MFA Houston’s exhibition, Alice Neel: Painted Truths continues to enjoy wide media attention. Marquand Books produced the exhibition’s accompanying catalogue, distributed by Yale University Press.
Neel’s career was profiled in last Sunday’s New York Times:
She focused on the least fashionable of realist genres, portraiture, which had long since been declared dead, bringing to it an electrifying verve.
Each year, the American Association of Museums sponsors the Museum Publications Design Competition. This year, 700 entries were submitted. We are not a museum, and therefore are not eligible to enter our work. In fact, we don’t usually know which of our books have been entered, so it’s always a delightful surprise to win!
Marquand Books was honored with four awards for our books and exhibition catalogues produced in 2009. Our Design Director, Jeff Wincapaw, was responsible for three of the wins.
Good design is a collaborative process, and we are fortunate to have talented and engaged clients. The museum directors, curators, publications directors, artists, photographers, writers, editors, and production and administrative support involved in these exhibitions and publications deserve credit as well. Our pre-press partner, iocolor, always makes us look good, as do the printers we work with. Many thanks to them all.
Cézanne and American Modernism
The Arts of Africa at the Dallas Museum of Art
We consider it an honor to have the iconic graphic designer Art Chantry as a guest contributor to Marquand’s blog. Below is an essay from his “Familiar Quotations Vol. 2” series. Look for more of Chantry’s writing to come.
alvin lustig was one of the most inspiring and prolific (and maybe among the very best) graphic designers of the last half century. he designed countless book covers, advertising, magazines (including the peculiar “gentry” magazine). unfortunately, he had the misfortune of dying before graphic design became such a popular sporting activity. the result is that nobody seems to remember him. like william golden or bradbury thompson, he’s been remaindered to that heap o’ exquisite designers thrown in the closet (and the landfill) so that we may worship at the shrine of paul rand (who managed to outlive all of his more talented competitors.)
Seattle’s venerable Elliott Bay Book Company officially opened shop in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood Wednesday. The store, which moved from its beloved Pioneer Square location after 37 years due to financial woes, is reinventing itself in one of Seattle’s most vibrant neighborhoods.
In major cities worldwide during the pre-burst bubble, many independent, street-level retail businesses were priced out of the cool neighborhoods they helped establish. Corporate conglomerates selling luxury goods drove commercial rent into the tens of thousands of dollars.
Many of these shops are simply environmental installations-as-advertising. While Nike, Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Gucci, and others of their ilk still drive many rental markets, it’s shifted a bit here in NYC, where desirable shopping districts such as Soho and Nolita are full of empty storefronts.
Marquand Books designs and produces fine illustrated books for art museums, galleries, trade publishers, artists, collectors, and architects.
