Customer Reviews

Orientalists: Western Artists in Arabia, the Sahara, Persia and

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In the last years i've read many books about the academic painters of the 19.century. Masters, who belong to the greatest of mankind,
fall into oblivion due to the unquestionable admiration of dilettante garbage in museums and the media.
Kristian Davies gave us with this art book a small jewel at hand, an important contribution for the improvement of the situation.
Contrary to many authors of other art books, most of them troublesome to read and see the end of the book, Davies, with his easy, flowing, personal and knowledgeable writing style, captivate his readers.
He weaves facts with his own experience and shared his love for oriental paintings, which were a great help to understand these countries, not only at his journeys. So he describe the impressing moments, when he saw a foreign area and culture for the first time, and miracly it appeared familiar to him, due to the great works of the despised Oriental painters.
Beside topic chapters concerning the roads and market places, faith or the representation of the woman, there are individual chapters about particular important masters.Not only relatively well-known ones , such as Gerome or Repin, are represented , but also largely unknown artist such as Vereshchagin or Bauernfeind. The German Gustav Bauernfeind, for sure one of the most ingenious German painters of all times, is not only almost unknown in Germany. His partly tragic life has, like Kristian Davies shows, large similarity with that of the painter Gauguin. Gauguin is pampered by the critics, Bauernfeind ignored, because he belongs to the academic painters. A tribe allegedly unable to inspire their pictures with life. That's ridiculous and wrong, as you can see by the enormous selection of the large sized, detailed and colorful pictures in this book.
This book deserves, as first art book, 6 stars!

This book absolutely blew me away. I manage a prestigious museum's bookstore in a major US city and have seen every single art history book that's come on the market in the last five years. I can honestly say that this book definitively sets a new standard for color reproduction and readability [it's easily the most accessible art book I've ever seen.] It contains hundreds of eye-popping color reproductions [and detail studies] of paintings that define the genre, some never having been seen by anyone for over a century. Plus, it's definitely NOT boring [like some other art books I could mention.] Author Kristian Davies has created a vibrant new hybrid of art history, personal experience, reflection and scholarly review. This book sets the bar so high for art books that it may never be surpassed. Highly recommended. If I could give it 6 stars, I would! And WHO is this new company Laynfaroh? I expect more great things from them in the future.

The Orientalist painters were contemporaries of the Impressionists. Whereas most educated people know of Manet, Monet, Degas, Renoir and the other Impressionist Masters, the Orientalist Masters are today almost unknown. Their obscurity is almost Darwinian in its completeness.

Kristian Davies like a physical anthropologist has gone back in time and dusted off the layers of dust that cover the Orientalist's paintings. What we discover are a number of painters with a vituoso technique and a solid command of the Western painting tradition. The high quality of the brush work, vivid colors and attention to detail are simply astonishing. There are few painters today that can match their technical skills.

After the September 11th terrorist attacks, these first artistic contacts between the West and the Orient take on special interest. Davies bravely enters into Edward Said's Orientalist debate. He uncovers an artistic vision that is much more complicated than a simple we versus them.

This is a beautiful book with very high production values. There are over 300 images of American, European and Russian Oreintalist masters. This book is highly recommended.

I have a lot of books on Orientalism paintings. Which is odd because you
can't actually go to any bookstores and find books on them. They all seem to
be rare, out of print, in a foreign language - and they're all expensive
($100+)Go to [...]and see for yourself. Its ridiculous. This
book on Orientalist pictures is great. Tons of the images are new to me. And
the ones that I have seen before - I only now realize how bad the color
quality is on a lot of the other Orientalist books because I can compare to
those in this book. Its like seeing them for the first time. One of the
other reviews here said that this book was actually readable. This made me
almost laugh out loud because art books and TOTALLY boring almost always. I
never understood. But The Orientalists really is fun to read. There's a
great chapter in here on opium and marijuana use and how its depicted in the
pictures! Its awesome, but its so well written that it keeps its integrity.
You don't feel like you're reading High Times or whatever. As the writer
said, its probably is the first time in western art that people were
depicted on drugs or doing drugs. And that way and a lot other ways, a lot
of these pictures are very relevant now today. There are even paintings of
Baghdad - from 100 years ago.
I was at first reluctant to buy this book (I did get it on amazon)
because I don' like spending too much money on the internet in case the book sucks. But its great, a big beautiful coffee table book. Worth the money. I saw
below that a guy even wrote a review from Iran! That's pretty interesting.

Simply beyond words! I have an enormous library of books on the subject-matter of Orientalism, from straight analysis to more image-driven hard covers and all manner of rare works as well; "The Orientalists" by Kristian Davies is bar none the finest, most vivid, most engaging book of them all. I am astonished at the volume of paintings the author was able to dig up from seemingly every nook and corner of the world, many of the images not seen by western eyes (or anyone's for that matter) in over 100 years. He has brought to light the work of artists, such as the gifted Verashchagin, who I'd virtually only read about but had seen so little of their work as to leave me wondering where it possibly all could have gone over the years. Lost to the ages- but found again by Davies. I should note that this is the first time, to my knowledge, that Verashchagin's work has been published in an English text/ artbook. Even some of the very hard to locate Russian/ Eastern European texts don't cover his work like this- and certainly not in color. The color! I can't believe the sheer quality of the reproductions in this book- they are unmatched by any other book on this subject. Few times, if ever, have I encountered such quality in a color image on the printed page which jumps out like these. The author has obviously made certain to do the paintings justice. I should additionally note how affordable this book was compared to most of the ridiculously overpriced hardcovers I own from stores like the defunct Hackers, whose overall quality and content can't match Davies' book. I have been waiting for a book like this for many years now and at last it is here. Having visited the publishers website, www.laynfaroh.com, I can see that everyone in the field who has gotten their hands on this, agree wholeheartedly with these assessments too. Full applause to author Kristian Davies. I notice he has written another artbook as well discussing the Cape Ann art colony which I'm going to look into. My thanks to you!

