Get into Art Books at the Mercer County Library

I spend a lot of time thinking about art. The more I learn, the less I seem to know. In some philosophies, I think that makes me a wise person. Loaded today in the film projector of my mind is a visit we took to a local museum when I was in middle school. As the tour was winding up, my class formed a circle around three metal blocks that were stacked on top of each other near the museum entrance. The resounding opinion was, and I’m censoring myself here, “That is not art.” To our surprise, a man emerged from the fog of our war on aesthetics and promptly yelled at us. He was, or so he claimed, the person who had sculpted the blocks, and he scolded us for knowing nothing about art. I think about that experience a lot. On one hand, it was highly entertaining. On the other, it speaks to an ongoing issue about the nature of art and who, exactly, it’s for.

You, MCL Blog reader, may have some notions or hesitations about art yourself. For this blog post, and your potential to enjoy art, I will simply provide a quote by Oscar Wilde as our guiding light: “The artist should never try to be popular. Rather the public should be more artistic.” Like most Oscar Wilde quotes, that sentence could be construed in a variety of ways. For our purposes, I will interpret it to mean that it is up to us, the individual members of the public, to determine what we value, enjoy, and take inspiration from. The artist’s creation is a wave on the shore. It is our decision to let it wash over us or to scramble back to our beach umbrellas.

Now that we’ve established that your perception and enjoyment of art does not have to be guided by any other person, group or echo from an ivory tower, I am happy to provide you with a list of artistic resources that we have available here at the Mercer County Library System. If you don’t like them, I encourage you to search through our collection on your own in order to find something meaningful to you. Enjoy your journey of self-discovery!

A History of Women Photographers by Naomi Rosenblum

ISBN: 9781558597617

“In a work of staggering beauty and immense learning, Rosenblum presents a comprehensive history of women's accomplishments in photography around the world and throughout the entire history of the medium, from the mid-1800s to the present. She explores the work of some 240 photographers.”

The Great Movies III by Roger Ebert

ISBN: 9780226182087

“Roger Ebert has been writing film reviews for the Chicago Sun-Times for over four decades now and his biweekly essays on great movies have been appearing there since 1996. As Ebert noted in the introduction to the first collection of those pieces, ‘They are not the greatest films of all time, because all lists of great movies are a foolish attempt to codify works which must stand alone.’”

Cy Twombly: A Retrospective by Kirk Varnedoe

ISBN: 9780870706202

“The largest and most comprehensive survey ever held in the United States of the work of American abstract artist Cy Twombly (b. 1928), Cy Twombly: A Retrospective comprises nearly 100 works, including paintings, sculptures, and works on paper, which reveal the panoramic range of subjects and emotions addressed in his art. The exhibition redefines Twombly’s place as a singular master in postwar art, and establishes the critical role his work has played in the international development of contemporary art.” -MoMA

Jazz: The Rough Guide by Ian Carr

ISBN: 9781858281377

Critical biographies cover the legends of the genre as well as today's hottest young players. Included are nearly 3,000 recommendations of recordings.

The Magic Mirror of M.C. Escher by Bruno Ernst

ISBN: 9781566197700

"A woman once rang me up and said, 'Mr. Escher, I am absolutely crazy about your work. In your print Reptiles you have given such a striking illustration of reincarnation.' I replied, 'Madame, if that's the way you see it, so be it.'" An engagingly sly comment by the renowned Dutch graphic artist Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) -- the complex ambiguities of whose work leave hasty or single-minded interpretations far behind.”

Opera Anecdotes by Ethan Mordden

ISBN: 9780195036008

“Here are anecdotes both classic and arcane: Giuseppe Verdi's discourse on How to Write an Opera, Enrico Caruso's adventures in the San Francisco earthquake, Arturo Toscanini's reunion dinner with his former lover Geraldine Farrar, and Beverly Sills' ad libbing from the Met balcony during a Lily Pons Lakme.”

Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies by Ross King

ISBN: 9781632860125

“Claude Monet is perhaps the world's most beloved artist, and among all his creations, the paintings of the water lilies in his garden at Giverny are most famous. Seeing them in museums around the world, viewers are transported by the power of Monet's brush into a peaceful world of harmonious nature. Monet himself intended them to provide ‘an asylum of peaceful meditation.’”

Mark Rothko by Jeffrey S. Weiss

ISBN: 9780894682292

“Catalogue of a retrospective exhibition of 115 paintings on canvas and on paper from virtually every period of the artist's career. Contains four essays on color, darkness, surface and space in Rothko's work by John Gage, Barbara Novak and Brian O'Doherty, Carol Mancusi-Ungaro, and Jeffrey Weiss. There is also a chronology by Jessica Stewart and interviews on Rothko's legacy between Jeffrey Weiss and Mark Rosenthal and five artists: Ellsworth Kelly, Brice Marden, Gerhard Richter, Robert Ryman and George Segal.”

Hokusai: Prints and Drawings by Hokusai Katsushika

ISBN: 9783791324906

“Hokusai was one of the great masters of the Japanese woodblock print. His exquisite compositions and dynamic use of color set him apart from other printmakers, and his unequalled genius influenced both Japanese and a whole generation of Western artists. Now available for the first time in paperback, this book reproduces the artist's finest works in plates that convey the full variety of his invention, each of which is provided with an informative commentary.”

Visualizing the Beatles: A Complete Graphic History of the World’s Favorite Band by John Pring

ISBN: 9780062790989

“A visual history of The Beatles illustrates the evolution of their style and sound through infographics that examine the songs on every album, cover designs, chart positions, instruments used, and a wealth of other details.”

- by Andrew, Lawrence Branch