Modern Art. A History from Impressionism to Today

Over 200 paintings, sculptures, photographs, and conceptual works trace the history of innovation and adventure in modern art. With explanatory texts for each work and essays introducing each of the major modern movements, this is an authoritative overview of the ideas and artworks that shook standards, challenged the establishment, and paved the way for new ideas.

Modern Matters
A detailed account of modern art movements

Most art historians agree that the adventure of modern art first developed in the 1860s in Paris. A circle of painters, known today as the Impressionists, began to paint with rapid, loose brushstrokes. They turned to everyday street life for their subjects, rather than exaggerated heroic scenes, and escaped the power of the Salon by organizing their own independent exhibitions.

After this initial assault on the art establishment, there was no stopping it. In a constant desire to challenge, innovate, and inspire , one modernist style supplanted the next: symbolism, expressionism, futurism, dadaism, abstract art, renewed realism, surrealism, abstract expressionism, pop, minimalism, and conceptual art.

This indispensable overview traces the restless energy of modern art with a year-by-year succession of groundbreaking artworks that shook standards and broke down barriers . Introductory essays outline the most significant and influential movements along with explanatory texts for each major work and its artist.

The publisher
Hans Werner Holzwarth is a graphic designer and editor specializing in contemporary art and photography. His TASCHEN publications include Jeff Koons, Christopher Wool, Albert Oehlen, Ai Weiwei, and David Hockney's SUMO: A Bigger Book, as well as monographs such as Jean-Michel Basquiat .

Modern Art. A History from Impressionism to Today
Hardcover, 14 x 19.5 cm
696 pages
English language