The Floating World by novelist James A. Michener is a classic work on the Japanese print of the Edo period (1615-1868). Mr. Michener shows how the Japanese printmakers, cut off from revivifying contacts with the art of the rest of the world and hampered by their own governmental restrictions, were able to keep their art vital for two centuries through their vigor and determination. For this new edition, Howard A. Link updates the scholarship and expands on many theoretical aspects introduced in Michener's study.

This volume investigates Degas' dual role as both artist and collector. Featuring works by well-known artists like Delacroix, Ingres, Daumier, Manet, Cézanne, Gauguin, Van Gogh, Cassatt, and others, this publication is the definitive text outlining Degas' long career collecting important pieces by his predecessors as well as his contemporaries. -- Metropolitan Museum of Art website.

This book examines the two-way bridge-building cultural exchange which took place between Japan and Britain in the years after 1859 and into the early years of the twentieth century.

Defining Russian Graphic Arts explores the energy and innovation of Russian graphic arts during the period which began with the explosion of artistic creativity initiated by Serge Diaghilev at the end of the nineteenth century and which ended in the mid-1930s with Stalin's devastating control over the arts. This beautifully illustrated book represents the development of Russian graphic arts as a continuum during these forty years, and places Suprematism and Constructivism in the context of the other major, but lesser-known, manifestations of early twentieth-century Russian art. The book includes such diverse categories of graphic arts as lubki (popular prints), posters and book designs, journals, music sheets, and ephemera. It features not only standard types of printed media and related studies and maquettes, but also a number of watercolor and gouache costume and stage designs. About 100 works borrowed from the National Library of Russia and the Research Museum of the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, Russia-many seen here for the first time outside of Russia-are featured in this book. Additional works have been drawn from the Zimmerli Art Museum, The New York Public Library, and from other public and private collections. Together they provide a rare opportunity to view and learn about a wide variety of artists, from the acclaimed to the lesser known. This book is a companion volume to an exhibition appearing at the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University.

The ultimate research tool for the study of Japanese prints, this publication represents eight years of research by the author William Green. It lists over 6000 publications dating from 1822 to 1993, concentrating on those in English. In addition, the inclusion of newspaper and periodical reviews of the most important books and catalogs enables the academic debate concerning Japanese prints to be followed. This book is divided along thematic lines into 15 chapters and also contains three indexes, making it an easy-to-use reference work for students, scholars and collectors alike.

Why did collectors seek out posters and collect ephemera during the late-nineteenth and the twentieth centuries? How have such materials been integrated into institutional collections today? What inspired collectors to build significant holdings of works from cultures other than their own? And what are the issues facing curators and collectors of digital ephemera today? These are among the questions tackled in this volume-the first to examine the practices of collecting prints, posters, and ephemera during the modern and contemporary periods. A wide range of case studies feature collections of printed materials from the United States, Latin America, France, Germany, Great Britain, China, Japan, Russia, Iran, and Cuba. Fourteen essays and one roundtable discussion, all specially commissioned from art historians, curators, and collectors for this volume, explore key issues such as the roles of class, politics, and gender, and address historical contexts, social roles, value, and national and transnational aspects of collecting practices. The global scope highlights cross-cultural connections and contributes to a new understanding of the place of prints, posters and ephemera within an increasingly international art world.