Visual Arts favourites — Readings Books

Cover image for 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art

65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art

Marcia Langton, Judith Ryan

65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art stares into the dark heart of Australia's brutal colonial history and offers new insights into the first art of this country.

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marramarra

Brook Garru Andrew, Jessica Neath

marramarra highlights contemporary Indigenous art from across the planet and how artists and their communities are providing truth-telling about the past and inspiration to imagine better futures.

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Cover image for The Paintings of Criss Canning

The Paintings of Criss Canning

Criss Canning

Criss Canning is one of Australia's finest and most celebrated still-life artists. Criss has explored flowers, textiles and decorative objects in her paintings over five decades. For thirty-five years, she…

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Cover image for Paris in Ruins

Paris in Ruins

Sebastian Smee

The Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic's gripping account of how political turmoil in Paris from 1870-1871 gave rise to Impressionism.

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Cover image for Vincent Namatjira

Vincent Namatjira

Vincent Namatjira

'Welcome to the past, present and future. I stand side-by-side with my great-grandfather, who I never met - two painters from the centre of this country, standing up and making…

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Cover image for Vitamin Txt

Vitamin Txt

Phaidon Editors

A ground-breaking global survey of today's most innovative artists working with text

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Cover image for mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri

mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri

Judy Watson is one of Australia's most globally collected and exhibited artists. Her practice is centred on truth-telling as a Waanyi woman, particularly in relation to environmental protection; historic government…

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Cover image for Photography - A Queer History

Photography - A Queer History

From Robert Mapplethorpe to Deborah Bright, this is the essential guide to queer photography.

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Cover image for Ken Whisson: Painting and Drawing

Ken Whisson: Painting and Drawing

Quentin Sprague

A richly illustrated study of Australian modernist painter Ken Whisson's life and work.

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Cover image for Iwantja

Iwantja

Iwantja Artists

Located on a small ridge at the edge of the Indulkana Ranges, approximately 575 kilometres south of Alice Springs, Iwantja Arts art centre is home to some of Australia's most…

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Cover image for The Invisible Dragon (30th anniversary edition)

The Invisible Dragon (30th anniversary edition)

Dave Hickey

An expanded edition of Hickey's controversial and exquisitely written apologia for beauty-championed by artists, reviled by art critics, and as powerful as ever 30 years on

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Cover image for Cressida Campbell

Cressida Campbell

National Gallery of Australia

Cressida Campbell celebrates the career of an exceptional Australian colourist who has worked between painting and printmaking for over forty years

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Cover image for Prime, Art's Next Generation

Prime, Art’s Next Generation

Phaidon Editors

The most exciting rising stars in contemporary art - who’s who and what’s next - featuring 107 artists born since 1980, as chosen by a new generation of art experts…

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Cover image for Get Your Shit Together

Get Your Shit Together

David Shrigley

This is the most comprehensive book to date on the work of beloved British artist David Shrigley.

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Cover image for Catholica: The Visual Culture of Catholicism

Catholica: The Visual Culture of Catholicism

Suzanna Ivanic

This richly illustrated book provides the visual keys for any art lover to decode and understand the iconography, tenets, sites, and rituals of the Catholic faith through accessible analysis of…

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Cover image for Bacon in Moscow

Bacon in Moscow

James Birch

The hilarious account of one man’s quest to mount a Francis Bacon exhibition in the Soviet Union.

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Cover image for WHO ARE YOU: Australian Portraiture

WHO ARE YOU: Australian Portraiture

Sophie Gerhard, Joanna Gilmour, Penelope Grist, David Hurlston, Hannah Presley

One of the most comprehensive explorations of portraiture undertaken in Australia.

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Cover image for Dot Circle and Frame: The Making of Papunya Tula art

Dot Circle and Frame: The Making of Papunya Tula art

John Kean

A startling, vibrant, radical new form of desert art arrived in Papunya Tula in 1971, anchored and inherited in ceremony; stimulated by the twentieth century and painting onto canvas.

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Cover image for Free Fall

Free Fall

Ben Quilty

A stunning art book of Quilty’s most recent collection of paintings from his series ‘Free Fall

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Cover image for Sybil & Cyril: Cutting Through Time

Sybil & Cyril: Cutting Through Time

Jenny Uglow

From one of our most admired writers, a beautifully illustrated story of a dynamic artistic partnership between the wars.

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Cover image for Great Women Painters

Great Women Painters

Phaidon Editors

A sumptuous survey of over 300 women painters and their work spanning almost five centuries

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Cover image for Banksy: Completed

Banksy: Completed

Carol Diehl

There’s more to Banksy than the painting on the wall: the first in-depth investigation into the mysteries of the world’s most famous living artist.

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Cover image for The Salon of 1846

The Salon of 1846

Charles Baudelaire,Michael Fried

In his introduction to Charles Baudelaire’s Salon of 1846, the renowned art historian Michael Fried presents a new take on the French poet and critic’s ideas on art, criticism, romanticism…

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Cover image for Art in Detail: 100 Masterpieces

Art in Detail: 100 Masterpieces

Susie Hodge

An accessible guide to the finer details of 100 masterpieces of Western art.

