Culture & Society

Disco and Discovery Ads of the 1970s get funky and socially conscious Both eclipsed and influenced by television, American print ads of the 1970s departed from the bold, graphic forms and subtle messages that were typical of their sixties counterparts...

Americana in Full Bloom To the moon and back with advertising in the 1960s With the consumerist euphoria of the fifties still going strong and the race to the moon at its height, the mood of advertising in the sixties was cheerful, optimistic, and at...

Advertising in the Atomic Age From “The World’s Finest Automatic Washer” to the Cadillac which “Gives a Man a New Outlook” As McCarthyism swept across the United States and capitalism was king, white America enjoyed a feeling of pride and security that...

Alex Pilcher’s A Queer Little History of Art is a beautiful book that illustrates the wide variety of queer art from around the world exploring bodies and identity, love and desire, and prejudice and protest through drawing, painting, photography,...

An expansive account of the ever-popular mid-century movement, from the place where it all began Embark on a surprising and joyful visual tour of American mid-century modernism through hundreds of photographs, drawings, and pieces of ephemera organized...

The need-to-know names of Japanese graphic design from the late 19th century to the pre-digital decade, presented alongside more than 500 color images of vintage ephemera With Fracture, author Ian Lynam presents a survey of Japanese design across a...

As the companion to the exhibition, Fighting for Freedom places Black craftspeople at the forefront of American history, from before the Revolutionary War through the Civil War and beyond Reconstruction. Delving into diverse narratives of creativity,...

Diego Rivera’s America revisits a historical moment when the famed muralist and painter, more than any other artist of his time, helped forge Mexican national identity in visual terms and imagined a shared American future in which unity, rather than...

The authoritative and wide-ranging visual essay on the aesthetics of Japan, a classic volume now back in print with a stunning new cover design ‘Japan style’ is an aesthetic recognizable to everyone: a beautifully displayed flower, an elegant...

Written to inspire courage in those daunted by wartimes shortages, How to Cook a Wolf continues to rally cooks during times of plenty, reminding them that providing sustenance requires more than putting food on the table. M. F. K. Fisher knew that the...

Renowned designers Charles and Ray Eames are amongst the greatest designers of the 20th century. They are, of course, most well known for their groundbreaking and iconic furniture designs, but they also created important, creative, experimental, and...

More than four decades after the passing of Monuments Woman Captain Rose Valland (1898–1980), one of the great heroines of World War II, the Monuments Men and Women Foundation released the first-ever English translation of her 1961 memoir, The Art Front:...

Portraits of 50 pioneering figures of the Harlem Renaissance This elegantly designed and beautifully produced volume presents portraits of 50 extraordinary individuals who contributed to making the Harlem Renaissance one of the great cultural movements...

Lincoln Kirstein was a polymathic writer, critic, curator and impresario: a key connector and an indefatigable catalyst whose sweeping contributions to American cultural life in the 1930s and ‘40s shaped artists and institutions. Best known for...

From Darkness into Light Wartime action and postwar triumph in the advertising of the 1940s At the beginning of the decade, America was at war. Patriotism was an integral part of everyday life, with the sentiment mirrored in advertising. As America...

Jackson Pollock, the towering American artist who was to revolutionize twentieth-century art with his “dripping” painting technique, grew up between the late 1920s and the late 1940s, the youngest of five boys born in the American West. Though often...

In early modern Japan, cultural salons were creative spaces for people of all ages and social levels to pursue painting, poetry, and other artistic endeavors as serious but amateur practitioners. All using a pen- or art-name, individuals were able to...

A hilarious celebration of cats in artwork from medieval times. Look what the cat dragged in from the Middle Ages—a curious compendium of cats unlike any you’ve ever lapped up before. Here’s the purrfect bedside companion for cat...

A visual journey through Zen’s influence on Japanese life, from calligraphy to the martial arts Formed by a convergence of the Buddha’s teachings with Taoism and local tradition, Zen has had a profound impact on the art and culture of Japan...

Five centuries of fascinating female creativity presented in more than 400 compelling artworks and one comprehensive volume The most extensive fully illustrated book of women artists ever published, Great Women Artists reflects an era where art made by...