Книги жанра British Museum Press
Название: Byzantium
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2012
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Byzantium, the Roman empire in the eastern Mediterranean, dominated the political and religious face of Europe for over a thousand years. In this introduction Rowena Loverance traces the history of the empire from the founding of its capital Constantinople in AD330 to its capture by the Ottoman Turks in 1453. Many of the outstanding political and religious events, and the personalities behind them, are reflected in the art of the period. The author draws on the British Museum's extremely rich collections to illustrate the story — including spectacular Byzantine silver, ivories, jewellery and icons, as well as pieces from the empire's neighbours and enemies from Persia, Asia Minor and Western Europe.
Название: Mummy: The Inside Story
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2013
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Egyptian mummies are perennially popular with visitors to museums but what is their relevance in the twenty-first century? What can we learn from the study of these ancient remains? Mummies are an unparalleled source of scientific data, addressing a host of questions about life in one of the most highly developed societies of the ancient world. Although the ancient Egyptians left many written records, these tell only part of the story, and researchers rely heavily on human remains to complete the picture. These throw light on many important issues about which the inscriptions are often silent: physical anthropology, family relationships, life expectancy, nutrition and health, disease and the causes of death. They also of course provide a unique insight into the fascinating and complex processes of mummification; including not only the artificial preservation of the corpse, but also the ritual elements which played such an important part: the placing of amulets, the putting on of wrappings and the equipping of the body with religious texts and images. For many years, the only way to extract this data from Egyptian mummies was to unwrap them a process both destructive and irreversible. Then, the advent of modern non-invasive imaging techniques X-rays and Computerized Tomography (CT) scanning made it possible to look inside a mummy without disturbing the wrappings in any way. Now this technology has advanced still further. Thanks to the latest computer-generated images, we are able to perform a virtual unwrapping of a mummy and to embark on a journey within the body, visualizing every feature and amulet in 3D. The subject chosen for this ground-breaking experiment, the priest Nesperennub, has been one of the British Museums treasured exhibits for over a hundred years. His beautifully painted mummy-case has never been opened since it was sealed up by embalmers on the West Bank at Thebes shortly before he was buried, but now after 2,800 years technology has unlocked its secrets. This book takes the reader on a journey of discovery, gathering information about Nesperennub from a variety of sources. First, his place in history and his role in Egyptian society are pieced together from the inscriptions the formal record of his life which was intended for posterity. Then the 3D technology makes it possible to enter the mummy case and to explore the body, collecting data about Nesperennub as a person, seeing his face, assessing his health, and looking over the shoulders of the embalmers as they prepared him for eternal life.
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2008
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This is a unique book to accompany an extraordinary new exhibition of one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th centuries, the Terracotta Army of the First Emperor of China. The Terracotta Army is evidence of the organisational power of the Qin Dynasty that unified China in 221 BC. It has become a symbol of China's long and coherent cultural history and, now that China is rapidly developing, it reminds the world of China's future potential. This book unfolds the historical and archaeological context of the Terracotta Warriors, and explores the new research and excavation that has been carried out in the years since the first discovery in 1974. The book is divided into five sections, all written by experts in the field. The first chapter concentrates on the Qin's rise and military conquest and unification of the Warring States. The second chapter explores the Qin Empire, its ideology and practices, and the emperor's achievements and legacy. The third chapter examines imperial tours and mountain inscriptions, and the fourth focuses on the mausoleum itself and the rituals that surrounded it. The fifth and final chapter, the crux of the book, examines the site itself, the Terracotta Army, the various new excavations that have taken place and future plans. Large numbers of the Terracotta Army's men and horses, displayed in military formation, are illustrated with striking photography. Their manufacture is explained and demonstrated with moulds, inscriptions, broken warriors and heads of warriors. Also illustrated and discussed are fascinating new discoveries such as terracotta bureaucrats, acrobats and strong men, life-size bronze birds, hundreds of suits of stone armour and terracotta warriors with coloured faces preserved with new technology.
Название: Shunga
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2010
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Over the course of the Edo period (16001868), an extraordinarily large quantity of paintings, prints and illustrated books with sexual and erotic themes was produced in Japan. As urban culture expanded rapidly during the seventeenth century, erotic material was a major genre of woodblock print production. These constitute some of the finest examples of art-printing in Japan, employing deluxe materials and special printing effects. This book looks at pictures by some of the most renown artists, such as Kitagawa Utamaro and Katsushika Hokusai, who produced erotic imagery as a standard part of their work. When creating erotica, artists often played on sexual situations in everyday life: a wife catches her husband having sex with a maid, mice start copulating in imitation of humans. Erotic encounters in Edo-period woodblock prints reflect multiple perspectives male, female, heterosexual and homosexual. Japanese erotic art is also notable for its tone of humour, much more so than in Western representations of sex. There was also frequent recourse to satire and parody, often in defiance of contemporary censorship and sumptuary regulations.
Название: Shunga
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2013
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Discover Japanese art like no other. Originally created by the artists of the ukiyo-e school of the floating world to advertise brothels in 17th-century Yoshiwara, these popular spring pictures (shunga) transcended class and gender in Japan for almost 300 years. These tender, humorous and brightly coloured pieces celebrate sexual pleasure in all its forms, culminating in the beautiful, yet graphic, work of iconic artists Utamaro, Hokusai and Kunisada. This catalogue of a major international exhibition aims to answer some key questions about what shunga is and why was it produced. Erotic Japanese art was heavily suppressed in Japan from the 1870s onwards as part of a process of cultural modernisation that imported many contemporary western moral values. Only in the last twenty years or so has it been possible to publish unexpurgated examples in Japan and this ground-breaking publication presents this fascinating art in its historical and cultural context for the first time. Within Japan, shunga has continued to influence modern forms of art, including manga, anime and Japanese tattoo art. Drawing on the latest scholarship and featuring over 400 images of works from major public and private collections, this landmark book sheds new light on this unique art form within Japanese social and cultural history. Shunga: sex and pleasure in Japanese art is published to accompany an exhibition at the British Museum from October 2013 to January 2014.
Название: Icons
Жанр: British Museum Press
Год: 2014
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The painted panels made for use in Byzantine and Orthodox churches and for prayers at home are perhaps the most effective and enduring form of religious art ever developed, and also perhaps one of the most mysterious. The peaceful, clear imagery found within them can be appreciated on both a religious and a secular level. This book will look at icons in the context of the history of Christianity and examine all aspects of the production and power of this distinctive art form. Based on an analysis of British Museum examples that have been carefully studied by restorers, Robin Cormack explains how icons were made, framed and displayed. He explores their subject matter, showing how scenes can be identified and how the iconography developed over the centuries and examining the role of portraiture. Icons is illustrated mainly with Cretan, Greek and Russian examples from the British Museum, which holds Britain's foremost collection of icons.
