- Publisher
- Phaidon
- Published
- 1995
- Shelf
- art: History
- ISBN
- 9780714832470
History
The Story of Art
E. H. Gombrich
The best single-volume history of art there is, written to be read from the front.
Why read it
Gombrich opens with "There really is no such thing as Art. There are only artists" and spends six hundred pages showing what he means: each period solving a problem the last one left behind. The narrative is the point. It gives you a spine to hang everything else on.
Why own it
It is the book you open to check a date and put down forty minutes later. Reproductions sit beside the argument rather than in a plate section, and nothing on a screen replaces flipping between two centuries with a thumb.
Who it is for
Anyone whose art history has holes, which is nearly everyone.
Reading order
Book 1 of 5 in the art reading order, where it starts. See all 5
Read nextWays of SeeingJohn BergerWith the history in place, Berger asks who is looking and who is being looked at, and links oil painting to modern advertising.Opens a search on AbeBooks, a network of independent and antiquarian sellers, which is where a good part of this shelf has to be found, because it is out of print.
Read next
Chosen because they argue with this one, not because a machine noticed they share a category.
Also on the·art shelf