Glittering Images
A Journey Through Art from Egypt to Star Wars
(Sprache: Englisch)
One of our most omnivorously talented cultural critics--the best-selling author of Sexual Personae and Break, Blow, Burn--presents a primer of Western art's defining moments, from the tomb of Queen Nefertari to George Lucas's digitally-enhanced duel in Revenge of the Sith.
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One of our most omnivorously talented cultural critics--the best-selling author of Sexual Personae and Break, Blow, Burn--presents a primer of Western art's defining moments, from the tomb of Queen Nefertari to George Lucas's digitally-enhanced duel in Revenge of the Sith.
Klappentext zu „Glittering Images “
Modern life is a sea of images. With so much visual data bombarding us-from personal devices to mass media-our brains must rapidly adapt to make sense of it all. Here to guide us is America's premier intellectual provocateur, Camille Paglia. In these pages, Paglia returns to the subject that made her famous, situating our current visual environment within the epic scope of all of art history. With trademark audacity, Paglia tours through more than two dozen seminal paintings, sculptures, architectural styles, performance pieces, and digital art works that have transformed our world. Combining close analysis with historical context, she trains our eye to each image-from an Egyptian tomb to Jackson Pollock's abstract Green Silver to Renée Cox's daring performance piece Chillin' with Liberty. And in her stunning conclusion, she declares the avant-garde tradition dead and film director George Lucas the world's greatest living artist. Written with energy, erudition, and wit, Glittering Images will profoundly change the way we see.
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From Chapter 1Resurrection
Queen Nefertari
Ghosts carved out of time. Egyptian art is a vast ruin of messages from the dead. Clean and simple in form, Egyptian painted figures float in an abstract space that is neither here nor there. The background is coolly blank. Everything is flattened into the foreground, an eternal present where serenely smiling pharaohs offer incense and spools of flax to the gods or drive their chariot wheels over fallen foes. Hieroglyphics hang in midair, clusters of sharp pictograms of a rope, reed, bun, viper, owl, human leg, or mystic eye.
Resurrection was the master value of a civilization that dreamed of conquering the terrors of death. At the heart of Egyptian religion was a corpse the mummy of the great god Osiris, swaddled in linen strips. Osiris was murdered and dismembered by his evil brother, Set, who scattered his fourteen body parts throughout Egypt. Isis, Osiris s sister and devoted wife, collected and reassembled them except for the missing penis, which she fabricated in wood or clay. As Osiris s embalmer and enhancer, therefore, Isis acted as a resourceful proto-artist, assembling materials and molding a work of mummiform sculpture that would be reproduced in Egyptian art and cult for three thousand years.
Passage to the afterlife meant a descent to the underworld. Souls hoping for rebirth invoked Osiris and literally became him. Despite its preoccupation with death, Egyptian art is rarely claustrophobic. The beyond was no spectral twilight but a lively zone of physical needs and pleasures. Warehousing stools, chairs, tables, chests, clothing, perfumes, ointments, jewelry, games, daggers, boomerangs, chariots, and jars of extracted viscera, the tomb was a distillation of real life. The urbane aristocrats promenading across the walls are wide-eyed and cheerful as they face the great unknown. Their majestically enthroned guardian gods often seem faintly comic, with the large heads of birds, beetles, or
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hippopotamuses, vestiges of primitive animism.
Resurrection also symbolizes our modern recovery of Egypt. For a millennium after the fall of Rome, Egypt was wrapped in a haze of occult legend. After Islam s arrival, it became a closed world whose pagan remains were ignored and neglected. Napoleon s 1798 invasion helped start Egyptology: a French officer s discovery of the Rosetta Stone led to the decipherment of hieroglyphics, while the immense, multivolumed report by Napoleon s team of surveyors and scientists set off a craze for Egyptian style that swept European architecture and decor and would even produce America s Washington Monument. Over the next century, thanks to photography, knowledge of Egypt was gradually spread throughout the world. The ancient Egyptians have finally achieved their immortality.
