Looking at the Overlooked: Four Essays on Still Life Painting

by Norman Bryson

Book Overview

In this, the only up-to-date critical work on still life painting in any language, Norman Bryson analyzes the origins, history and logic of still life, one of the most enduring forms of Western painting. The first essay is devoted to Roman wall-painting while in the second the author surveys a major segment in the history of still life, from seventeenth-century Spanish painting to Cubism. The third essay tackles the controversial field of seventeenth-century...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 094846206X
• ISBN13: 9780948462061
• Release Date: August 2017
• Publisher: Reaktion Books
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

brilliant

If you're wavering on your decision to purchase this work, just go for it. I took a seminar from Professor Bryson one semester, and let me tell you, this man simply exists on a whole different intellectual level. He constantly confronts and re-perceives art and artistic theory, pushing your mind to process visual information in radically different ways.

Looking at the Overlooked, The first critical book I have read on Still Life painting

There is not much literature available on the subject of still life painting that goes beyond the obvious surface information. This is the first review of the history of still life painting which reexamines the human implications of different still life ideas throughout history. The four essays are in depth explorations of the challenging questions asked by seemingly ordinary subject matter and the formal ways in which artists engage these concepts. I wish I would have known about this book years ago.

range and richness

In many american universities there is a sharp division between the classic art historians and the linguistics-inclined post modernists. Bryson's range encompasses both.

A sensitive, intimate book on the virtues of still lifes

This small and highly accessible book reflects on the significance of the slighted area of still life painting. It is a gentle and reflective reminder of the significance of domesticity and the interior in painting.