On Friday, May 18, Lois Dodd: Catching the Light opened at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art. This retrospective exhibition of Dodd’s work features paintings from the 1950s to the present. Together, the paintings highlight Dodd’s commitment to painting the immediate world she inhabits, from the green world of Maine’s rural coast to the steely landscape of New York City.
Dodd started painting in the early 1950s, during the birth of the Abstract Expressionism movement, and despite the predominance of mainstream styles and trends, her work persisted in its unique observational style. Her paintings are simple, quiet, and dramatic only in way they capture light and shadow. Her work attends to the small details of life around her—brick walls, garden flowers, and broken windows—objects and scenes others might not notice.
Marquand Books produced the exhibition catalogue that accompanies Lois Dodd: Catching the Light. The catalogue, designed by Susan E. Kelly, includes essays and reflections written by Dodd’s colleagues and features more than eighty color illustrations.
To purchase a copy of Lois Dodd: Catching the Light or to learn more about the exhibition, visit the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art online.
Throughout his life, Leonardo da Vinci worked to understand and illuminate the mystery of human anatomy. His skill as an anatomist is revealed in notes, sketches, and drawings that depict bones and muscles with an accuracy centuries ahead of its time.
The Royal Collection in London is currently showing da Vinci’s anatomical work in the exhibition Leonardo da Vinci: Anatomist. The exhibition at The Queens Gallery in Buckingham Palace highlights the incredible detail and scientific fidelity with which da Vinci recorded the human body.
The exhibition catalogue was produced by Marquand Books and designed by John Hubbard. It features eighty-seven illustrations of da Vinci’s key studies, including his dissections of the skull, drawings of major organs and vessels, and notes on human proportion. Collaborative essays by Martin Clayton and Ron Philo provide historical insight to da Vinci’s drawings and life.
To learn more about the exhibition Leonardo da Vinci: Anatomist or to purchase the catalogue, visit The Royal Collection online.
photography by Jeremy Linden
Maps may be one of the most pleasing reference tools in which form and function meet. Some of the books we produce include maps created by our production artist (and resident cartographer), Jeremy Linden. We recently sat down to look through some of the maps he has made for our clients and to discuss his mapmaking process.
What was the first map you worked on at Marquand Books?
In 2009, I created our first in-house map; it was for the book The Arts of Africa. I traced out the map, drew in the country outlines, and put the labels where the client wanted them. We went through a couple different color schemes as I worked with the designer to coordinate the map with the theme of the book.
Tracing the outline was pretty tedious. When you’re doing it, you’re working really close up to the map, but when you zoom out, you have this awesome, detailed coastline. Making the map was really fun; for some reason, I really enjoyed it.
A detail of the map from Art of Armor.
What were the next maps you made?
The year after The Arts of Africa we did a much smaller, less-detailed map of Japan for the book Dreams and Diversions. Then we worked on a few small figure illustrations. The next big one—which is probably one of my favorite maps—was for the Art of Armor.
Why is this one your favorite?
It was more detailed and, because of the book’s design, it allowed me to be more stylized. I also had a full, double-page spread to work with. This book included a timeline, so I designed the timeline and map to match. I got to come up with icons and keys myself, so I drew little daimyo castles. It’s gratifying to take the maps and adjust them to complement the design of the book—in this case, the black and orange of the map plays with the Japanese lacquer and the rusty orange colors of the armor.
The map of Australia in Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art is very detailed. Tell me about your design process.
I made this map right after Art of Armor, and I wanted to make sure it didn’t look the same. I really like the dark background of the Art of Armor map, but I didn’t want to go that route again. With this one, I picked up the color from the text and tried to make the elements reflect the aboriginal art, with the repeating lines and dots.
A detail of the map from Ancestral Modern.
What books tend to include maps?
So far, it’s been books with specific regional information. The Arts of Africa and Ancestral Modern are good examples—they want to show where in the area art came from. With Ancestral Modern, topography plays into in the actual works of art. We’re working on a book now about French faience and porcelain, and the map will show locations of the manufactories. We’re also working on a book about van Gogh, and that map will include biographical information about where the artist lived and how those regions influenced his art.
This image shows the steps taken to create a street map of van Gogh’s nineteenth-century Paris.
What do you like about designing maps?
I love maps; I think they ground the story. And making maps seems so simple—it’s just an infographic—but there really is an art to it. It’s not that you’re coming up with something new, but you get to decide how you will take the information and present it. That’s when it starts to become fun.
If you could design any map, what would it be?
I would probably do a non-fictional place. I’d like to try my hand at making a map look antique. So far, my maps have been very clean—just information. They look very modern. But some of the maps we’ve had made in the past look almost painted. I think painting a map digitally would be a fun challenge.
This comparison of styles shows a modern design (left) and a traditional design (right) of a map referencing eighteenth-century French ceramic manufactories.
“[Day] is one of the rare photographers who has something to say, and he knows exactly how to say it.” — Robert Demachy*
Boston photographer F. Holland Day advocated for the acceptance of photography as fine art. In the early 1900s, he gained international recognition as a leader in the Pictorialist movement—a style of photography that resisted the notion of photographs as mere records of reality. From intimate portraits of friends to stylized photographs of models in costume, Day’s work demonstrated his ability to create and capture scenes with as much detail and emotion as an artist working with paint.
The current exhibition at the Addison Gallery of American Art, Making a Presence: F. Holland Day in Artistic Photography, explores Day’s dynamic persona through a variety of pictures, including photographs by Day and portraits of the artist taken by his contemporaries. The photographs reveal Day’s diverse interests, independent spirit, and elaborate imagination.
Marquand Books produced the exhibition catalogue for Making a Presence: F. Holland Day in Artistic Photography. The 132-page book, designed by Zach Hooker, presents more than ninety color illustrations and includes essays by Trevor Fairbrother, the curator of the exhibition.
To learn more about Making a Presence: F. Holland Day in Artistic Photography, visit the Addison Gallery of American Art. To pre-order a copy of the exhibition catalogue, visit Yale University Press.
* Trevor Fairbrother, Making a Presence: F. Holland Day in Artistic Photography. (Andover: Addison Gallery of American Art, 2012), 15.
photography by Jeremy Linden
“I want to remain vulnerable to beauty. I want to be stopped in my tracks by something I call beautiful that I have never noticed or seen before.”
— Barbara Rogers
This month Hudson Hills Press will release Barbara Rogers: The Imperative of Beauty. The book documents Barbara Rogers’s development as an artist and teacher and chronicles her use of figurative, abstract, and ornamental forms.
Nature is a prominent subject in Rogers’s work, and she explores its nourishing and destructive powers. Vibrant colors, animals, and people compose her early paintings, while abstract and ornamental forms take center stage in her recent works. Present throughout her work is Rogers’s pursuit of beauty: “Through my paintings, I am reclaiming a space for beauty in the midst of everyday life; I seek to create a place of respite, reflection, and contemplation.”
Marquand Books produced The Imperative of Beauty. Designed by Zach Hooker, the 224-page book includes more than 150 color illustrations and features essays by Paul Eli Ivey and interviews with Rogers by Marilyn Zeitlin. Visit Roger’s website to learn more about her life and work. To purchase The Imperative of Beauty, visit Hudson Hills Press.
Photography by Jeremy Linden
