Modern Japanese Printmakers: New Waves and Eruptions, Malene Wagner, Prestel, 272pp, £35 (hb)
This new survey celebrates the lives and work of 44 Modern Japanese artists dating from the early 20th century to today, exploring printmaking in all its forms. Artists featured include Saitō Kiyoshi, who was influenced by European artists, especially Odilon Redon and Edvard Munch, along with Shinoda Tōkō who trained in traditional Japanese calligraphy but, in her own words, “decided to try my own style”. Other artists featured include Shinohara Ushio, known for his Ukiyo-e-inspired figures, which are often shown faceless, and Yayanagi Go whose “eye-catching signature style is defined by bright, intense colours, bold shapes and a linear sharpness”, says the author, Malene Wagner.
Nina Chanel Abney, Thelma Golden and Jazmine Hughes (contributors). Monacelli, 280pp, £49.95 (hb)
Monacelli presents the debut monograph of works by the US artist Nina Chanel Abney with chapters dedicated to specific media, such as paintings, public works, works on paper, commercial works, sculptures and installations. The publication “not only charts Abney’s artistic ethos but offers an intimate glimpse into how she tackles everything from Black sexuality and [the US] modern election cycle to police brutality and national identity,” says a publisher’s statement. An interview with Thelma Golden, the director of The Studio Museum in Harlem, explores Abney’s links with music, race and aspects of history.
Massimo Listri: Italian Palaces, Taschen, 640pp, $200 (hb)
The Florence-born photographer Massimo Listri captures some of Italy’s grandest palaces from the Palazzo Te in Mantua to Palazzo Medici Riccardi in Florence and Palermo's sumptuous Palazzo Butera. Robert Stalla, a professor of history of art at the Vienna University of Technology, writes in the introduction: “[The palazzo] is a refined, architecturally crafted secular building in which the lines dividing castles, villas and fortresses sometimes become blurred.” In 2018, Listri’s photographs of some of the world’s oldest libraries featured in a Taschen publication.
Strange Discoveries: The Art of Denton Welch, Alan Hollinghurst and James Cahill (contributors), John Swarbrooke Fine Art, 33pp, £20 (hb)
The first solo exhibition in over 40 years dedicated to Denton Welch opened at John Swarbrooke Fine Art gallery in London last month. Welch, who died in 1948 aged 33, created still-lifes, portraits and landscapes incorporating cats and gothic motifs. The accompanying catalogue expands on the exhibition themes, highlighting how “his outsider status—as a gay man in a time when this was illegal—is reflected in the rare, heightened sensibility in his art”, says a publisher’s statement. The catalogue includes texts by the Booker prizewinning novelist Alan Hollinghurst and the critic and novelist James Cahill.
