Distributed Presses

The wires and webs are buzzing with news about many of our client presses, and here's your chance to partake of the excitement—

Just in time for the November 9th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Tariq Ali will be talking about the past and future of communism at the Harvard Book Store on November 10th at 7:00 pm. Visit the store for more details.

In contrast, an icon of capitalist splendor—Las Vegas—will be on display October 29, 2009 to February 5, 2010 when the Yale School of Architecture presents an exhibit on Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown's Las Vegas Studio.

If you've seen Bright Star, the new film on John Keats and Fanny Brawne and are eager to learn more about one of the original Romantics, you should check out this new podcast featuring Stephen Hebron, author of John Keats: A Poet and His Manuscripts, discussing what Keats's letters and poems reveal about his creative process.

Fred Czarra, author of Spices: A Global History, reveals his good taste and love of flavor in an article by the Southern Maryland News.

Creatures great and small, covered in fur or scales, get a full treatment in The Chronicle Review's look at Reaktion's Animal Series.

Over at Jews for Justice for Palestinians, Brian Klug discusses his new book from Seagull, Offence: The Jewish Case.

Finally, the excitement is only just beginning for Seagull's new translation of short stories from one of the most unique and significant fiction writers of the 20th Century, Thomas Bernhard.

Posted by COA at 12:01 PM | Permalink
Posted to Art and Architecture | Author Events | British Library | Features | Food | Literature | Politics and Current Events | Reaktion | Reviews | Seagull Books | Verlag Scheidegger & Spiess

Swiss architect Peter Zumthor has been named the 2009 winner of the Pritzker Architecture Prize, the premiere international distinction for an architect. Zumthor is best known for his design for the Therme Vals spa complex in the Swiss Alps. Inspired by the spa's majestic surroundings, Zumthor built the structure on the sharp grade of an Alpine mountain slope with grass-topped roofs to mimic Swiss meadows.

The Pritzker jury praised both Zumthor's detailed approach to each of his projects as well as his use of materials, commenting: "In Zumthor's skillful hands, like those of the consummate craftsman, materials from cedar shingles to sandblasted glass are used in a way that celebrates their own unique qualities, all in the service of an architecture of permanence.… In paring down architecture to its barest yet most sumptuous essentials, he has reaffirmed architecture's indispensable place in a fragile world."

Two recent books by Verlag Scheidegger and Spiess offer wonderful insight into Zumthor's work alongside gorgeous images that present his striking designs. Peter Zumthor Therme Vals is the only book-length study of this unique building, and it includes the his original sketches and plans for its design. Seeing Zumthor is a unique collaboration between distinguished Swiss photographer Hans Danuser and Zumthor. Danuser's images of the buildings created by Zumthor are photographs that comment equally on the art of photography and the art of architecture.

Posted by COA at 09:03 AM | Permalink
Posted to Art and Architecture | Awards | Verlag Scheidegger & Spiess

Art and photography blog 5B4 features an insightful review of Las Vegas Studio. The book reproduces the groundbreaking images from Robert Venturi, Denise Scott Brown, and Steven Izenour's classic treatise in architectural theory Learning from Las Vegas alongside new essays that explore how the pictures contemplate the phenomenon of the modern city and forge the link to architectural practice of the decades since.

From 5B4's Review:
"Las Vegas Studio: Images from the Archive of Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown in design and execution is the exact opposite of the gaudy flash of its content. Cool, calculated and elegant, it embraces an aesthetic which is so controlled and clean that it manages to somehow reign in the explosion of typography, color, and scale that the photos describe."

Posted by COA at 04:27 PM | Permalink
Posted to Art and Architecture | Reviews | Verlag Scheidegger & Spiess