Colour library

2 total works

Cubism

by Philip Cooper

Published March 1995

Cubism was one of the most influential movement in Western art this century. Beginning with the revolutionary experiments of Picasso and Braque in Paris between 1906 and 1908, cubism gathered momentum and soon spread to the rest of Europe and America. The movement’s rejection of illusionistic representation in favour of an autonomous pictorial language opened the way to abstraction. The Cubists also invented papier collé and collage and pioneered a new approach to sculpture, innovations that are still being explored today. This book presents a wide cross-section of all these developments, and its 48 full-page colour plates, commentaries and black-and-white illustrations of comparative works provide a perfect introduction to Cubism.

Impressionism

by Philip Cooper and Mark Powell-Jones

Published 12 August 1998

The Impressionists developed one of the most innovative movements in the history of Western art. Their revolutionary ideas about light and colour, expression, realism, the aim of painting and the role of the artist, all laid the foundations of modern art. Although ridiculed at first by the art establishment in Europe, Impressionism became one of the most celebrated and popular of art styles, and artists such as Monet, Manet, Pissaro and Renoir have achieved enduring acclaim.

Critic Philip Cooper has chosen illustrations to show the diversity of and connections between Impressionist paintings, and has written detailed commentary on each colour plate.