Glittering Images: A Journey Through Art from Egypt to Star Wars

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The ever-provocative Paglia returns with a survey of Western art, captured in 24 essays that move from Egyptian tombs to Eleanor Antin's conceptual art project "100 Boots". In the end, she proclaims that the avant-garde is dead and that George Lucas is our greatest living artist. This will get the smart folks talking. Copyright 2012 Reed Business Information. Library Journal (05/01/2012):

Aperture Magazine Anthology: The Minor White Years, 1952-1976

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Published on the occasion of its sixtieth anniversary, this is the first ever anthology of "Aperture" magazine. This long-awaited overview provides a selection of the best critical writing from the first 25 years of the magazine--the period spanning the tenure of cofounder and editor Minor White. "Aperture" was established in 1952 by a group of photographers, including Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, Barbara Morgan and historian-curators Beaumont and Nancy Newhall. Their intention was to provide a forum "in which photographers can talk straight to each other, discuss the problems that face photography as profession an art, share their experiences, comment on what goes on, descry the new potentials." With its far-ranging interests in diverse photographic styles, myriad themes and subjects (including a strong streak of spirituality in diverse forms) and an adventurous commitment to a broad international range, "Aperture" has had a profound impact on the course of fine-art photography. The texts and visuals in this anthology were selected by Peter C. Bunnell, White's protege and an early member of the "Aperture" staff, who went on to become a major force in photography as an influential writer, curator and professor. Several articles are reproduced in facsimile, and the publication is enlivened throughout by other features, including a portfolio of exceptional covers, as well as a selection of the colophons (short statements or quotes) that appeared at the front of each magazine.

The Digital Negative: Raw Image Processing in Lightroom, Camera Raw, and Photoshop

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Shooting in the raw format gives digital photographers complete control over every aspect of image quality. "The Digital Negative: Raw Image Processing in Lightroom, Camera Raw, and Photoshop" is devoted exclusively to the topic and shows you how to make the most of that control. Now that raw image processing technology has matured as an essential aspect of digital photography, you need a modern book that takes a seasoned approach to the technology and explains the advantages and challenges of using Lightroom or Camera Raw to produce magnificent images. 

Bryan Peterson's Understanding Composition Field Guide: How to See and Photograph Images with Impact

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What makes an image amazing? Believe it or not, it is not about the content. What makes a photo compelling is the "arrangement" of that content--in other words, its composition. The right composition gives your images impact and emotion; the wrong one leaves them flat. In this handy, take-anywhere guide, renowned photographer, instructor, and bestselling author Bryan Peterson frees amateur photographers from the prejudices of what is "beautiful" or "ugly" so that they can instead focus on color, line, light, and pattern. Get the tools you need to show your distinct voice and point of view in every image you shoot. With this guide in your camera bag, you'll be equipped not only to "see" beautiful images but to successfully shoot them each and every time. 

Leonardo and the Last Supper

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Booklist (07/01/2012):
*Starred Review* With pink tights, a notebook hanging from his belt, long hair, and beard, handsome, fit 42-year-old Leonardo cut quite a figure on the streets of Milan, where he had high hopes for major commissions from the duchy's cunning ruler, Lodovico Sforza. For all his brilliance, as King explains with commiseration, respectful amusement, and meticulous documentation, Leonardo had little to show for himself beyond his notoriety for infuriating patrons. Consequently, he was ecstatic when Sforza agreed to fund the making of a truly monumental bronze horse. But war waits for no man, not even a relentlessly inquisitive, left-handed, vegetarian genius. After the 75 tons of metal meant for his equine colossus were turned into cannons, Leonardo was asked to paint a mural 15 feet high and nearly 30 feet long in the Dominican refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie depicting the Last Supper. This is quintessential King territory, and his uniquely detailed, far-ranging, and engrossing chronicle of the creation of this revolutionary masterpiece, a quantum shift in art, perfectly complements his best-selling Michelangelo & the Pope's Ceiling (2003). Himself an exceptional portraitist and craftsman, King brings to precise life a fully dimensional, irresistibly audacious, and wizardly Leonardo and his powerfully affecting, miraculously surviving mural, a glorious culmination of the artist's astounding powers of observation and exhilarating vision of the world. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)

Edward Weston: 125 Photographs

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"Edward Weston is one of the essential photographers of the 20th century. He helped define our prewar notions of the American West when it still beckoned as a frontier, as a refuge from civilization--if you could bear the unsparing light. His eye often sought out the lush, the sensual: nudes like landscapes, landscapes like nudes, and shells and peppers like both." --The New York Times

100 Ideas That Changed Photography

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This compelling book chronicles the most influential ideas that have shaped photography from the invention of the daguerreotype in the early 19th century up to the digital revolution and beyond. Entertaining and intelligent, it provides a fascinating resource to dip into. Arranged in a broadly chronological order to show the development of photography, the ideas that comprise the book include innovative concepts, cultural and social incidents, technologies, and movements. Each idea is presented through lively text and arresting visuals, and explores when the idea first evolved and its subsequent impact on photography.