Ulf Kuster - Böcker

The recently deceased French-American sculptor Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) was one of the most important artists of the last century. Her fleshy blobs, skeletal spiders and the aggressive fragility of her work offered a new solution to the antagonism between the figurative and the abstract that had previously been part and parcel of modernism. Bourgeois herself provided a unique interpretive level to modern art through the uses she made of childhood trauma, family life and sexuality. This accessible study serves as both an ideal introduction to the central themes of the late artist's oeuvre and as a commemoration of her one-hundredth birthday. Over the course of nine chapters, it examines her life, her exploration of the works of other artists and the transformation of her emotions into such works of art as the now iconic pieces "Destruction of the Father," "Fillette," "Cells" and "Maman."

Edward Hopper’s world-famous paintings articulate an idiosyncratic view of modern life. With his impressive subjects, independent pictorial vocabulary, and virtuoso play of colors, Hopper continues to influence to this day the image of the United States in the first half of the twentieth century. He began his career as an illustrator and became famous around the globe for his oil paintings. They testify to his great interest in the effects of color and his mastery in depicting light and shadow. The Fondation Beyeler is devoting its large exhibition in the spring of 2020 to Hopper’s iconic images of the vast American landscape. The catalogue gathers together all of the paintings, watercolors, and drawings from the 1910s to the 1960s on display in the exhibition, and supplements them with essays focused on the subject of depicting landscape.

That incomparable melancholy in Edward Hopper’s pictures occasionally leads us to look at the details of his life. Where exactly did this master of loneliness live and work? What were his most important influences while he was working on his great paintings of America? In this wonderful, simply structured, A-to-Z book, Ulf Küster pursues these themes, which say a great deal about the painter and his interests, and yet he never loses sight of the artist and the necessary distance to his inimitable pictures.Thus, Küster strolls through the ABCs of Hopper’s life and work, from the “American landscape,” “Buick” “Goethe,” and “shadow and sunlight” to the key word, “time.” On the way he opens up many new doors or insights, enriching the views of Hopper’s paintings and make it possible to interpret them in new ways. An entertaining and informative book.

Piet Mondrian had a decisive influence on the development of painting from figuration to abstraction. On the occasion of his 150th birthday, Mondrian Evolution is dedicated to his multifaceted work and artistic development. Initially working in the tradition of Dutch landscape painting of the late 19th century, Symbolism and Cubism subsequently took on great significance for him. It was not until the early 1920s that the artist focused on a wholly non-representational pictorial vocabulary, limited to the rectangular arrangement of black lines with surfaces in white and the primary colors blue, red and yellow. In separate chapters, this path is traced through motifs such as windmills, dunes, and the sea, farms reflected in the water, and plants in various forms of abstraction.

Windmills, Foxtrot and Yves Saint-Laurent Pivotal in modern art’s move towards abstraction, Piet Mondrian’s oeuvre is extraordinarily versatile and complex. Not only did he paint and draw, he also wrote extensively about his thoughts and theories on art and life. Moving from traditional Dutch landscape painting to a pronounced rhythmic framework focusing on compositional structure rather than naturalistic representation, Mondrian was profoundly impressed by contemporary culture. Thus, he was not only inspired by the pattern of the extensive Dutch canal system, but also by the rhythm of jazz and the foxtrot. Demonstrating the impact of his oeuvre, Yves Saint-Laurent's famous "Mondrian Dress" even made him a fashion icon posthumously.Celebrating the 150th anniversary of his birth, Ulf Küster entertainingly leads through well- and lesser-known aspects of Mondrian's life and work offering inspiring impulses for reflection and further engagement with the fascinating artist.

Wayne Thiebaud's famous, literally candy-colored still lifes of pies, cakes, gumball machines, and lipsticks reflect the promise and abundance of the American way of life - a society of plenty, where supply exceeds demand.The tactile impression created by his pasty layers of paint brings the objects to life and creates an atmosphere in which irony and melancholy are carefully balanced. Testing the possibilities of painterly expression, Thiebaud’s brilliant painting technique explores the boundaries of the real and imagined world.This catalog presents all aspects of the legendary American artist’s oeuvre, including still lifes and portraits, as well as his deserted, multi-perspective cityscapes and river landscapes, in luminous pastels that exude a peculiar summertime sadness.

Following key terms from A–Z, these books illuminate little-known aspects and shed new light on familiar motifs and themes. This time about the artist Edvard Munch Edvard Munch is one of the most famous painters of the early 20th century and a role model for many artists to this day. His legendary painting Scream even inspired a popular emoji, something that no other artist has ever achieved. Munch had a unique way of placing himself as an individual in the foreground of his art, making his psychological state the subject of his work. In doing so, he created a personal and at the same time universal “diary of the soul” that still captivates us today, as international exhibitions of the Norwegian artist show. In twenty-six short chapters, from A for anxiety to G for ghosts, R for revolvers and Z for zoo, familiar but also surprising aspects of his art and life are presented in a compelling way.

Form, color, and light – a pioneer of painterly abstractionPaul Cezanne is unquestionably one of the most influential artists of the nineteenth century. He is regarded as a pioneer of modernism who deliberately broke with the laws of perspective in his works and constructed the world out of color and form. He thus gave decisive impetus to Cubist painting and the development of abstraction. The catalogue accompanies a comprehensive exhibition at the Fondation Beyeler, which is honoring this central artist in its collection with a solo show for the first time in its history. The exhibition and catalogue focus on the last and most significant phase of the French painter's career and highlight key themes from his later years, including still lifes, portraits, landscapes, and scenes of bathers. With around seventy oil paintings and watercolors, the exhibition and catalogue allow us to experience form, light, and color in Cezanne's groundbreaking works—qualities that have influenced artists across generations and continue to inspire them to this day.