Secret Knowledge (New and Expanded Edition)

Secret Knowledge (New and Expanded Edition) PDF

Author: David Hockney

Publisher: Avery

Published: 2006-10-05

Total Pages: 328

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

"Secret Knowledge created an international sensation when it was first published. David Hockney's theory of how the great works of Western art were created with mirrors and lenses attracted major media attention around the world and generated intense debate in the fields of science and art history. Now, in this expanded edition, Hockney takes his thesis even further, revealing for the first time new findings." "In Secret Knowledge, Hockney explains how he uncovered piece after piece of scientific and visual evidence, each one yielding further revelations about the past. With the benefit of his painter's eye, he examines the major works of art history and reveals the truth of how artists such as Caravaggio, Velazquez, van Eyck, Holbein, da Vinci, and Ingres used mirrors and lenses to help them create their famous masterpieces. For this new edition, Hockney delves still deeper into art history, disclosing the evidence that Renaissance artists also used these methods to develop perspective and chiaroscuro - radically challenging our view of how these two foundations of Western art were established." "Hundreds of paintings and drawings are reproduced and accompanied by Hockney's descriptions. His own photographs and drawings illustrate the various methods used by past artists to capture accurate likenesses and present the results they would have achieved. In addition, extracts from the many historical and modern documents he uncovered offer further intriguing evidence, while correspondence between him and an array of international experts provides an account of the remarkable story as it happened." "Secret Knowledge is not just about the lost techniques of the Old Masters. It is also about now and the future. It is about how we see, treat, and make images today, in an age of computer manipulation."--BOOK JACKET.

Vermeer's Camera

Vermeer's Camera PDF

Author: Philip Steadman

Publisher:

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 238

ISBN-13: 9780192803023

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Art historians have long speculated on how Vermeer achieved the uncanny mixture of detached precision, compositional repose, and perspective accuracy that have drawn many to describe his work as "photographic." Indeed, many wonder if Vermeer employed a camera obscura, a primitive form of camera, to enhance his realistic effects? In Vermeer's Camera, Philip Steadman traces the development of the camera obscura--first described by Leonaro da Vinci--weighs the arguments that scholars have made for and against Vermeer's use of the camera, and offers a fascinating examination of the paintings themselves and what they alone can tell us of Vermeer's technique. Vermeer left no record of his method and indeed we know almost nothing of the man nor of how he worked. But by a close and illuminating study of the paintings Steadman concludes that Vermeer did use the camera obscura and shows how the inherent defects in this primitive device enabled Vermeer to achieve some remarkable effects--the slight blurring of image, the absence of sharp lines, the peculiar illusion not of closeness but of distance in the domestic scenes. Steadman argues that the use of the camera also explains some previously unexplainable qualities of Vermeer's art, such as the absence of conventional drawing, the pattern of underpainting in areas of pure tone, the pervasive feeling of reticence that suffuses his canvases, and the almost magical sense that Vermeer is painting not objects but light itself. Drawing on a wealth of Vermeer research and displaying an extraordinary sensitivity to the subtleties of the work itself, Philip Steadman offers in Vermeer's Camera a fresh perspective on some of the most enchanting paintings ever created.

Caveat Emptor

Caveat Emptor PDF

Author: Ken Perenyi

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2022-04-12

Total Pages: 235

ISBN-13: 163936305X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

It is said that the greatest art forger in the world is the one who has never been caught. Caveat Emptor reveals the astonishing story of America’s most accomplished art forger. Ten years ago, an FBI investigation in conjunction with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York was about to expose a scandal in the art world that would have been front-page news in New York and London. After a trail of fake paintings of astonishing quality led federal agents to art dealers, renowned experts, and the major auction houses, the investigation inexplicably ended, despite an abundance of evidence collected. The case was closed and the FBI file was marked “exempt from public disclosure.” Now that the statute of limitations on these crimes has expired and the case appears hermetically sealed shut by the FBI, this book, Caveat Emptor, is Ken Perenyi’s confession. It is the story, in detail, of how he pulled it all off. Glamorous stories of art-world scandal have always captured the public imagination. However, not since Clifford Irving’s 1969 bestselling Fake has there been a story at all like this one. Caveat Emptor is unique in that it is the first and only book by and about America’s first and only great art forger. And unlike other forgers, Perenyi produced no paper trail, no fake provenance whatsoever; he let the paintings speak for themselves. And that they did, routinely mesmerizing the experts in mere seconds. In the tradition of Frank Abagnale’s Catch Me If You Can, and certain to be a bombshell for the major international auction houses and galleries, here is the story of America’s greatest art forger.

