History of Modern Art

Comprehensive and insightful, History of Modern Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Photography is the definitive source of information on the art of the modern era. This Fourth Edition is a freshly retold story of the art and artists of the last 150 years from modernism's mid-nineteenth-century European beginnings to today's divergent art trends. In the decade that has passed since the publication of the previous edition, art historians have come to recognize that works of art, whether sublimely beautiful or provocatively repelling, are artistic responses made by individuals to life in the real world. In her thoughtful reworking of H. H. Arnason's classic text, Marla Prather poses critical questions -- Why did Cubist painters and sculptors refract their subject matter in the way they did? Why did Abstract Expressionism take hold in America? Why did Postmodern architects reject the clean lines of the International Style? What does it mean that artworks of the late 1990s defy categorization? -- and provides insightful and thought-provoking answers. Almost 500 of the nearly 1,500 illustrations are new to this edition, a reflection of Prather's thorough rethinking and updating of the content. The final section of the book presents thirty-seven artists representative of today's decentralized art scene who are working in mediums ranging from conventional painting and photography to video and performance art. With its fully revised bibliography, History of Modern Art, Fourth Edition, is an essential volume for anyone with a curiosity about modern art and culture. Book jacket.

The late H. H. Arnason was an art historian, educator, and museum administrator who, for many years, was Vice President for Art Administration of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. He began his professional life in academe, teaching at Northwestern University, University of Chicago, and University of Hawaii. From 1947 to 1961, Arnason was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Art at the University of Minnesota Marla F. Prather is Curator of Twentieth-Century Art at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. A scholar and educator, she has written major sections in a number of catalogues to landmark exhibitions of twentieth-century art and artists, including those for Willem de Kooning and Alexander Calder, and has taught courses on aspects of twentieth-century art. Her B.A. and M.A. degrees are from The University of Kansas; she is a doctoral candidate at Columbia University in New York City