The definitive monograph on the greatest painter of the early Renaissance, now available in an affordable paperback edition

Giotto is traditionally considered a founder of the Italian Renaissance, praised for his understanding of space and the human body. Producing a series of commissioned works for the church and upper classes in his native Tuscany and surrounding regions, Giotto (c. 1267–1337) changed the course of European art by breaking away from the stiff, predictable figures of the Byzantine and medieval traditions. His great fresco cycles, most notably the lives of the Virgin and Christ in the Scrovegni (or Arena) Chapel, Padua, are filled with realistic depictions of three-dimensional figures set in dramatic, even revolutionary, perspectival spaces.

In this authoritative survey of Giotto's life and work, Francesca Flores d'Arcais draws on a broad range of sources, from fourteenth-century documents to recent art-historical investigations. Her research leads her to important reattributions of Giottesque paintings and to new conclusions regarding the execution and dating of both famous and lesser-known works. In this second edition of her study, d'Arcais also discusses the earthquake of September 26, 1997, that damaged the frescoes of the Upper Basilica of San Francisco in Assisi, some of which are attributed to the young Giotto. Now available in a paperback edition at an irresistible price, Giotto combines splendid images and d'Arcais's insightful text in the definitive monograph on the greatest of trecento masters.

A selection of Ansel Adams' breathtaking images, remastered to celebrate over 100 years of The National Park Service.

Ansel Adams was hired by the United States Department of the Interior to photograph America's national parks, producing this group of breathtaking images.

In 1941, Ansel Adams photographed America's national parks for a series of murals that would celebrate the country's natural heritage. Because of the escalation of World War II, the project was suspended after less than a year, but not before Adams had produced these images, which illustrate both his early innovations and the shape of his later, legendary career as America's foremost landscape photographer.

The invitation to photograph the nation's parklands was the perfect assignment for Adams, as it allowed him to express his deepest convictions as artist, conservationist, and citizen. These stunning photographs of the natural geysers and terraces in Yellowstone, the rocks and ravines in the Grand Canyon, the winding rivers and majestic mountains in Glacier and Grand Teton national parks, the mysterious Carlsbad Caverns, the architecture of ancient Indian villages, and many other evocative views of the American West demonstrate the genius of Adams' technical and aesthetic inventiveness.

In these glorious, seminal images we see the inspired reverence for the wilderness that has made Ansel Adams' work an enduring influence on environmentalism as well as art.

Ansel Adams (1902–1984) was one of the most prolific and highly acclaimed photographers of the twentieth century, and the author of dozens of publications. He helped establish the department of photography at New York’s Museum of Modern Art and founded the Friends of Photography in Carmel, California, and the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. A member of the board of directors of the Sierra Club for thirty-seven years, Adams was instrumental in the growth of the American conservationist movement.

Alice Gray is a writer and editor based in Louisville, Kentucky. Her work has appeared in such publications as Art & Auction and Art News.

The first comprehensive monograph on contemporary artist Karen Gunderson written by Pulitzer Prize winner Elizabeth Frank.

Widely collected in Hollywood and New York, artist Karen Gunderson is perhaps best known for her work since the 1980s, when she transitioned from painting in color to working only in black. Over her forty-plus-year career, Gunderson has tackled subjects from clouds to royalty to the cosmos. Her long-developed, labor intensive technique, including rigorous brushwork and paint layering, employs a range of black shades that create a unique three-dimensional effect: The multiple textures from the paint catch light and make the paintings shimmer and appear to move, alternating with shadows and highlights that illuminate her subjects—historic royal figures, bodies of water, mountains, and constellations—depending on how the viewer moves in front of each artwork.

Tracing the life and career of the artist, Karen Gunderson is written by author and critic Elizabeth Frank, who won the Pulitzer Prize for her biography of poet Louise Bogan and is the author of a number of books on art, including Jackson Pollock, published by Abbeville.

Art lovers and artists interested in Gunderson’s painting technique will discover captivating works in this book—in more than 100 illustrations—that shows how the artist pushes the limits to what one can do with black paint. While abstract artists of the past, including Ad Reinhardt and Pierre Soulages, have employed black paint, Gunderson has set herself apart from this lineage. She has distinguished herself not only with her use of figurative subjects, but also the way her works radiate a quiet optimism—a sharp contrast with this dark medium.