PALLAS ATHENE 2019-20 LIVES OF THE ARTISTS LIVES OF THE ARTISTS 3 ART 8 This series, published by Pallas Athene, presents lives of great artists by their contemporaries in a beautiful small format, richly illustrated and introduced by a leading scholar. Many of these writings have not been available for years – or even MUSIC 16 centuries – and in some cases have never been translated into English. The illustrations are carefully chosen to ARCHITECTURE 17 illuminate the text. Ideal for the general reader, the student or the researcher. Each volume 115 x 145 mm, between 80 and 268 pages. SCULPTURE 26 lives of titian RUSKIN 18 by Vasari, Aretino, Speroni, Priscianese and Dolce PHOTOGRAPHY 24 introduced by Carlo Corsato 2019 978 1 84368 171 7 £9.99 POETRY 24 NEW 176pp, 66pp colour ill. DESIGN 25 Titian (c. 1488-1576) was recognised very early on as the leading painter of his gen- DRAWING 26 eration in Venice. Starting in the studio of the aged Giovanni Bellini, Titian, with his contemporary Giorgione, almost immediately started to expand the range of what was JAN MORRIS 27 possible in painting, converting Bellini’s statuesque style into something far more impres- HISTORY 28 sionistic and romantic. This restless spirit of innovation and improvisation never left him, and during his long life he experimented with a number of different styles, the brushwork NATURE AND GARDENS 30 of his last great paintings showing a mysterious poetry that has never been equalled. LITERATURE 31 POLITICS AND SOCIETY 33 lives of tintoretto SPIRITUALITY 33 by Vasari, El Greco, Aretino, Boschini, Calmo, Borghini and Franco introduced by Carlo Corsato TRAVEL 34 2019 978 1 84368 172 4 £9.99 NEW FOOD AND WINE 37 192pp, 86pp colour ill. including 2 fold-outs THE SLEEP QUILT 38 The most exhilarating painter of the Renaissance and arguably of the whole of Western art, Tintoretto was known as Il Furioso because of the attack and energy of his style. FANTASY 38 His vaunting ambition is recorded in the inscription he placed in his studio: il disegno DISTRIBUTION INFORMATION 39 di Michelangelo ed il colorito di Tiziano (‘Michelangelo’s drawing and Titian’s colour’). Unavailable in any form for many years, these biographies have been newly edited for this edition. They are introduced by the scholar Carlo Corsato, who places each in its artistic and literary context. More than 80 pages of colour illustrations, including two foldouts, cover the full range of Tintoretto’s astonishing output. lives of leonardo da vinci by Giorgio Vasari, Matteo Bandello, Anonimo Gaddiano, Antonio Billi, Paolo Giovio, Sabba da Castiglione and Leonardo da Vinci introduced by Charles Robertson 2019 978 1 84368 173 1 £9.99 NEW 166pp, 67pp colour ill. including a fold-out As one of the greatest exponents of painting of his time, Leonardo was celebrated by his fellow Florentine Vasari (who was nevertheless responsible for covering over the great fresco of the Battle of Anghiari with his own painting). Vasari’s carefully researched life of Leonardo remains one of the main sources of our knowledge, and is printed here togeth- er with the three other early biographies, and important letters by Leonardo and others. Personal reminiscences by the novelist Bandello, and humanist Sabba di Castiglione, round out the picture of the quintessential Renaissance man. 3 | Pallas Athene LIVES OF THE ARTISTS LIVES OF THE ARTISTS lives of blake a memoir of vincent van gogh by Henry Crabb Robinson, Alexander Gilchrist and John Thomas Smith by Jo van Gogh-Bonger introduced by Martin Myrone introduced by Martin Gayford 2019 978 1 84368 178 6 £9.99 NEW new ed. 2018 978 1 84368 155 7 £9.99 192pp, 63pp colour ill. 192pp, 87pp colour ill. William Blake (1757-1827), hailed as ‘the glorious luminary’ by William Rossetti, Vincent van Gogh’s short, passionate life was driven by an almost unimaginable is one of the great mystics in the history of Western art. His hallucinatory paintings, creative energy that eventually overwhelmed him. The outlines of his story – the watercolours and in particular the illustrations he made for his books of poetry are early strivings in Holland and Paris, the revelatory impact of the move to Provence, instantly recognisable, and have inspired generations of artists in his wake. the attacks of madness that led ineluctably to his suicide – are almost as familiar as Although he was largely ignored by his contemporaries, or derided as mad, a num- the paintings. Yet it is more than possible that neither the paintings nor Van Gogh’s ber of perceptive critics and commentators took great interest in both the man and his story would have survived at all if it had not been for his remarkable sister in law, work during his lifetime. This volume presents some of the earliest and most illumi- Jo