among the Amish: Drawings and Writings by Keith Bowen

Running Press, 144 p., $30

This delightful coffee-table book portrays a group of people known to many Philadelphians — yet also mysterious and anachronistic. When Welsh artist Keith Bowen began drawing the Amish, he was gradually welcomed into the community, perhaps because his handicraft harmonizes with Amish values. Bowen makes no attempt to systematically explain the Amish way of life, but simply presents the daily scenes and rituals he witnessed, from weddings and funerals to family meals, harvesting and children's games. The drawings are wonderfully evocative: full of life and color.

— Robin Rice