Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Art in Theory (1648-1815) provides a wide-ranging and comprehensive collection of documents on the theory of art from the founding of the French Academy until the end of the Napoleonic Wars. Like its highly successful companion volumes, Art in Theory (1815-1900) and Art in Theory (1900-1990), its' primary aim is to provide students and teachers with the documentary material for informed and up-to-date study. Its' 240 texts, clear principles of organization and considerable editorial content offer a vivid and indispensable introduction to the art of the early modern period.

Harrison, Wood and Gaiger have collected writing by artists, critics, philosophers, literary figures and administrators of the arts, some reprinted in their entirety, others excerpted from longer works. A wealth of material from French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch and Latin sources is also provided, including many new translations.

Among the major themes treated are early arguments over the relative merits of ancient and modern art, debates between the advocates of form and color, the beginnings of modern art criticism in reviews of the Salon, art and politics during the French Revolution, the rise of landscape painting, and the artistic theories of Romanticism and Neo-classicism.

Each section is prefaced by an essay that situates the ideas of the period in their historical context, while relating theoretical concerns and debates to developments in the practice of art. Each individual text is also accompanied by a short introduction. An extensive bibliography and full index are provided.

For more details of our book and journal list in Art, visit http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/arttheory

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Part I Establishing the Place of Art: Introduction
• 1 Ancients and Moderns
• 1 From The Painting of the Ancients 1637
• 2 Letter to Junius 1637
• 3 From The Art of Painting, its Antiquity and Greatness 1649
• 4 Dedication to Constantijn Huygens from Icones I 1660
• 5 From Painting Illustrated in Three Dialogues 1685
• 6 ''A Digression on the Ancients and the Moderns'' 1688
• 7 Preface and ''second Dialogue'' from Parallel of the Ancients and Moderns 1688
• 8 From Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning 1694
• 2 The Academy: Systems and Principles
• 9 Letters to Chantelou and to Chambray 1647/1665
• 10 Observations on Painting c. 1660-5
• 11 Recollections of Poussin 1662-1685
• 12 Petition to the King and to the Lords of his Council 1648
• 13 Statutes and Regulations of the AcadTmie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture 1648
• 14 From An Idea of the Perfection of Painting 1662
• 15 Letter to Poussin c. 1665
• 16 ''the Idea of the Painter, Sculptor and Architect'' 1664
• 17 From Conversations on the Lives and Works of the Most Excellent Ancient and Modern Painters 1666
• 18 Preface to Seven Conferences 1667
• 19 ''First Conference'' 1667
• 20 ''second Conference'' 1667
• 21 ''sixth Conference'' 1667
• 22 ''Conference on Expression'' 1668
• 23 Table of Precepts: Expression 1680
• 3 Form and Colour
• 24 ''de Imitatione Statuorum'', before 1640
• 25 From The Microcosm of Painting 1657
• 26 From ''diary of the Cavaliere Bernini''s Visit to France'' 1665
• 27 From De Arte Graphica 1667
• 28 ''remarks on De Arte Graphica'' 1668
• 29 From The Rich Mines of Venetian Painting 1676
• 30 ''Conference on Titian''s Virgin and Child with St John'' 1671
• 31 ''Conference on the Merits of Colour'' 1671
• 32 ''thoughts on M. Blanchard''s Discourse on the Merits of Colour'' 1672
• 33 From Dialogue upon Colouring 1673
• 34 From Practical Discourse on the Most Noble Art of Painting c. 1675
• 35 From The Antiquity of the Art of Painting c. 1690
• 4 The ''je ne sais quoi''
• 36 From The Hero 1637
• 37 From The Art of Worldly Wisdom 1647
• 38 ''Answer to Davenant''s Preface to Gondibert'' 1650
• 39 From Fire in the Bush and The Law of Freedom in a Platform 1650/2
• 40 From PensTes c.1654-1662
• 41 On Grace and Beauty from Conversations on the Lives and Works of the Most Excellent Ancient and Modern Painters 1666
• 42 From The Conversations of Aristo and Eugene 1671
• 43 From A Compleat Body of Divinity 1689/1701
• 44 On Art and Beauty, Before 1716
• 5 Practical Resources
• 45 From Miniatura; or The Art of Limning, Revised 1648
• 46 On Rembrandt and Jan Lievens c.1630
• 47 Letters to Constantijn Huygens 1636-9
• 48 From In Praise of Painting 1642
• 49 From The Art of Painting, its Antiquity and Greatness 1649
• 50 Preface to Perspective Practical 1651
• 51 From Introduction to the Academy of Painting; or, The Visible World 1678
• 52 ''the Excellency of Painting'' from A Treatise of Perspective 1684
• 53 From Principles for Studying the

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Paul Wood is co-editor of Art in Theory 1900 - 1990 (1992) and of Art in Theory 1815 - 1900 (1998). He has published widely on modern art and art history in a variety of journals and exhibition catalogues. He has edited The Challenge of the Avant Garde (1998) and co-edited Investigating Modern Art (1996) and has contributed to Realism, Rationalism, Surrealism , and Modernism in Dispute (both 1993) and to Critical Terms for Art History (1996). He is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Art History at the Open University.

Jason Gaiger is co-editor of Art in Theory 1915 - 1900 (1997). He has published various articles in the field of art history and aesthetics, and has been a visiting lecturer at the Universities of Essex, York and North London. He is currently Lecturer in Art History at the Open University.