You know shoddy: an adjective meaning cheap and likely poorly made. But did you know that before it became a popular descriptor, shoddy was first coined as a noun? In the early nineteenth century, shoddy was the name given to a new textile material m...

This is the first detailed analysis of elite men's clothing in 17th-century Scotland and its influence on English male fashion. Focusing on the years 1566 through 1701, it centers on the clothing choices of five Stuart royals: James VI and I, Prince...

It's early spring and below the earth's surface seeds are just starting to sprout. One by one they stretch through the dirt and towards the sun, extending their shoots and leaves and growing tall. All except for one seedling, who isn't quite ready. E...

The multiple, in its relations with art and industry, is the starting point for an investigation into the evolution of jewelry design. In going beyond an obsolete notion of industrial serial production, contempo¬rary jewelry stands out as a highly in...

The Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (translated as the Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art and commonly abbreviated as S.M.A.K.), located in Ghent, Belgium, has quickly established a reputation for both a superlative permanent collection and pro...

In Paris at the turn of the 20th century, an artistic revolution was underway. The Salon des Independants was organized in 1884 by a group of artists and thinkers that included Albert Dubois-Pillet, Odilon Redon, Georges Seurat, and Paul Signac, who...

Alexej von Jawlensky and Marianne von Werefkin occupy a prominent place in art history as a pioneering artist couple of the avant-garde movement. Early in her career in Russia, Werefkin attracted a great deal of attention for her Realist-inspired por...

Sidney Nolan (1917-1992) is renowned for an oeuvre ranging from views of Melbourne's seaside suburb St. Kilda to an iconic series on outlaw hero Ned Kelly. Working in factories from age fourteen, Nolan began his training spray painting signs on glass...

Recognizing the second lives of historical African artworks when they enter museum collections and addressing them in dialogue with the works of six established and emerging African artists, this book represents how today's practitioners are reformul...

This groundbreaking volume examines the extraordinary artistic and cultural traditions of the African region known as the Sahel ("shore" in Arabic), a vast area on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert that includes present-day Senegal, Mauritania,...