Jannis Kounellis : XXII stations on an odyssey 1969-2010 /

Kounellis is a sculptor, installation, and performance artist who was a pioneer of the 1960s Italian movement arte povera-an anticommercial rejection of traditional fine art materials with an emphasis on using commonly available materials. The book is composed of a series of 400 black-and-white photographs documenting 22 installations in factories, warehouses, churches, and castles. The artwork in this book does double duty; the purpose of the photographs is to document the installations, but the photographs themselves are also beautiful images and works of art. Each set of photographs includes an academic essay by former museum director and curator Scheps, which sets the scenes for the installations by describing the building and location, the materials used, theories and symbolism Kounellis employed, and the context in which the artwork was created and viewed. VERDICT No fewer than five monographs have been dedicated to Kounellis's work in the last decade. The images and the research in this volume combine to make this an important title for readers studying sculpture, installation art, and photography. The well-footnoted essays make this book ideal for academic libraries.-Valerie Nye, Santa Fe Univ. of Art and Design Lib., NM (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.