From earliest times through the Middle Kingdom, the rulers of Egypt were buried in sprawling necropolises at the desert s edge near the Delta, as the Nile fans out -toward the sea. The principal sacred districts were at Saqqara and Giza, where the Great Sphinx, hacked out of bedrock, still guards Chephren s mammoth pyramid. After a devastating Syrian invasion, the capital of Egypt was moved four hundred miles south to Thebes. There the upstart warrior pharaohs of the New Kingdom created their own cemetery facing toward the setting sun across the Nile the Valley of the Kings, scarcely more than a dry gulch behind the high, horned escarpment of the Libyan Plateau. Pyramids or telltale markers of any kind were prudently avoided. The coffins were buried deep in the rock and the entryways heaped with rubble. Nevertheless, most tombs in the Valley of the Kings were looted within two centuries. One that escaped detection belonged to a minor king, Tutankhamen, who died young. When his tomb was found and opened in 1922, the staggering treasures, such as his solid-go
Resurrection also symbolizes our modern recovery of Egypt. For a millennium after the fall of Rome, Egypt was wrapped in a haze of occult legend. After Islam s arrival, it became a closed world whose pagan remains were ignored and neglected. Napoleon s 1798 invasion helped start Egyptology: a French officer s discovery of the Rosetta Stone led to the decipherment of hieroglyphics, while the immense, multivolumed report by Napoleon s team of surveyors and scientists set off a craze for Egyptian style that swept European architecture and decor and would even produce America s Washington Monument. Over the next century, thanks to photography, knowledge of Egypt was gradually spread throughout the world. The ancient Egyptians have finally achieved their immortality.
From earliest times through the Middle Kingdom, the rulers of Egypt were buried in sprawling necropolises at the desert s edge near the Delta, as the Nile fans out -toward the sea. The principal sacred districts were at Saqqara and Giza, where the Great Sphinx, hacked out of bedrock, still guards Chephren s mammoth pyramid. After a devastating Syrian invasion, the capital of Egypt was moved four hundred miles south to Thebes. There the upstart warrior pharaohs of the New Kingdom created their own cemetery facing toward the setting sun across the Nile the Valley of the Kings, scarcely more than a dry gulch behind the high, horned escarpment of the Libyan Plateau. Pyramids or telltale markers of any kind were prudently avoided. The coffins were buried deep in the rock and the entryways heaped with rubble. Nevertheless, most tombs in the Valley of the Kings were looted within two centuries. One that escaped detection belonged to a minor king, Tutankhamen, who died young. When his tomb was found and opened in 1922, the staggering treasures, such as his solid-go
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Inhaltsverzeichnis zu „Glittering Images “
