Best Sellers

The Story of Art, one of the most famous and popular books on art ever written, has been a world bestseller for over four decades. Attracted by the simplicity and clarity of his writing, readers of all ages and backgrounds have found in Professor Gombrich a true master, and one who combines knowledge and wisdom with a unique gift for communicating his deep love of the subject.

For the first time in many years the book has been completely redesigned. The illustrations, now in colour throughout, have all been improved and reoriginated, and include six fold-outs. The text has been revised and updated where appropriate, and a number of significant new artists have been incorporated. The bibliographies have been expanded and updated, and the maps and charts redrawn.

The Story of Art has always been admired for two key qualities: it is a pleasure to read and a pleasure to handle. In these respects the new edition is true to its much-loved predecessors: the text runs as smoothly as ever and the improved illustrations are always on the page where the reader needs them. In its new edition, this classic work continues its triumphant progress tirelessly for yet another generation, to remain the title of first choice for any newcomer to art or the connoisseur.

The Art Book is a landmark in the world of publishing. Available in a range of different formats and in over 20 different languages, it has received rave reviews since its first publication and can be frequently found on bestseller lists around the world.

Now available for the first time in a highly covetable and portable midi format, this second edition is an updated and substantially expanded version of the hugely successful original book.

An A-Z guide to 600 great artists from medieval to modern times, it debunks art-historical classifications and pairs brilliant examples of all periods, schools, visions and techniques. By breaking with traditional classifications, The Art Book represents a fresh and original approach to art: an unparalleled visual sourcebook and a celebration of our rich and multifaceted culture.

Why would a smart New York investment banker pay $12 million for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock's drip paintingNo. 5, 1948 sell for $140 million?

Intriguing and entertaining, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark is a Freakonomics approach to the economics and psychology of the contemporary art world. Why were record prices achieved at auction for works by 131 contemporary artists in 2006 alone, with astonishing new heights reached in 2007? Don Thompson explores the money, lust and self-aggrandizement of the art world in an attempt to determine what makes a particular work valuable while others are ignored.

This book is the first to look at the economics and the marketing strategies that enable the modern art market to generate such astronomical prices. Drawing on interviews with past and present executives of auction houses and art dealerships, artists and the buyers who move the market, Thompson launches the reader on a journey of discovery through the peculiar world of modern art. Surprising, passionate, gossipy, revelatory, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark reveals a great deal that even experienced auction purchasers do not know.

Sarah Thornton's vivid ethnography―an international hit, now available in twenty translations―reveals the inner workings of the sophisticated subcultures that make up the contemporary art world. In a series of day-in-the-life narratives set in New York, Los Angeles, London, Basel, Venice and Tokyo, Seven Days in the Art World explores the dynamics of creativity, taste, status, money and the search for meaning in life.

This legendary book has been universally hailed as the best, the most readable and the most provocative account of modern art ever written.

Through each of the thematic chapters Hughes keeps his story grounded in the history of the 20th century, demonstrating how modernism sought to describe the experience of that era and showing how for many key art movements this was a task of vital importance.

The way in which Hughes brings that vitality and immediacy back through the well-chosen example and well-turned phrase is the heart of this book's success.

The most thorough, cogent and lavishly illustrated survey of art in the Western tradition, Janson's History of Art has now been completely redesigned and updated to make it the ultimate visually and intellectually exciting resource for today. Timelines; glossary; bibliography; index. 1,266 illustrations, more than 775 in full color.

A complete catalogue of the 871 paintings and a detailed monograph on his life and art
This study of Vincent van Gogh represents a rare and happy chance in art history, combining a detailed monograph on his life and art with a complete catalogue of the 871 paintings by one of the greatest modern artists. This volume also reproduces most of van Gogh's paintings in colour for the first time.