Ian Dawson is a practising sculptor, who first came to prominence in the 1990s with a series of large-scale melted plastic sculptures that celebrated creativity through the destructive act. His practice remains intensely experimental, involving different processes and diverse materials. Ian has exhibited internationally and his work is held in both public and private collections worldwide.

Creating a successful sculpture requires an imaginative concept and a sound design that utilize the potential and avoid the limitations of the material and the process used in making it. Prior to a few decades ago, most sculptors were restricted to carving stone and wood or casting plaster, ceramics and bronze for their creations. Contemporary sculptors, however, are no longer bound by the limitations of these traditional materials and processes, and can now create works in sizes, forms and textures that could not have been achieved previously. Many modern sculptures are now made from materials ranging from steel and aluminum to plastics and composites using processes ranging from welding and adhesive bonding to molding and 3D printing. To fully utilize the full potential of such new materials, the sculptor needs to understand their points of strength, their limitations, and the most effective way of shaping them to achieve a given design. Although this book is written by a materials engineer, the subject matter is presented from the point of view of the sculptor with emphasis on the strengths and weaknesses of different materials, their resistance to weather conditions, natural color and possible surface textures, possible methods of shaping and joining, tools and equipment needed, and safety measures to take. Whenever possible, case studies are used to illustrate the sequence of processes and the cost elements involved in shaping a given material to create an actual work of sculpture.

The sculptural object has spent much of the recent past being made to disappear from view. The word sculpture might still carry connotations of weight, scale and material, yet none of these things may necessarily be present in any particular work. Whether lost into a void, left behind in an expanded field or exploded to occupy the architectural space that once simply contained it, the sculptural object as the flotsam of an artist's engagement with process and materials, seems to have been in a continual state of crisis since first becoming detached from its plinth. As for the sculptor, the artist as maker, they can often be seen performing as magician, orchestrating events and actions which culminate in the object of our desire, the decorative assistant, simply vanishing from the stage. This book questions both the presence and absence of the object and its maker within contemporary British sculpture.

Sculpture parks and gardens, whether woodland sanctuaries or urban retreats, sprawling sites or intimate oases, offer sculpture lovers and artists alike unique ways to experience the outdoors, sculpture, and the intersections between nature and culture. Since the mid-20th century, these venues have become important tourist destinations and essential aspects of public life in cities such as Chicago, Minneapolis, and Seattle and regions such as Yorkshire in England and the Hudson Highlands in New York. Landscapes for Art: Contemporary Sculpture Parks surveys a wide range of sculpture parks and gardens that focus on contemporary art--from well-established, museum-type institutions to small-scale, non-collecting, experimental programs. The book includes profiles of sculpture parks in the U.S., U.K., Japan, Australia, Lithuania, China, Italy, Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium, India, Latvia, Sweden, and Finland (among others). There are articles on key topics by art critics, landscape architects, and sculpture park professionals and interviews with Isamu Noguchi, Martin Friedman, and Alfio Bonanno.

In an ancient account of painting’s origins, a woman traces the shadow of her departing lover on the wall in an act that anticipates future grief and commemoration. Lisa Saltzman shows here that nearly two thousand years after this story was first told, contemporary artists are returning to similar strategies of remembrance, ranging from vaudevillian silhouettes and sepulchral casts to incinerated architectures and ghostly processions. Exploring these artists’ work, Saltzman demonstrates that their methods have now eclipsed painting and traditional sculpture as preeminent forms of visual representation. She pays particular attention to the groundbreaking art of Krzysztof Wodiczko, who is known for his projections of historical subjects; Kara Walker, who creates powerful silhouetted images of racial violence in American history; and Rachel Whiteread, whose work centers on making casts of empty interior spaces. Each of the artists Saltzman discusses is struggling with the roles that history and memory have come to play in an age when any historical statement is subject to question and doubt. In identifying this new and powerful movement, she provides a framework for understanding the art of our time.

A veteran art critic helps us make sense of modern and contemporary art The landscape of contemporary art has changed dramatically during the last hundred years: from Malevich's 1915 painting of a single black square and Duchamp's 1917 signed porcelain urinal to Jackson Pollock's midcentury "drip" paintings; Chris Burden's "Shoot" (1971), in which the artist was voluntarily shot in the arm with a rifle; Urs Fischer's "You" (2007), a giant hole dug in the floor of a New York gallery; and the conceptual and performance art of today's Ai Weiwei and Marina Abramovic. The shifts have left the art-viewing public (understandably) perplexed. In The Art of Looking, renowned art critic Lance Esplund demonstrates that works of modern and contemporary art are not as indecipherable as they might seem. With patience, insight, and wit, Esplund guides us through the last century of art and empowers us to approach and appreciate it with new eyes. Eager to democratize genres that can feel inaccessible, Esplund encourages viewers to trust their own taste, guts, and common sense. The Art of Looking will open the eyes of viewers who think that recent art is obtuse, nonsensical, and irrelevant, as well as the eyes of those who believe that the art of the past has nothing to say to our present.

Translated into English for the first time, On Contemporary Art, a speech by the renowned novelist César Aira, was delivered at a 2010 colloquium in Madrid dedicated to bridging the gap between writing and the visual arts. On Aira’s dizzying and dazzling path, everything comes under question—from reproducibility of artworks to the value of the written word itself. In the end, Aira leaves us stranded on the bridge between writing and art that he set out to construct in the first place, flailing as we try to make sense of where we stand. Aira’s On Contemporary Art exemplifies what the ekphrasis series is dedicated to doing—exploring the space in which words give meaning to objects, and objects shape our words. Like the great writers Walter Benjamin and Hermann Broch before him, Aira operates in the space between fiction and essay writing, art and analysis. Pursuing questions about reproducibility, art making, and limits of language, Aira’s unique voice adds new insights to the essential conversations that continue to inform our understanding of art.