Max Hollein

The Legion of Honor Museum in San Francisco assembled another charming special exhibit, and this is the pictorial book for it. I was not aware of the “Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood - PRB” (and sisterhood) group of artists before this show. Even after enjoying the pieces at the exhibit (possibly from too much gawking at the beauty of the pieces), this book did a better job in educating me the history, goals, and influences of this 1848 secret artistic alliance. The PRB distilled four key principles of expressing genuine ideas, studying nature attentively, learning from previous art, and producing thoroughly good pictures and statues. They were at the time dismissing their contemporaries, desiring to express elements in their truest form. This book did a good job providing the details of their influences, notably Netherlandish Jan van Eyck and Hans Memling, Germanic Albercht Durer, and the Italian Sandro Botticelli. The latter’s work, displayed at the Uffizi, had floored me when I saw the pieces in person. His influence resulted in two artful, dreamy, nature themed pieces at the exhibit: John Roddam Spencer Stanhope’s “Love and the Maiden”, 1877, and his niece, Evelyn De Morgan’s “Flora”, 1894. My one ding on the book is that some pieces are printed darker and/or not accurately colored than what I recall. Other than that, this book is a winner.… (more)

This Casanova book is a pictorial summary for the special exhibit “Casanova: The Seduction of Europe” currently at Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Legion of Honor. Using art, costumes, dining ware, furniture, and books, this exhibit highlighted Casanova’s time in Europe and Ottoman Empire. The book is organized similar to the room arrangements, dominated by the regions of Venice, Paris, and London. Both the exhibit and this book is charming and creative, summarizing his life with various paintings showing life and times and specific individuals he met, including the cover lady, Manon Balletti, by the famed Rococo artist Jean-Marc Nattier. Manon Balletti is rumored to be the lady that Casanova regretted not having married. The artist François Boucher and six of his mythological paintings is also well featured in the exhibit and the book. Though not in the book (which I wish it is), his famously erotic la Jeune Fille allongée or “Resting Girl” featuring Marie-Louise O'Murphy is in the exhibit from the Cologne museum. If you see the exhibit, this is a very worthy book to take home.… (more)