Essays, criticism, and performance scripts written between 1985 and 2003 by an artist whose artistic practice investigates and reveals the social structures of art and its institutions. Andrea Fraser's work, writes Pierre Bourdieu in his foreword to Museum Highlights, is able to "trigger a social mechanism, a sort of machine infernale whose operation causes the hidden truth of social reality to reveal itself." It often does this by incorporating and inhabiting the social role it sets out to critique—as in a performance piece in which she leads a tour as a museum docent and describes the men's room in the same elevated language that she uses to describe seventeenth-century Dutch paintings. Influenced by the interdisciplinarity of postmodernism, Fraser's interventionist art draws on four primary artistic and intellectual frameworks—institutional critique, with its site-specific examination of cultural context; performance; feminism, with its investigation of identity formation; and Bourdieu's reflexive sociology. Fraser's writings form an integral part of her artistic practice, and this collection of texts written between 1985 and 2003—including the performance script for the docent's tour that gives the book its title—both documents and represents her work. The writings in Museum Highlights are arranged to reflect different aspects of Fraser's artistic practice. They include essays that trace the development of critical "artistic practice" as cultural resistance; performance scripts that explore art institutions and the public sphere; and texts that explore the ambivalent relationship of art to the economic and political interests of its time. The final piece, "Isn't This a Wonderful Place? (A Tour of a Tour of the Guggenheim Bilbao)," reflects on the role of museums in an era of globalization. Among the book's 30 illustrations are stills from performance pieces, some never before published.

"In honor of the Oriental Institute's centennial celebration, this special edition guide to 100 select highlights of the collections of the Oriental Institute Museum at the University of Chicago presents objects from ancient Mesopotamia, Syro-Anatolia, the Levant, Egypt, Nubia, and Persia. The guide features a history of the collections, new photography, provenance information, and a brief description of each object"--

Every year, thousands of visitors flock to the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, the largest museum devoted exclusively to the arts of Asia in the United States. Featuring more than 18,000 artworks, the museum's world-class collection highlights the unique material, aesthetic, and intellectual achievements of Asian art and culture. This book presents two hundred and thirty exemplary works spanning both ancient and modern times. Among its many treasures, readers will find a Japanese clay jar from 3000-2000 BCE, a Chinese bronze Buddha dating to 338, a seventeenth-century Indian painting from the Shahnama (Book of Kings), a mid-twentieth-century Korean wrapping cloth, and a new Thai work made from textile, window mesh, safety pins, and amulets. A collaboration between museum curators, artists, educators, and collectors, the book also takes an in-depth look at fourteen masterpieces selected for their beauty, rarity, and historical importance. Stunning full-color photographs and new texts—including a foreword by museum director Ja Xu—offer fresh perspectives on both ancient and contemporary objects. A handsome addition to any art history collection, this volume is an essential resource for museum visitors as well as anyone interested in Asian art.

Through the exceptional permanent collection at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, this book looks at arms and armor as art--from warfare to war games, from hunting to the pursuit of glory The Philadelphia Museum of Art's holdings of arms and armor are among the finest of their kind in the world. Presenting nearly 100 masterpieces from the collection, this lavishly illustrated volume includes complete armors and armor elements, swords, firearms and crossbows, staff weapons, horse equipment, and related accessories. Drawn for the most part from the princely armories of Europe, these objects represent the epitome of the armorer's art, and many are published here in color for the first time. The engaging text by Dirk H. Breiding summarizes the latest scholarship and discusses how the museum's collection--the core of which consists of a 1977 bequest by the distinguished connoisseur and scholar Carl Otto Kretzschmar von Kienbusch (1884-1976)--has evolved over the years. This volume reveals how arms and armor--uniting art, fashion, design, politics, and technology--can be seen as unique expressions of human creativity.

Published to celebrate the opening of the Denver Art Museum’s newly renovated campus, this stunning volume highlights masterworks from the museum’s global art collection. Published to celebrate the opening of the Denver Art Museum’s newly renovated campus, this stunning volume highlights masterworks from the museum’s global art collection. Founded in 1893, the Denver Art Museum is now one of the largest art museums between Chicago and the West Coast. Featuring around 70,000 works, the collection represents cultures from Africa and Asia to Europe and Oceania, from the ancient past to the present day. Housed in landmark buildings by Daniel Libeskind and Gio Ponti, the museum also showcases work by regional artists, and provides invaluable ways for the community to learn about the world.