The Greek-born Italian painter Giorgio de Chirico is a master of metaphysical painting. This fully illustrated catalogue presents de Chirico's work in relation to the world and myths of classical antiquity.

"The unexpected encounter of a rubber glove, a green ball, and the head from the classical statue gives rise to one of the most compelling paintings in the history of modernist art: Giorgio de Chirico's Song of Love (1914). This uncanny image exemplifies what de Chirico called 'metaphysical' painting, which creates a disturbing sense of unreality, outside the usual logics of space and time, through the novel depiction of ordinary things. Emily Braun's essay explores the work's enigmatic motifs, showing how their roots range from the ancient culture of the Mediterranean, through the commercial scenarios de Chirico observed in the streets of Paris in the years around World War I, to the work of the avant-garde painters and poets of the time. The Song of Love continues to captivate viewers as de Chirico intended, even a century after it was made." - Back cover.

Valerio Ferme is the Harold and Edythe Toso Endowed Chair professor in Italian Studies at Santa Clara University. --Book Jacket.

This book addresses physical, chemical, and biological methods for the preservation of ancient artifacts. Advanced materials are required to preserve the Mediterranean belt's historic, artistic and archaeological relics against weathering, pollution, natural risks and anthropogenic hazards. Based upon the 10th International Symposium on the Conservation of Monuments in the Mediterranean Basin, this book provides a forum for international engineers, architects, archaeologists, conservators, geologists, art historians and scientists in the fields of physics, chemistry and biology to discuss principles, methods, and solutions for the preservation of global historical artifacts.

Painted in Paris on the eve of World War One, the Metaphysical cityscapes of Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978) redirected the course of modernist painting and the modern architectural imagination alike. Giorgio de Chirico and the Metaphysical City examines the two most salient dimensions of the artist’s early imagery: its representations of architectural space and its sustained engagement with the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. Centering upon a single painting from 1914 – deemed by the painter “the fatal year” – each chapter examines why and how de Chirico’s self-declared “Nietzschean method” takes architecture as its pictorial means and metaphor. The first, full-length study in English to focus on the painter’s seminal work from pre-war Paris, the book places de Chirico’s “literary” images back in the context of the city’s avant-garde, particularly the circle of Guillaume Apollinaire. Merjian’s study sheds light on one of the most influential and least understood figures in 20th-century aesthetics, while also contributing to an understanding of Nietzsche’s paradoxical consequences for modernism.

"Picasso and Truth" offers a breathtaking and original new look at the most significant artist of the modern era. From Pablo Picasso's early "The Blue Room" to the later "Guernica", eminent art historian T. J. Clark offers a striking reassessment of the artist's paintings from the 1920s and 1930s. Why was the space of a room so basic to Picasso's worldview? And what happened to his art when he began to feel that room-space become too confined--too little exposed to the catastrophes of the twentieth century? Clark explores the role of space and the interior, and the battle between intimacy and monstrosity, in Picasso's art. Based on the A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts delivered at the National Gallery of Art, this lavishly illustrated volume remedies the biographical and idolatrous tendencies of most studies on Picasso, reasserting the structure and substance of the artist's work. With compelling insight, Clark focuses on three central works--the large-scale "Guitar and Mandolin on a Table" (1924), "The Three Dancers" (1925), and "The Painter and His Model" (1927)--and explores Picasso's answer to Nietzsche's belief that the age-old commitment to truth was imploding in modern European culture. Masterful in its historical contextualization, "Picasso and Truth" rescues Picasso from the celebrity culture that trivializes his accomplishments and returns us to the tragic vision of his art--humane and appalling, naive and difficult, in mourning for a lost nineteenth century, yet utterly exposed to the hell of Europe between the wars.

Although the Book of Hebrews "is not exactly what most of us would regard as a user-friendly book," notes Donald Hagner, "Hebrews has always been popular among Christians." Encountering the Book of Hebrews was written to help students more fully appreciate the complexities of this favorite section of Scripture. Hagner begins by exploring introductory issues (e.g., historical backgrounds, author, audience, date, purpose, structure, genre) and overarching themes (e.g., heavenly archetypes and earthly copies, the use of the Old Testament, the attitude toward Judaism). The heart of the book then offers a chapter-by-chapter exposition of Hebrews. Unlike commentaries, it does not try to be exhaustive--examining all details and answering all questions--but instead guides students to the issues that are most important for their study of this difficult book. Hagner concludes with a final look at the contribution of Hebrews to the New Testament, New Testament theology, the church, and the individual Christian. As with other volumes in the Encountering Biblical Studies series, Encountering the Book of Hebrews is designed for classroom use and includes a number of helpful features, including further-reading sections, key terms, chapter objectives, and outlines along with numerous sidebars and illustrations.

This illustrated book focuses on the aesthetic impact ancient art had on twentieth-century artists Picasso, de Chirico, Léger, and Picabia between 1906 and 1936.

"Born in 1923, graduating from the School of Architecture at Liverpool University in 1950, James Stirling ranks as one of the most interesting figures to emerge in Britain in the second half of the twentieth century. His activity lasted from 1950 until 1992, the year of his death. His work exemplified a continuous and undogmatic research, in which modern architecture is constantly redefined through the attention given to its social content and its physical context."--BOOK JACKET.

For the general public and specialists alike, the Hellenistic period (323–31 BC) and its diverse artistic legacy remain underexplored and not well understood. Yet it was a time when artists throughout the Mediterranean developed new forms, dynamic compositions, and graphic realism to meet new expressive goals, particularly in the realm of portraiture. Rare survivors from antiquity, large bronze statues are today often displayed in isolation, decontextualized as masterpieces of ancient art. Power and Pathos gathers together significant examples of bronze sculpture in order to highlight their varying styles, techniques, contexts, functions, and histories. As the first comprehensive volume on large-scale Hellenistic bronze statuary, this book includes groundbreaking archaeological, art-historical, and scientific essays offering new approaches to understanding ancient production and correctly identifying these remarkable pieces. Designed to become the standard reference for decades to come, the book emphasizes the unique role of bronze both as a medium of prestige and artistic innovation and as a material exceptionally suited for reproduction. Power and Pathos is published on the occasion of an exhibition on view at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence from March 14 to June 21, 2015; at the J. Paul Getty Museum from July 20 through November 1, 2015; and at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, from December 6, 2015, through March 20, 2016.