Introduction 1 Resurrection: Queen Nefertari
2 Mystic Vision: Idols of the Cyclades
3 The Race: Charioteer of Delphi
4 Roof of Air: Porch of the Maidens
5 God’s Snare: Laocoön
6 Sky of Gold: Saint John Chrysostom
7 Living Letters: The Book of Kells
8 Solitary Watcher: Donatello, Mary Magdalene
9 Island of Love: Titian, Venus with a Mirror
10 Lord of the Sea: Agnolo Bronzino, Portrait of Andrea Doria as Neptune
11 Blaze of Glory: Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Chair of Saint Peter
12 Satin Knights: Anthony Van Dyck, Lord John Stuart and his Brother, Lord Bernard Stuart
13 Swirling Line: The French Rococo
14 Martyr of the Revolution: Jacques-Louis David, The Death of Marat
15 Arctic Ruin: Caspar David Friedrich, The Sea of Ice
16 City in Motion: Édouard Manet, At the Café
17 Melting Color: Claude Monet, Irises
18 Heaven and Hell: Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon
19 Heart of Stone: George Grosz, Life Makes You Happy!
20 Dance of the Mind: Tamara de Lempicka, Portrait of Doctor Boucard
21 Luncheon in the Twilight Zone: René Magritte, The Portrait
22 Romance of the Grid: Piet Mondrian, Composition with Red, Blue, and Yellow
23 Elegance at Ease: John Wesley Hardrick, Xenia Goodloe
24 Shooting Stars: Jackson Pollock, Green Silver
25 Sun and Rain: Andy Warhol, Marilyn Diptych
26 On the Road: Eleanor Antin, 100 Boots
27 Electric: Walter De Maria, The Lightning Field
28 Blue Dawn: Renée Cox, Chillin’ with Liberty
29 Red River: George Lucas, Revenge of the Sith
Acknowledgments
Index
Autoren-Porträt von Camille Paglia
Camille Paglia
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Camille Paglia
- 2013, 224 Seiten, mit Abbildungen, Maße: 16,9 x 23,3 cm, Kartoniert (TB), Englisch
- Verlag: Penguin Random House
- ISBN-10: 0307278026
- ISBN-13: 9780307278029
- Erscheinungsdatum: 01.08.2013
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
A magisterial, poetically composed, and masterly study. . . . Paglia writes rhapsodically of art s power. . . . [She is] one of the most erudite public intellectuals in America. The Philadelphia InquirerHighlights Ms. Paglia s impressive range and famously eclectic tastes. . . . [She is] a critic determined to teach the redemptive possibilities of patient, informed observation. The Wall Street Journal
Riveting. . . . Revelatory. . . . Subtle, penetrating and sometimes funny. The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
[Paglia is] an art-for-art s-sake worshiper of art and literature whose close readings, influenced by Walter Pater and Sigmund Freud, are pyrotechnic and passionate. San Francisco Chronicle
Dazzling. . . . Compulsively readable. . . . Paglia at her best. . . . The lean precision of the book is a marvel. . . . Her choices range from the classic and expected to the obscure and the startling. . . . Even her explorations of the more familiar works will have you marveling anew. Salon
Paglia [is] an intellectual sensation. . . . Here we find Paglia s bewitching eye, matched with her gift for language, at its best. City Journal
Artists, questing outsiders, are still with us, still finding their way, making their way. Perhaps some of them will be inspired by the glittering images Camille Paglia offers here. Los Angeles Times
An essential work by an essential public intellectual. Vice
Paglia is a lively, bracingly outspoken writer able to draw on her knowledge of both fine arts and popular culture. National Post
A fascinating, uncommonly accessible look at the history of images in Western art. . . . [Paglia is] an incisive cultural critic, a dedicated teacher and a nimble-minded writer. Cincinnati City Beat
An intelligently detailed examination of 29 works of art, ranging from a tomb painting of Egyptian Queen Nefertari to George Lucas film Revenge of the Sith. . . . Paglia is a wonderful popularizer of art history and art
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appreciation. Kirkus Reviews
Succinct, lively, and illuminating. . . . Paglia s bold and rigorous, handsomely illustrated and welcoming art iconography will accomplish her mission to provoke, enlighten, and inspire.. Booklist (starred)
A valuable cultural critique and an elucidating history. . . . [A] highly reflective and imaginative history of images in Western art. . . . Paglia writes with energetic lucidity, and her entries on the Laocoön and Donatello s Mary Magdalene are standouts in this absorbing volume. Publishers Weekly
The ever-provocative Paglia returns. . . . She proclaims that the avant-garde is dead and that George Lucas is our greatest living artist. This will get the smart folks talking. Library Journal
Succinct, lively, and illuminating. . . . Paglia s bold and rigorous, handsomely illustrated and welcoming art iconography will accomplish her mission to provoke, enlighten, and inspire.. Booklist (starred)
A valuable cultural critique and an elucidating history. . . . [A] highly reflective and imaginative history of images in Western art. . . . Paglia writes with energetic lucidity, and her entries on the Laocoön and Donatello s Mary Magdalene are standouts in this absorbing volume. Publishers Weekly
The ever-provocative Paglia returns. . . . She proclaims that the avant-garde is dead and that George Lucas is our greatest living artist. This will get the smart folks talking. Library Journal
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