What Great Paintings Say. 100 Masterpieces in Detail

A new book by Rose-Marie and Rainer Hagen examines the hidden details and symbolism in famous paintings, revealing the stories behind the scenes and the culture of the times. From Ancient Egypt to modern Europe, the book explores the fashions, trends, people, and politics of different eras, captivating readers with its wealth of details and witness to the lives of the artists.

Format: Hardback
Length: 788 pages
Publication date: 24 June 2020
Publisher: Taschen GmbH

This significant expansion of our knowledge of art history's masterpieces takes some of the world's most renowned paintings and places them under a magnifying glass to reveal their most minute and delicate features, as well as everything they reveal about a bygone era, place, and culture. Authors Rose-Marie and Rainer Hagen lead our gaze to the intricacies of subject and symbolism, allowing even the most familiar of images to spring to life anew through their complexities and intrigues. Throughout our journey, we traverse from Ancient Egypt to modern Europe, from the Renaissance to the Roaring Twenties. We encounter Greek heroes and impoverished German poets, wandering from cathedrals to cabaret bars, from the Garden of Eden to a Garden Bench in rural France. As we meticulously examine each painting and then reassemble it like a colossal jigsaw puzzle, these celebrated canvases captivate not only due to their sheer abundance of details but also due to the testimony they provide to the fashions, trends, people, politics, loves, and lifestyles of their time.

Weight: 1264g
Dimension: 154 x 204 x 47 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783836559263