Landscape and Western Art (Oxford History of Art)

by Malcolm Andrews (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  2000

  $5.87

  What is landscape? How does it differ from land ? Does landscape always imply something to be pictured, a scene? When and why did we begin to cherish images of nature? What is nature ? Is it everything that isn't art or artefact? This book explores many issues raised by the range of ideas and images of the natural world in Western art since the Renaissance. Using a thematic structure many issues are examined, for instance: landscape as a cultural construct; the relationship between landscape as accessory or backdrop and landscape as the chief subject; landscape as constituted by various practices of framing; the sublime and ideas of indeterminacy; and landscape art as picturesque or as exploration of living processes. These issues are raised and explored in connection with Western cultural movements, and within a full international and historical context. Many forms of landscape art are included: painting, gardening, panorama, poetry, photography, and art. The book is designed to both take stock of interdisciplinary debates and act as a stimulus to rethinking assumptions about landscape.