Diminutive marvels of artistry and fine craftsmanship, portrait miniatures reveal a wealth of information within their small frames. They can tell tales of cultural history and biography, of people and their passions, of evolving tastes in jewelry, fashion, hairstyles, and the decorative arts. Unlike many other genres, miniatures have a tradition in which amateurs and professionals have operated in parallel and women artists have flourished as professionals. This richly illustrated book presents approximately 180 portrait miniatures selected from the holdings of the Cincinnati Art Museum, the largest and most diverse collection of its kind in North America. The book stresses the continuity of stylistic tradition across Europe and America as well as the vitality of the portrait miniature format through more than four centuries. A detailed catalogue entry, as well as a concise artist biography, appears for each object. Essays examine various aspects of miniature painting, of the depiction of costume in miniatures, and of the allied art of hair work.

A comprehensive bibliography and exhibition chronology of the world's greatest museum of the decorative arts and design. The Victoria and Albert Museum, or South Kensington Museum as it used to be known, was founded by the British Government in 1852, out of the proceeds from the Great Exhibition of 1851. Like the Exhibition, it aimed to improve the expertise of designers, and the taste of the public, by exposing them to examples of good design from all countries and periods. 2,500 publications have to date been produced by, for, or in association with the V&A. The National Art Library, which is part of the Museum, has prepared this detailed catalogue, supplemented by a secondary list of 500 other books closely related to the V&A. The 1,500 exhibitions and displays recorded include those held in the main Museum and at its branches, the Bethnal Green Museum (now the National Museum of Childhood) and the Theatre Museum, Covent Garden, and additionally those it has organized at external venues, in Great Britain and abroad. The exhibitions and publications are fully cross-referenced, and there are name, title and subject indexes to the whole work, as well as an explanatory introduction.

This book is the first survey of the figural arts of the Iranian world from prehistoric times to the early twentieth century ever to consider themes, rather than styles. Analyzing primarily painting - in manuscripts and albums, on walls and on lacquered, painted pen boxes and caskets - but also the related arts of sculpture, ceramics, and metalwork, the author finds that the underlying themes depicted on them through the ages are remarkably consistent. Eleanor Sims demonstrates that all these arts display similar concerns: kingship and legitimacy; the righteous exercise of princely power and the defense of national territory; and the performance of rituals and the religious duties called for by the paramount cult of the day. She describes a variety of superb works of art inside and outside these categories, noting not only how they illustrate archetypal themes but also what it is about them that is unique. She also discusses the ways that Iranian art both influenced and was influenced by invaders and neighboring lands. Boris I. Marshak discusses pre-Islamic and also Central Asian art, in particular the earliest Iranian wall paintings and their pictorial parallels in rock carvings and metalwork, and the richly painted temples and houses of Panjikent. Ernst J. Grube considers religious imagery, and provides an informative bibliography.

A catalog of the museum's collection of some 300 European portrait miniatures dating from the early 16th to the mid-19th centuries. Each piece is described in detail and illustrated with bandw and color photos. Includes an overview of the history of miniature painting, notes on artists, and indices of artists, collectors, makers, and sitters. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

A sumptuously illustrated new catalog on British portrait miniatures, all from the world-renowned collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art