American Images: The Sbc Collection of Twentieth-Century American Art

Based on the work in the SBC Collection, which has nearly 1,000 works of American art of the twentieth century, American Images provides a survey of art of that period. The thirteen essays take us roughly chronologically through the art of twentieth century using as reference points the work in the collection. From realist work we progress through Modernism with abstract and Cubist influences, Pop and Minimalism, to the diversity of the close of the century.

The book also contains a (selected) Catalogue of Work held in the collection, and a Bibliography arranged to follow the pattern of the essays. The essays themselves are illustrated with 72 black and white pictures, and there are 160 colour plates to be found following the relevant essays. Some 400 thumbnail black and white pictures illustrate the Catalogue of Work.

An informative book covering a wide range of work both two and occasionally three dimensional art, it is well illustrated. Perhaps some of the images could be larger, a number of the colour plates are reproduced quite small relative to the page size for no good reason, and of course the landscape pictures do not fair too well either on the portrait proportion page. There are however a few double-page spreads and a fair number of good sized images.

While there are many familiar names included in the survey and some familiar works of art, there are also many less familiar pieces, adding greatly to the appeal of the book. ( )