“I confess I do not admire naked boys. They always seem to me to need clothes—whereas one hardly sees why the lovely forms of girls should ever be covered up.”
—Lewis Carroll
In his day, writer Lewis Carroll was a highly regarded pioneer of the new art of portrait photography. While the nude photographs of his young girl subjects were discreetly returned to their parents or destroyed after his death, many of his photos of both distinguished 19th century personalities (Tennyson, Rossetti, etc.) and the young daughters of his friends and colleagues are collected in this slim volume along with a selection of his writings on photography from his unpublished diaries and notebooks. SS

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 127 pages
Illustrated

After a serious illness in 1792, Goya spent five years recuperating and reading French revolutionary literature. After his recovery, Goya produced Los Caprichos, a series of 80 aquatints. This was his reaction to a Spain that he believed had abandoned all reason. Los Caprichos is peopled with grotesque monsters, witches, asses, devils and strange creatures that are all caricatures of members of Spanish society. Goya savagely shows the nightmare of the Inquisition, the horrors of medical quackery, and rips apart the pseudocultural mores of Spanish society, attacking marriage, education, the church, royal politics and occultism. These excellent drawings provide some of the most biting social criticism ever. MC

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 183 pages
Illustrated

An artistic enemy of National Socialism since the early ‘20s, Grosz was a superb and savage chronicler of German humanity and politics. As the artist says in his preface to the Berlin edition of 1930: “Realist that I am, I use my pen and brush primarily for taking down what I see and observe, and that is generally unromantic, sober and not very dreamy. The devil knows why it’s so, but when you take a closer look, people and objects become somewhat shabby, ugly and often meaningless or ambiguous. My critical observation always resembles a question as to meaning, purpose and goal… but there is seldom a satisfying answer… I raise my hand and hail the eternal human law… and the cheerful, good-for-nothing immutability of life!” GR

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 125 pages
Illustrated

More than 240 black-and-white photographs of brilliantly conceived African masks, intense with “the psychic power projected from the depths of human experience,” including animal heads, faces, grotesques, beaded and tufted images, headdresses made of wood, ivory and brass. One of the great influences on 20th-century Modern art, prominently as uglified in the works of Picasso. Features “the psychology behind the masks, the roles of the dancer, the dance and the audience, naturalism vs. abstraction as applied to the masks, the carving styles of various tribes, and the place of the carver in tribal society.” GR

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 248 pages
Illustrated

A series of grandly brooding etchings depicting imaginary prisons executed between 1743 and 1745 by the frustrated Italian architect Giovanni Battista Piranesi. “In these works architectural fantasy strains and breaks the boundaries of human perception, creating a vast system of visual frustration that seems co-extensive with the universe. Where do the innumerable staircases lead? What do the immense vaults support or enclose? The ambiguous structures are compounded with projecting beams, pulleys, wooden ladders, rickety catwalks and gangways, hanging ropes and chains, iron rings embedded in the walls, and, so insignificant as to be almost not there, a few faceless human figures haunting the shadows… .”

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 63 pages
Illustrated

Set against the colorful descriptions of Rodin’s atelier, we hear, through conversations with his close friend Paul Gsell, Rodin’s opinions and philosophy on art and of some of his influences. In the chapter “Realism in Art” it’s revealed that unlike most sculptors who place models on pedestals and arrange them, Rodin would pay models to roam around his studio “to furnish him constantly with the sight of the nude moving with all the freedom of life”; by watching them he found inspiration for a natural pose. Often criticized by his contemporaries for his realistic portrayals of the human figure, he broke the rules of the time with his bold expression and style. This book gives insight into the rationale and methods utilized by Rodin. With intuitive sagacity he comments on the various works of Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Raphael and many more of the famous names who fill the art museums of the world. The book includes 51 illustrations of his sculptures including La Belle Heaulmiere, Head of Sorrow, the unfinished Gates of Hell, of course The Thinker, and 23 prints and drawings. TR

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 119 pages
Illustrated

This is the first in a series of three pocket-size books from Dover reproducing Blake’s famous “Illuminated Books.” By trade Blake was a London engraver, and in 1789, while in his early ‘30s, he developed this technique fusing poetry and images via copper engraving, hand-tinting and organic design. The story behind the creation of these poems is as unique as the images; Blake says that he had been searching for some time for a way to display his poems, and one night his dead brother came to him in a dream and dictated this process. Yes, Blake was a romantic and a visionary. These Dover books are presented in the same size, format and layout as the original 31 plates. Songs of Innocence was the first and most popular of Blake’s “Illuminated Books.” The poems are lightweight and best to read to children: they are joyful, sensitive and full of angels who rush in to save everything. MDH

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 42 pages
Illustrated

Book 2 in a series of three, this volume was published in 1794 following the success of Songs of Innocence. Containing 26 full-color plates, Songs of Experience is meant to be read in conjunction with Songs of Innocence. Whereas the first may leave the reader feeling light and unaffected, Experience’s poems are rich with more meaning and bespeak wisdom, sorrow, earthly powers and animism. Blake continued to publish new editions of Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience throughout his life, constantly making changes to page layout and coloring. This book reflects the choices he made after 1815 when he employed deep color and shading to add texture to the written word. MDH

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 48 pages
Illustrated

Here’s where the reader gets to the wisdom of Blake: “Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained,” “The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom,” “Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by incapacity.” These are a few of the “Proverbs of Hell” and they are sublime. Blake was purported to be a visionary, but it’s not until this book that his raging vision really shone through. It is a subversion of all that is thought to be good and evil. Blake’s been to hell… and he likes it! MDH

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 43 pages
Illustrated

“My whole face is breaking out. It is covered with puffy areas, scabs and some flowing acid serum which tears up my nerves. I suppose I shall finish the exteriors this morning… Alekan knows in advance the kind of strangeness that I am after… The least workman is gracious. Not one of them has sulked in spite of this tedious shifting around of wires… following orders, which from the outside, seem sheer caprice… The makeup men and the dressers know their jobs. Lucile and Escoffier carry their tiny mistakes as if they were a cross. In short, the unit is an extension of myself. The old dream of forming one person out of many is fully realized. I will put up with this pain until it becomes unbearable.” GR

Publisher: Dover
Paperback: 142 pages
Illustrated