Bøger udgivet af Museum of Fine Arts,Boston

Located at the intersection of trade routes from central Africa, the ancient Near East, and the Classical world, ancient Nubia ruled the entire Nile Valley at the height of its power in the eighth century bc. Its neighbour and frequent rival Egypt called it 'the gold lands' because its territories held such an abundance of the precious metal, and because its inhabitants produced some of the most finely crafted jewelry of the ancient world. This book features over 100 adornments and personal accessories from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, which houses the finest collection of Nubian jewelry outside Khartoum. The first comprehensive introduction to the sophisticated jewels of this great empire, it reveals how Nubian artisans employed techniques that would not be reinvented in Europe for another thousand years, and how the original owners valued such possessions not only for their inherent beauty, but also because they were imbued with magical meanings. Exquisite photography and an authoritative history written by leading experts make this book essential for both jewelry aficionados and anyone interested in the great cultures of the ancient world.

"This book was published in conjunction with the exhibition Quilts and color: the Pilgrim/Roy Collection, organized by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, from April 6 to July 27, 2014"--Colophon.

A new addition to the MFA Highlights series.

The blossoming of contemporary crafts in Japan that began in the twentieth century is rooted in a long and rich tradition of exquisite design and technical accomplishment. This book showcases the range of creative approaches in Japanese ceramics and bamboo art beginning in the postwar period and focusing on the past three decades.

The world-renowned collection of European decorative arts from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston is full of sumptuous surprises. Some delicate and some divine, the objects range from an opulent automaton to a richly wrought crosier, and vary in scale from a salt cellar in the form of a crustacean to the fine wood panelling of an entire dining room. Their dates of manufacture span more than a thousand years--the earliest made shortly after the fall of the Roman Empire and the most recent in the computer age. They reach across space as well as time, bearing evidence not only of cultural exchange among European countries, such as England and France, but also of the revival of ancient motifs and of contemporary trade with India and China. Presented here with an introduction to the topic and individual texts on each piece, these diverse works are organized chronologically and by stylistic movements to highlight the hidden histories of these works.

The story of African Americans in the visual arts has closely paralleled their social, political and economic aspirations over the last four hundred years. This book gathers works by leading figures from the nineteenth century to the present Henry Ossawa Tanner, Jacob Lawrence, Romare Bearden, Lois Mailou Jones, Gordon Parks, and Wifredo Lam.

The catastrophic events of March 11, 2011 - the earthquake, tsunami, and ensuing nuclear meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant - have been called the triple disaster in Japan. Among the first artists to respond to these experiences were photographers. Some, including those with personal ties to the affected Tohoku region, attempted to document the devastation, drawing on a long history of depicting natural disasters in Japanese art. As the immediate effects of the earthquake and tsunami gave way to the slowly unfolding nuclear disaster, artists began to respond to the challenges of depicting an invisible threat that calls up the collective memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The resulting images assembled in this lavishly illustrated volume are by turns poignant, searing, disturbing and often strangely beautiful. With interpretive essays from leading American and Japanese scholars and statements from the artists themselves, this book presents the unfolding process of how photography can address destruction, social change, anxiety and memory, through images that express emotions beyond words.

Sometime in the early fourth century bc, an unknown Egyptian master carved an exquisite portrait in dark-green stone. The statue that included this remarkably lifelike head of a priest, who was likely a citizen of ancient Memphis, may have been damaged when the Persians conquered Egypt in 343 bc before it was ritually buried in a temple complex dedicated to the worship of the sacred Apis bull. Its adventures were not over, though: after almost two millennia, the head was excavated by August Mariette, a founding figure in French Egyptology, under a permit from the Ottoman Pasha. Returned to France as part of a collection of antiquities assembled for the inimitable Bonaparte prince known as Plon-Plon, it found a home in his faux Pompeian palace. After disappearing again, it resurfaced in the personal collection of Edward Perry Warren, a turn-of-the-twentieth-century American aesthete, who sold it to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Along the way, this compelling and mysterious sculpture, known worldwide as the Boston Green Head, has reflected the West's evolving understanding of Egyptian art - from initial assertions that it was too refined to be the product of a lesser civilization, to recognition of the sophistication of the culture that produced it.

Artists from some of Asia's largest megacities explore issues of migration, consumption, sustainability and cultural heritage raised by the region's rapid urbanization.