Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9110 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09-28
• Binding: Hardcover
• 416 pages

Synopsis
'Great art has dreadful manners...' Simon Schama observes at the start of his epic exploration of the power, and whole point, of art. 'The hushed reverence of the gallery can fool you into believing masterpieces are polite things, visions that soothe, charm and beguile, but actually they are thugs. Merciless and wily, the greatest paintings grab you in a headlock, rough up your composure and then proceed in short order to re-arrange your sense of reality...' With the same disarming force, "Power of Art" jolts us far from the comfort zone of the hushed art gallery, as Schama closes in on intense make-or-break turning points in the lives of eight great artists who, under extreme stress, created something unprecedented, altering the course of art forever.The embattled heroes - Caravaggio, Bernini, Rembrandt, David, Turner, Van Gogh, Picasso and Rothko - each in his own resolute way faced crisis with steadfast defiance. The masterpieces they created challenged convention, shattered complacency, shifted awareness, and changed the way we look at the world.With powerfully vivid story-telling, Schama explores the dynamic personalities of the artists and the spirit of the times they lived through, capturing the flamboyant theatre of bourgeois life in Amsterdam, the passion and paranoia of Revolutionary Paris, and the carnage and pathos of civil-war Spain.

Most compelling of all, "Power of Art" traces the extraordinary evolution of eight world-class works of art. Created in a bolt of illumination, such works 'tell us something about how the world is, how it is to be inside our skins, that no more prosaic source of wisdom can deliver. And when they do that they answer, irrefutably and majestically, the nagging question of every reluctant art-conscript..."OK, OK, but what's art really for?"

Customer Reviews

A Godsend
Often art books can be rather highbrow and aimed at people who already know what they're talking about. The joy of Schama's work is that it is readable, interesting and understandable to the average person without ever being patronising or just plain dumb. Doing a course on art history I had to tackle the paintings of Mark Rothko, which is not easy for a beginner. Schama's fine chapter on Rothko gave me a way in to start looking at and actually making sense of the paintings. The chapters on David and Pollock were equally illuminating. The illustrations are of an excellent quality and a good size, so you can really get up close to the pictures and I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

Beautifully printed and written
This is a delightful book: the BBC has produced a real gem. While the format sems to be caught between two stools (part coffee-table book, part bed-side book), it manages to capture two types of reader: the browser for the sensational prints and close-ups of the paintings, and the reader: for the snappy prose of Schama. You can hear is slightly derogatory tone coming off the pages. he has managed to construct good stories around the painters and situate their work within their lives to give the book a bit of momentum. Hats off.

There is so much more to art that just paint and canvas!
After being totally addicted to the BBC series, I was given this book as a present by my long-suffering partner and I can honestly say it's one of the best coffee table/non-fiction books I've ever owned. Schama is an amazingly engaging writer, he has you there, focused on everything he says - you take in the information - just like the best teacher you ever had at school - you just cant help it. If school had been half as interesting as this I would have had a degree in art!! And as a post script, I dragged the afore mentioned, long suffering partner round the Louvre for nearly four hours tracking down the paintings in this book and he had to listen to me waxing lyrical about the artist/painting - OK, he's probably questioning the day he bought this book for me but you know what I think I actually have him interested in art as more than just a piece of canvas and paint!