BELLAS ARTES

A definitive and long overdue monograph revealing the extraordinarily prolific career of the American artist Wes Lang, whose frenetic and manic paintings bring together ideas and icons mined from a post-pop American landscape. In the Wes Lang universe, recurring figures and symbols—horses, reapers, skulls, Native American chiefs, even nods to his favorite painters, country and jazz musicians—serve as emblems in one way or another for freedom and inspiration. References to the Tao Te Ching and the lectures of Ram Dass are scattered throughout the work, revealing a central ethos that underlies the artist’s complex iconography. The repetition of these sometimes paradoxical images and phrases, motifs and mantras, gives Lang’s work a ritualistic aspect seemingly at odds with his eclectic and spontaneous style. Introduced with an exploratory essay by the critic Arty Nelson, the book draws on more than 25 years’ worth of material, from stark paintings on wood that formed the artist's first exhibition to richly layered oil paintings exhibited in Paris in 2020, and from unpublished pencil drawings to imagery made iconic by his enigmatic commercial collaborations. Oversized and with pull-out gatefold pages, the book is testament to the scope and richness of Lang's work: expansive in its iconography, deceptively intimate in its detail, and juxtaposing a textured, painterly style with a playful acceptance of the diversity of his own influences.

The extraordinary paintings and watercolors of this contemporary British abstract artist, deeply influenced by the romantic English landscape tradition of Constable and Turner. This is the first major look at the work of the renowned yet intensely private and reclusive artist William Tillyer (b. 1938), best known for his abstract oil paintings, watercolors, and prints. Tillyer’s skill and hugely varied body of work make him one of Britain’s most respected artists, in the same generation as Lucian Freud and David Hockney. Tillyer is finally getting the recognition he deserves. While Tillyer’s paintings are largely abstract, they are based on the landscape of North Yorkshire, where he has lived and worked for most of his life. The book covers Tillyer’s experiments with nontraditional materials and techniques—his 3D panels, cut canvases, constructed works with found objects, printmaking with a wide range of processes, and paintings on wire mesh.

Ver cine con los hijos es una experiencia reseñable para cualquier mortal. Pero si eres crítico y das clase de historia del cine, el reto es mayúsculo. A traves de estas páginas, de capítulos que transitan del cine animado al de aventuras, del terror a la ciencia ficción, Javier Ocaña acompaña a sus hijos –y a los lectores– en un viaje que nos lleva desde Blancanieves a Kurosawa, desde la infancia a la madurez, emocional e intelectual. Un libro en el que alta y baja cultura se entremezclan dejando espacio solo a la curiosidad y a la intuición, y que nos transmite la emoción de volver a ver nuestras películas favoritas como si las estuvieramos viendo por primera vez.