van Gogh-Bonger. nating writings by people who knew Blake, and bringing this astonishing visionary to After Vincent’s death and that of her husband (Van Gogh’s brother Theo), Jo life. devoted her life to preserving and exhibiting the paintings, and editing the letters. It is in her short and unaccountably neglected biography that we can come closest to Vincent the man. anecdotes of william hogarth, written by himself introduced by Martin Myrone the lives of caravaggio 2019 978 1 84368 179 3 £9.99 NEW by Mancini, Baglione and Bellori 192pp, 50pp colour ill. introduced by Helen Langdon The greatest satirical painter and printmaker of his time, Hogarth was also a portraitist new ed. 2016 978 1 84368 138 0 £8.99 of uncommon acuity and an important theorist of art. His forthright character and 112pp, 46pp colour ill. blunt honesty shine in his autobiographical Anecdotes. This is the first new edition for nearly fifty years, and the first for over two hundred to be entirely reset and to be In the course of a short and violent life, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571- fully illustrated. It is a fascinating picture of a great artist and the tumultuous world he 1610) revolutionised painting, producing a style of shockingly immediate realism that lived in and helped to shape. swept through Europe. The impact of his art and personality continue to resonate to An introduction by leading expert Martin Myrone illuminates the context of this this day. invaluable memoir, which has a unique place in the history of art. Almost everything we know about Caravaggio’s life comes from these three early biographies, which reflect the sometimes horrified fascination that Caravaggio exerted on his contemporaries. Giulio Mancini was Caravaggio’s doctor; Giovanni Baglione a the lives of rubens bitter rival and art historian; Giovanni Pietro Baglione the most judicious art historian of the following generation. All three provide a vivid picture of a man whose life reads by Bellori, Sandrart, de Piles in part like a thriller, as well as a fascinating window onto a world and habits of seeing that were mercilessly challenged introduced by Jeremy Wood by his art. new ed. 2019 978 1 84368 022 2 £8.99 NEW ED. 112pp, 41pp colour ill. auguste rodin by Rainer Maria Rilke The unparalleled brilliance of Rubens’ career changed perceptions forever, not only introduced by Alexandra Parigoris about painting but also about painters. These three biographies, never before published in English, show the impact of Rubens’ life and art on three very different observers. 2018 978 1 84368 124 3 £8.99 Baglione, an Italian painter and art historian, saw at first hand the astonishing success 96pp, 20pp colour ill. of his first visits to Rome. Sandrart, a German painter who knew Rubens, gives a full account of the later years of his career. De Piles, one of the greatest early art critics, Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) was already an old man when the young poet Rainer sought to turn French painting in the directions shown by Rubens; his biography of Maria Rilke went to interview him for the first time. Rilke stayed on to work as Rodin’s Rubens was based on family papers and his evaluation of Rubens’ style is one of the secretary. Intensely sensitive to art, and in particular to the irreducible power of objects, most influential ever written. and yet able to express this awareness in prose of great lyricism and clarity, Rilke was This is the second edition of the first publication in English of these Lives of Rubens, and is introduced by a leading expert destined to be the critic who would most naturally dramatise Rodin’s work. In 1903, on the painter, Jeremy Wood. Rilke published his essay Rodin, a sustained and profound meditation on the unique power of Rodin’s sculpture that has never been equalled. Written around a chronolo- gy of Rodin’s work, it is also a very approachable introduction to some of the greatest sculpture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Pallas Athene | 4 5 | Pallas Athene LIVES OF THE ARTISTS LIVES OF THE ARTISTS england italy lives of gainsborough the life of raphael the life of michelangelo by Philip Thicknesse, William Jackson and Sir Joshua Reynolds by Giorgio Vasari by Giorgio Vasari introduced by Anthony Mould introduced by Jill Burke introduced by David Hemsoll new ed. 2018 978 1 84368 157 1 2019 978 1 84368 166 3 £8.99 NEW new ed. 2018 978 1 84368 156 4 £8.99 £9.99 144pp, 52pp colour ill. 128pp, 51pp colour ill. 256pp, 59pp colour ill. One of the best-loved painters in English history, Thomas Gainsborough (1727- 1788), was also one of the most personally engaging. Bon vivant, wit, amateur the life of dialogues with and enthusiastic musician, he charmed sitters and friends alike.