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Cover image for Hilma af Klint: The secret paintings

Hilma af Klint: The secret paintings

More than a century after she painted her most celebrated works the visionary artist and abstract art pioneer, Hilma af Klint, is taking centre stage as her art captivates audiences…

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Cover image for Fairweather and China

Fairweather and China

Claire Roberts

Ian Fairweather is one of the most significant twentieth-century artists to have worked in Australia, and is exceptional among modern artists for his experience of Chinese life and culture. This…

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Cover image for The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago

The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago

Judy Chicago

In this provocative and resonant autobiography, world-renowned artist and feminist icon Judy Chicago reflects on her extraordinary life and career.

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Cover image for Goya's Graphic Imagination

Goya’s Graphic Imagination

Mark McDonald

This exploration of Francisco Goya’s graphic output reveals his technical virtuosity and boundless imagination

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Cover image for The Lives of the Surrealists

The Lives of the Surrealists

Desmond Morris

A biographical survey of the principal Surrealists by one of the last surviving members of the movement, bestselling author and artist Desmond Morris, who knew many of the key participants…

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Cover image for Futura-isms

Futura-isms

Futura

A collection of fascinating quotations from the legendary artist and graffiti pioneer –

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Cover image for Guerrilla Girls

Guerrilla Girls

Guerrilla Girls

It’s about time! The Guerrilla Girls, the masked feminist avengers who have been critiquing and reshaping the art world for decades, have compiled the very first career-spanning volume of their…

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Cover image for Keith Haring

Keith Haring

Simon Doonan

Part of the ‘Lives of the Artists’ series: highly readable short biographies of the most popular artists

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Cover image for Clive Bell and the Making of Modernism

Clive Bell and the Making of Modernism

Professor Mark Hussey (Professor of English, Pace University, USA, Pace University, USA)

Reclaiming Bell’s stature among the makers of modernism, Hussey has given us a biography to muse and marvel over - a snapshot of a time and of a man who…

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Cover image for Musee Picasso Paris

Musee Picasso Paris

This comprehensive tome covers all aspects of Picasso’s artistic career, from self-portraits to sculpture to photography, and features an extensive chronology of his life.

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Cover image for Hilma af Klint Catalogue Raisonne volume II: Paintings for the Temple

Hilma af Klint Catalogue Raisonne volume II: Paintings for the Temple

The second instalment in an epic and authoritative seven-volume Hilma af Klint catalogue raisonne: the pioneering abstractionist’s beloved The Paintings for the Temple series

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Cover image for Still Life: Contemporary Australian Painters

Still Life: Contemporary Australian Painters

Amber Creswell Bell

A rich survey of the work of more than forty still-life artists, which presents the genre in a uniquely Australian light.

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Cover image for The Mirror and the Palette

The Mirror and the Palette

Jennifer Higgie

A dazzlingly original and ambitious work of art history, intertwining biography and cultural history, and packed with tales of rebellion, adventure, revolution, travel and tragedy

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Cover image for Nature's Palette

Nature’s Palette

Patrick Baty

The first-ever visual expansion of Werner’s Nomenclature of Colours, featuring over 800 illustration references from the natural world.

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Cover image for Talk Art

Talk Art

Russell Tovey,Robert Diament

A joyful and straightforward introduction to contemporary art from the creators of hit podcast Talk Art - actor and collector Russell Tovey and gallerist Robert Diament.

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Cover image for Australia at the Venice Biennale: A Century of Contemporary Art

Australia at the Venice Biennale: A Century of Contemporary Art

Kerry Gardner

With works from Sidney Nolan, Howard Arkley and more, this richly illustrated work illuminates the untold stories and origins of the most important event of the art world

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Cover image for Kaffe Fassett in the Studio

Kaffe Fassett in the Studio

Kaffe Fassett

World-renowned artist and textile designer Kaffe Fassett provides a window into his creative process, offering readers new patterns, new ideas, and new inspiration With successes like Bold Blooms and Dreaming…

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Cover image for The Botanical Art of William T. Cooper

The Botanical Art of William T. Cooper

Wendy Cooper

William T. Cooper was one of the world’s most esteemed bird painters. In his paintings, birds nibble at plump red berries, they rest on twisted vines and branches covered with…

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Cover image for Latin American Art Since 1900

Latin American Art Since 1900

Edward Lucie-Smith

The only one-volume introduction to modern and post-modern art from Latin America, perhaps the most exciting and rewarding art scene in the world today.

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Cover image for Global Art

Global Art

Jessica Lack

An essential guide to the multifarious and increasingly connected world of global art from 1900 to today.

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Cover image for Moscow and St. Petersburg in Russia's Silver Age

Moscow and St. Petersburg in Russia’s Silver Age

John E. Bowlt

‘Excellent … an A-Z of Tsarism’s last, magnificent flowering of the arts’ Independent on Sunday

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Cover image for Who's Afraid of Contemporary Art?

Who’s Afraid of Contemporary Art?

Kyung An,Jessica Cerasi

An accessible and irreverent introduction to the art and art world of today, written by two curators at the heart of the contemporary art scene.

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Cover image for Jessie Traill

Jessie Traill

Jo Oliver

Jessie Traill, one of Australia’s most outstanding etchers, worked in an uncommon field for women. This biography explores her remarkable life - as artist, humanitarian and independent spirit.

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Cover image for Frida A to Z

Frida A to Z

Nadia Bailey

This intricately illustrated and fastidiously-researched book unpacks the life of Frida Kahlo, who herself was larger-than-life. From growing up in Coyocoan, Mexico City, in her family home, where she embraced…

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