Customer Reviews

Art: A World History

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book was just what I had been searching for: a well-illustrated, thorough - yet concise - "all-encompassing" book of world art. This work covers individuals/creations from ancient times to present, and provides timelines and interesting facts like brief artist bios, the current locations of the featured masterpieces, and the official names of each artistic "period." Each artist gets his/her own few pages, describing his/her style/history, and there are tons of images, including one of the artist him/herself. It's quite substantial, and the pages have a high-quality shine. This is a great reference book and a jumping-off point for more in-depth exploration into art history and the people who shaped it.

This is a good book for those who slept through high school or college art history and now wish they had a bit more background for enjoying their local museum of art. The book is VERY concise and provides relevant historical perspectives. The page size is small (it is really a very thick handbook) so the photos of the various pieces are hard to appreciate. I have enjoyed going through it, however, and it has provided the foundation I was looking for.

I was looking for an interesting historical world view of art to teach a small group of 5 8th/9th graders. Having searched Google I found the book on Amazon which gave me the pertinent information I needed. It was great and a relief to find the book having done a lot of searching and I thank you for the prompt delivery. The students are fascinated by the book and the pictures are a great help and make the history very interesting.

Thanks again

R.T. Atherton

This is a superb survey of art, mostly painting and sculpture, from ancient to modern times - mostly Western, with a brief excursion into Japanese prints. The reproductions, most in brilliant color, are extraordinarily good. There are brief biographies of the artists with informative captions with the works. Perhaps most surprising and welcome in so small a book, the print is strong and unusually clear and easy to read. 500 pages with an index, but no bibliography. Highly recommended.

Easy to read (and fun as well) with most everything you would expect to find in a comprehensive history of art. Nothing new, no radical perspectives, but in depth enough to inspire further reading.
I wish it was bigger for the sake of the illustrations.

I should start by saying that the book itself as a reference is great. It covers a wide expanse of time. The chapters begin with an introduction about the era being covered. The artist profiles include facts about the artist like their birth and death dates, locations and influences.

I was surprised when I pulled the book out of the shipping box at how small it was. I expected the book to be slightly larger and neglected to check the dimensions before ordering. This is normally not something anybody considers before ordering a book online. The book it slightly larger than a typical CD case and about as thick as five cd cases.

Norman Rockwell was omitted from the text. I'd thought for sure that such a well known artist would have been included. I understand that the text cannot reasonably cover EVERY artist from history, however, There were a handfull of other artists that were omitted as well.

Overall, the book is great to have around and a pleasure to flip through. I was surprised at how many of the pieces I recognized. I purchased this as a reference to just have around and add a little more subject matter to the book case.

This book is full of information, wonderful illustrations, and it's absolutely beautiful. I'm amazed by the amount of information packed into this little book. Buy it!

I was very happy with this purchase. For a compact book, it is full of info and photos on both the artist and his paintings and you can't beat the price of it.

I used this book to review before National Boards--good info and put my head in a good frame of mind for writing about art--and it's small and portable so easy to take everywhere when the crunch is on.

great book! the choice of works could have been greater but they are fine, its hard to appreciate art in such a small format but this book works.

it makes a nice little refresher on the history of art for anyone with a love for it.

I like it, its set at a great price, but if you really want to appreciate the images, short of going to the museums, a large format book would be a better choice.