Ancient Secrets of the Fountain of Youth

Ancient Secrets of the Fountain of Youth PDF

Author: Peter Kelder

Publisher: Harmony

Published: 2007-12-18

Total Pages: 126

ISBN-13: 0307423506

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Offering practical instruction on how to perform the Tibetan Rites of Rejuvenation, which will take only minutes a day, many practitioners have experienced benefits, including increased energy, weight loss, better memory, new hair growth, pain relief, better digestion, and feeling overall more youthful. Legend has it that hidden in the remote reaches of the Himalayan mountains lies a secret that would have saved Ponce de Leon from years of fruitless searching for the Fountain of Youth. There, generations of Tibetan monks have passed down a series of exercises with mystical, age-reversing properties. Known as the Tibetan Rites of Rejuvenation or the Five Rites, these once-secret exercises are now available to Westerners in Ancient Secret of the Fountain Of Youth. Peter Kelder's book begins with an account of his own introduction to the rites by way of Colonel Bradford, a mysterious retired British army officer who learned of the rites while journeying high up in the Himalayas. Fountain of Youth then offers practical instructions for each of the five rites, which resemble yoga postures. Taking just minutes a day to perform, the benefits for practitioners have included increased energy, weight loss, better memory, new hair growth, pain relief, better digestion, and feeling overall more youthful.

History of Pictures

History of Pictures PDF

Author: David Hockney

Publisher: ABRAMS

Published: 2020-08-11

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 9781419750281

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

A compact edition of Hockney and Gayford's brilliantly original book, with updated material and brand-new pieces of art Informed and energized by a lifetime of painting, drawing, and making images with cameras, David Hockney, in collaboration with art critic Martin Gayford, explores how and why pictures have been made across the millennia. Juxtaposing a rich variety of images--a still from a Disney cartoon with a Japanese woodblock print by Hiroshige, a scene from an Eisenstein film with a Velazquez paint-ing--the authors cross the normal boundaries between high culture and popular entertainment, and argue that film, photography, paint-ing, and drawing are deeply interconnected. Featuring a revised final chapter with some of Hockney's latest works, this new, compact edition of A History of Pictures remains a significant contribution to the discussion of how artists represent reality.

Western Esotericism

Western Esotericism PDF

Author: Nicholas Goodricke-Clarke

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 180

ISBN-13: 1351537164

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Esotericism is the search for an absolute but hidden knowledge accessed through mystical vision, the mediation of higher beings, or personal experience. In Western cultural history esoteric approaches to religion have often been in conflict with - and suffered at the hands of - more established forms of religious belief and practice. 'Western Esotericism' presents a very broad and engaging history of the people and ideas which have shaped occult history from antiquity to today. Throughout the history of esotericism the dynamic of concealment and revelation has characterized the search for secret knowledge. Pursued both publically and privately, esotericism has come to influence more mainstream religious practice and culture and has significantly shaped our understanding of modernity. Today, esotericism continues to be practised by a range of both established and new religious movements. 'Western Esotericism' presents the essential guide to one of the most fascinating, provocative, and sustained of religious traditions.

The Secret of Our Success

The Secret of Our Success PDF

Author: Joseph Henrich

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2017-10-17

Total Pages: 464

ISBN-13: 0691178437

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

How our collective intelligence has helped us to evolve and prosper Humans are a puzzling species. On the one hand, we struggle to survive on our own in the wild, often failing to overcome even basic challenges, like obtaining food, building shelters, or avoiding predators. On the other hand, human groups have produced ingenious technologies, sophisticated languages, and complex institutions that have permitted us to successfully expand into a vast range of diverse environments. What has enabled us to dominate the globe, more than any other species, while remaining virtually helpless as lone individuals? This book shows that the secret of our success lies not in our innate intelligence, but in our collective brains—on the ability of human groups to socially interconnect and learn from one another over generations. Drawing insights from lost European explorers, clever chimpanzees, mobile hunter-gatherers, neuroscientific findings, ancient bones, and the human genome, Joseph Henrich demonstrates how our collective brains have propelled our species' genetic evolution and shaped our biology. Our early capacities for learning from others produced many cultural innovations, such as fire, cooking, water containers, plant knowledge, and projectile weapons, which in turn drove the expansion of our brains and altered our physiology, anatomy, and psychology in crucial ways. Later on, some collective brains generated and recombined powerful concepts, such as the lever, wheel, screw, and writing, while also creating the institutions that continue to alter our motivations and perceptions. Henrich shows how our genetics and biology are inextricably interwoven with cultural evolution, and how culture-gene interactions launched our species on an extraordinary evolutionary trajectory. Tracking clues from our ancient past to the present, The Secret of Our Success explores how the evolution of both our cultural and social natures produce a collective intelligence that explains both our species' immense success and the origins of human uniqueness.

The Secret Knowledge

The Secret Knowledge PDF

Author: David Mamet

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2011-06-02

Total Pages: 247

ISBN-13: 110151535X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

David Mamet has been a controversial, defining force in nearly every creative endeavor-now he turns his attention to politics. In recent years, David Mamet realized that the so-called mainstream media outlets he relied on were irredeemably biased, peddling a hypocritical and deeply flawed worldview. In 2008 Mamet wrote a hugely controversial op-ed for the Village Voice, "Why I Am No Longer a 'Brain-Dead Liberal'", in which he methodically attacked liberal beliefs, eviscerating them as efficiently as he did Method acting in his bestselling book True and False. Now Mamet employs his trademark intellectual force and vigor to take on all the key political issues of our times, from religion to political correctness to global warming. The legendary playwright, author, director, and filmmaker pulls no punches in his art or in his politics. And as a former liberal who woke up, Mamet will win over an entirely new audience of others who have grown irate over America's current direction.

Lanterna Rally - Theme by Grace Themes