What is it about ruins that is so alluring, so puzzling, that they can hold us in endless wonder over the half-erased story they tell? This elegant book explores the captivating hold these remains and broken pieces – from architecture to art and literature – have on us. Why are we suspicious of things that are too smooth, too continuous? What makes us feel, when we look at a fragment, that its very incompletion has a kind of meaning in itself?Looking at ancient fragments, Robert Ha...

From its beginnings in the seventeenth century, the Baroque embraced the whole of Catholic Europe and infiltrated Protestant England, Orthodox Russia and even Muslim Turkey. Architecture, paintings, poetry, music, natural science and new forms of piety all have their places on the Baroque map. In this surprising reinterpretation of the Baroque, Robert Harbison offers new readings that stress its eccentric and tumultuous forms, in which a destabilized sense of reality is often projected ont...

The twentieth-century architect Mies van der Rohe once declared that ‘Architecture starts when you carefully put two bricks together.’ In Travels in the History of Architecture renowned architectural writer Robert Harbison looks closely at such bricks, taking us on a journey through the great themes and movements of architecture, from antiquity to the present day. Using his own experience of the physical fabric of buildings, Harbison interprets the conceptions of the original architects an...

A collection of the world's greatest tales for children, including Rumpelstiltskin, Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, and Little Red Cap. First published in 1812, these stories have been part of childhood -- and storytelling tradition -- for countless generations. Enjoy all 62 tales in this collection.Sayre Street Books offers the world's greatest literature in easy to navigate, beautifully designed digital editions.

In the village of Wreay, near Carlisle, stands the strangest and most magical church in Victorian England. This vivid, original book tells the story of its builder, Sarah Losh, strong-willed and passionate and unusual in every way. Born into an old Cumbrian family, heiress to an industrial fortune, Sarah combined a zest for progress with a love of the past. In the church, her masterpiece, she let her imagination flower - there are carvings of ammonites, scarabs and poppies; an arrow pierce...

Despite its ancient Roman origins, concrete is considered the ultimate modern material, used everywhere in construction today: the equivalent of three tonnes of concrete per person on the planet is produced each year. Used in our pavements, roads, tunnels and walls, concrete surrounds us wherever we go and polarizes opinion, provoking intense loathing in some and fervent passion in others.Concrete and Culture breaks new ground by charting concrete's effects on culture sinc...

The Washington Monument is one of the most recognizable monuments in Washington D.C.. It took over 50 years to build, and it has stood for over 100 years. How much do you know about this magnificent monument.How thick are the walls at the base of the monument?Why is the Washington Monument made up of two different colors of marble?Why is there a stone in the monument that says "My language, my land, my nation of Wales – Wales forever"?What metal was used to cap...

Colleges and universities used to teach art history to encourage connoisseurship and acquaint students with the riches of our artistic heritage. But now, as Roger Kimball reveals in this witty and provocative book, the student is less likely to learn about the aesthetics of masterworks than to be told, for instance, that Peter Paul Rubens' great painting Drunken Silenus is an allegory about anal rape. Or that Courbet's famous hunting pictures are psychodramas about "castration anxiety." Or...

This volume presents the discipline’s best thinking on sustainability in written, drawn, and built form, drawing on over fifteen years of peer-reviewed essays and national design awards published by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA).Providing a primer on sustainability, useful to teachers and students alike, the selected essays address a broad range of issues. Combined with design projects that highlight issues holistically, they promote an understanding ...

Design students today are more visually literate than ever before, and their learning style naturally favors the visual over the textual. So why should they learn art and design theory from a traditional textbook? The only guide of its kind, Line Color Form offers a thorough introduction to design theory and terminology in a visually appealing and accessible format. With hundreds of illustrations and minimal text, this primer was created with visual learners in mind, making it ide...

Our knowledge of urban life in ancient Egypt is being transformed by new research and excavations. This is the first book to provide a comprehensive overview of what we know about settlements during the dynastic period, describing the sophistication of daily city life under the Pharaohs with a range and depth beyond any other publication on the subject. Stunning illustrations, authoritative text and helpful maps bring the urban landscape of ancient Egypt to life. This is the perfect book f...

Should artists be activists? Is activist art one of an artists primary responsibilities or a pointless sideshow on the fringes of serious politics? The philosopher, writer and art historian Lieven de Cauter, Ruben de Roo and Karel Vanhaesebrouck explore this theme in collaboration with other thinkers and doers in his new book Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization. In a time of globalization, populism, hypercapitalism, migration, War on Terror, and global warming, artistic engagement...