A Closer Look: Landscape

A Closer Look

by Erika Langmuir

Landscape is probably the most popular type of painting, but anyone who has ever been disappointed by vacation photographs knows how difficult it is to turn a view into a picture.  This book shows how artists in past centuries translated outdoor space and light into paint, and how landscape imagery evolved from mere ornament into a visual metaphor of the human condition.  The story is told from its beginnings in Roman mural decoration, through the Renaissance transformation of landscape into a vehicle for feelings and ideas, to the Impressionist revolution and beyond.  The continuing relevance of art to how we see the world, and our place in it, is demonstrated through a practical discussion of optics of real and painted landscape, illustrated with works from the National Gallery, London.
 

Published by National Gallery, London/Distributed by Yale University Press

96 pages, Paperback

First published September 5, 1997

About the author

Erika Langmuir, OBE, was educated in France and the United States. She has taught at the University of Sussex and held the Chair of Art History at the Open University. She was Head of Education at the National Gallery from 1988–1995.

Reviews

[Abby · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit dry at parts, but overall very informative and interesting! I personally love landscape paintings and this book was a good complement to that.

[Alicia Verstraeten · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another one from the collection. Learned some more about the history of landscapes in art and how artists view life.

Loved learning about this some more.