Books

Booksreview

Book review | The tale of a magnificent boat with a violent colonial history

This account of the theft of a South Seas cultural treasure by German colonists in the late 1800s reveals a series of atrocities

Heinrich Campendonk, a little-known Blaue Reiter artist is brought to life in new book

New critical assessment of the vibrant works of the German artist who was exiled to the Netherlands in 1935

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From Hogarth to Hockney, artists struck by puppy love are celebrated in four recent canine-themed books

Ahead of a new show of dog portraits at London's Wallace Collection, we round-up some publishing treats for you to paw over

An expert’s guide to Hokusai: four must-read books on the Japanese artist

All you ever wanted to know about Hokusai, from a history of The Great Wave to a novel about the artist's daughter—selected by the curator Sarah E. Thompson

Booksreview

Russian empress Catherine the Great and her women artists: a complex tale of gender, art and patronage

Engaging, accessible and beautifully illustrated book provides a welcome and stimulating contribution to scholarship on 18th-century art

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Extract | When the Picasso was almost knocked off the wall during a blockbuster show

A new memoir by Patrick Bringley details what it was like to work as a guard at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art

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More than reclining women: how Henry Moore mined a rich seam with his drawings of working men

New book uses artist's wartime commission in a coalmine to show his melancholy side and mildly left political strain,

Nigeria’s pivotal election: what's the future of art and culture in the country?

Plus, the Met: a guard’s memoir and Hubert Robert at Stockholm's Nationalmuseum

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Booksreview

Origins of US photographer William Eggleston’s trailblazing images go on display in new book

Ninety previously unseen photographs from the early 1970s reveal the foundations of his practice

Booksreview

A medieval tale of the jester, the priory and the hospital: book uncovers church's history for 900th anniversary

As Saint Bartholomew the Great celebrates nine centuries, a new volume explores how the church has, against the odds, remained at London’s heart

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New artist book fair adds another dimension to Miami’s art calendar

The inaugural edition of Tropic Bound takes places in the city’s Design District, but its programming extends across town to highlight South Florida’s book-making scene

UK exhibition uncovers holy link between Henry VIII’s rival wives Anne Boleyn and Catherine of Aragon

Both British queens owned the same prayerbook, curators at Hever Castle in England have found

Booksreview

Photographer documents thousands of churches 'in a manner only angels and spiders could achieve'

Remarkable photographs of thousands of church interiors in rural England and Wales have been brought together in this landmark publication

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‘That’s not enough’: Willem de Kooning’s advice to a young Wayne Thiebaud

An excerpt from one of Thiebaud’s final interviews, which features in the catalogue of a survey at the Fondation Beyeler, reveals how the US artist arrived at his signature style

What will museums of the future be like? Three key takeaways from a new book

András Szántó spoke to 21 architects about how museum architecture is shaping up, here are some of his findings

Book Clubinterview

Q&A: Jennifer Higgie on her new book about spiritualism and its importance to early Modernist women artists

The former editor of Frieze magazine says the idea that modernity had to be rational, cool and atheist was detrimental to art

An expert’s guide to Johannes Vermeer: five must-read books (and a website) on the Dutch Old Master

All you ever wanted to know about Vermeer, from a “legendary” show catalogue to an illustrated book for kids—selected by the curators Pieter Roelofs and Gregor J. M. Weber

Booksreview

The fine art of satire: an indispensable guide to the life and imagination of James Gillray

A monumental biography of the political caricaturist who is one of the greatest draughtsmen in the history of British art

Booksreview

For richer, for poorer: domestic life in 18th-century Ireland examined in new book

Scholarly essays examine how people lived, from poor tenant farmers to their whist-playing landlords

Unknown history of 600-year-old, coded Voynich Manuscript revealed by researcher

Stefan Guzy has scoured archives from the Holy Roman Empire and believes he has traced back the ownership of the mysterious cipher book

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An Englishman in New York: Richard Smith biography highlights the influence of the US city on his work

The artist returned from his trip to America in the 1960s “the personification of self-aware modernity”

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A daring Sargent portrait and the millions that changed everything for Isabella Stewart Gardner

An extract from a biography of the US collector and museum founder looks at how her modest taste was transformed by her inheritance and why her husband was not pleased by a revealing painting

Art books coming soon in 2023: the pick of the crop

The Art Newspaper’s books editor Jacqueline Riding selects spring and summer publications to look out for, from the Surrealism of Leonora Carrington to 100 years of Black figuration

Was Vermeer a painter of pleasure or a staunch Jesuit supporter? New book challenges our knowledge of the artist

Gregor Weber's biography "Johannes Vermeer: Faith, Light and Reflection" also supports the controversial view that Vermeer used a camera obscura

Booksreview

Biography peers into Surrealist Meret Oppenheim’s early years

New book is first English translation of artist’s album From Childhood to 1943 and a previously unpublished autobiographical text

Yayoi Kusamainterview

‘I never run out of ideas’: an interview with Yayoi Kusama and highlights from her new catalogue

The artist, who is now in her 90s and voluntarily living in a psychiatric hospital, has a major retrospective under way in Hong Kong

Booksreview

How art inspired director Stanley Kubrick’s famous horror film The Shining

Two recently published, richly illustrated books contain a wealth of movie ephemera including photographs, concept designs, postcards and scripts