This is a really great refreshing book. Much better color quality than other types of books on Orientalist painting.

I was in college in Massachusetts during the 80's, the real era for deconstructionism, the post-feminist critique, and how it related to the Ethics of Encounter and cross-culturalism. We were studying Said and many others. And I must say that for a couple of years I was definitely smitten with Edward Said's books, his polemic. When you are in that environment though, after all a while, you tend to have blinders to any other way of looking at things. The more you see the world through the deconstructionist "lens' the more carried away you get by that critical approach, and after a while you peal apart everything you look at, and then are unable to just "look at" it. Eventually I realized Edward Said's works were a little extremist. Looking back he just seemed like an unhappy man with an ax to grind. But his influence was so strong that to this day the ax is still grinding its way through some university campuses.
Davies' "The Orientalists" really made me laugh because of the refreshing stance he took against Said's philosophies. From what I can tell, Davies is not a professor nor affiliated with any university - this obviously makes him more at liberty to speak his mind openly and take risks. And indeed he does: his voice is much more opinionated and almost sarcastic than any I have ever read in an art book. For those who have not taught or worked in universities, they do not understand how curious the politics is in certain departments. To this day, the name of Edward Said is still sacrosanct in many circles, and has acquired a bizarre kind of cult status - and thus to criticize him openly or in one's writing risks loss of tenure or accolades.
This is not surprising though because very often it has been outsiders, independent writers or scholars who make leaps and bounds, who successfully refute dogma and open new modes of thinking precisely because they do so risk free. There is no chance they will be fired.
All of this is beside the point though. The Orientalists has amazing color pictures, and tons of them. So, even if you never read a word of the text, the book will give you hours of enjoyment. I can imagine art students ripping this work off for years to come. But if you do get into the text though, you will not be bored or put to sleep. It makes for fascinating reading, in a History Channel, sort of fast-paced way. The writing doesn't get bogged down into the kind of tiring academic legalese that so often happens with books on Orientalism.
The pictures are great and so many of them are new. And Davies' new proposal on how one should look at Orientalist painting ("Judging each for its own individual value") will hopefully in time prevail over the Saidian approach, as indeed it already seems to be.

I chanced upon this book by chance on Amazon, and since I already have at least two other books on the subject, I was skeptical. But after reading the rave reviews, I decided to go for it. I am glad I purchased this book, it is far better than the other two because the author is so knowledgable, and the book is beautifully designed and executed. The color reproductions are far brighter and clearer than my previous books, and the author places closeups directly across from the full painting, which lends itself to greater appreciation. The paper and typeface colors are wonderful, as is the dsign of the whole volume.
but best of all, the author weaves a fascinating story and analysis of this maligned and neglected genre. He tells a bit of history as he groups the paintings by either artists or subject. If you are into realistic, academic or historical painting, or just want to catch a glimpse of what the Middle East looked like in the 19th Century, this book is a must. Highly Recommended

I purchased "The Orientalists" for the spectacular pictures and I ended up loving it just as much for Kristian Davies' excellent narrative. I think he organized his book with great skill and care, choosing appropriate topics, focusing on the best artists and the most interesting explorers/adventurers. This book is so wonderful, I can't stop picking it up and re-reading it, looking again and again at the pictures, recommending to friends, buying it for gifts. Davies' artistic sensibility and his very fair view of peoples and places make this book impossible to replicate. It is one of a kind and the best of its kind.

This is the first art book I have purchased and I am glad to say it was a wonderful buy. The Orientalists is a book full of astounding images and rich prose.

The author has written an art book anyone, including a lamen like me, can enjoy reading. How many people actually read books on art, I would venture to guess that most would simply place a book of art on the coffee table and occasionaly glance at it. However, I was unable to put this book down. I found a greater satisfaction in reading Orientalists than reading most other books.

I learned so much about the rich history of this particular art and strongly reccomend any avid readers to buy this book. You will not regret it!!!

I am quite stunned by The Orientalists. There can not be an equal to this in the
genre, I'd say it is in fact one of the finest art history books ever released.
For it seems to strike the balance of analysis, wonderful prose, and utterly
mind-blowing high quality full-color images. I thought I had some knowledge of
what was to be seen in the Orientalist genre, including the tackier aspects of
it. The author's selection of these largely never-before-seen paintings is
exquisite. No ridiculous Ingres naked girls pieces to be found here. He doesn't
showcase any of the kitschier examples of the genre and for that I am grateful.
This is one fine book I would strongly recommend for both those new to the genre
and seasoned enthusiasts.