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The Arts of Mankind
Sumer
Translated by Stuart Gilbert & James Emmons. André Parrot (1901–1980) was a French archaeologist specializing in the ancient Near East. He led excavations in Lebanon, Iraq and Syria, and is best known for his work at Mari, Syria, where he led important excavations from 1933 to 1975.
- GenresArt
351 pages, Unknown Binding
First published October 19, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 2, 2015
The life of Malraux is a real cemetery. Suicide of his grandparents and great-grandparents, the death of his younger brother at 3 months, the death of Roland his other brother in 1945 in the boat which brought back him from concentration camp, the Spanish civil war, WWII...And if that were not enough, Claude his half-brother shot by the Nazis, Josette, his only true love, the mother of his children, dies in an accident of train 1944 His two sons die in an automobile accident.
Then Malraux writes on art. He is interest in all the times, all the countries. All that man could produce of beautiful think interested him, like if art was the ultimate rampart with nothingness.
His last idea, this collection, "Universe of the form" carried out with UNESCO. To ask specialists to write a monograph on one period or a civilisation. This volume is one of the first, but now there is around fifty of them , from archaÎc Greece to Persian, from Africa to Océania...
I inherited my aunt the first edition. When I read this book, when I see these photographs, I think of these cretins who destroyed the Assyrian bulls. And I think that the beauty is a weapon against the morons who dynamite Palmyre, who cuts the throat of, those who oppress the women.
Malraux is right, art, forms, all what man created of beautiful moves away us from barbary. It is why they will lose.
Then Malraux writes on art. He is interest in all the times, all the countries. All that man could produce of beautiful think interested him, like if art was the ultimate rampart with nothingness.
His last idea, this collection, "Universe of the form" carried out with UNESCO. To ask specialists to write a monograph on one period or a civilisation. This volume is one of the first, but now there is around fifty of them , from archaÎc Greece to Persian, from Africa to Océania...
I inherited my aunt the first edition. When I read this book, when I see these photographs, I think of these cretins who destroyed the Assyrian bulls. And I think that the beauty is a weapon against the morons who dynamite Palmyre, who cuts the throat of, those who oppress the women.
Malraux is right, art, forms, all what man created of beautiful moves away us from barbary. It is why they will lose.
October 5, 2023
Tengo la edición en castellano traducido brillantemente por Arturo del Hoyo ( 1961).
El prólogo escrito por André Malraux (Autor de "La condición humana”) ya es garantía del nivel intelectual de la obra, un erudito del arte que crea puentes fascinantes entre el pasado y nuestro tiempos.
Editorial Aguilar en su colección “El Universo de las Formas” editó estos libros con esmero, cuidando cada detalle, resalto cada una de las fotografías. Son bellas las que son planchas blanco/negro así como las impresas con tintas metalizadas que hacen “sentir" el bronce de la antigüedad.
Contiene un diccionario muy importante y sobretodo una sección de mapas que dan sentido para ubicar en el tiempo y en el espacio a esta maravillosa civilización de grandes arquitectos y artesanos.
SUMER, junto con “The Arts of Assyria” de André Parrot no pueden faltar en ninguna biblioteca de arte. Los Sumerios fueron grandes escultores, y aún hoy sus formas nos enseñan a través de los siglos, una cátedra de realismo y de simbolismo en el arte.
En la actualidad no se han vuelto a hacer libros tan bellos como estos.
Conviene buscarlos en librerías de viejo.
El prólogo escrito por André Malraux (Autor de "La condición humana”) ya es garantía del nivel intelectual de la obra, un erudito del arte que crea puentes fascinantes entre el pasado y nuestro tiempos.
Editorial Aguilar en su colección “El Universo de las Formas” editó estos libros con esmero, cuidando cada detalle, resalto cada una de las fotografías. Son bellas las que son planchas blanco/negro así como las impresas con tintas metalizadas que hacen “sentir" el bronce de la antigüedad.
Contiene un diccionario muy importante y sobretodo una sección de mapas que dan sentido para ubicar en el tiempo y en el espacio a esta maravillosa civilización de grandes arquitectos y artesanos.
SUMER, junto con “The Arts of Assyria” de André Parrot no pueden faltar en ninguna biblioteca de arte. Los Sumerios fueron grandes escultores, y aún hoy sus formas nos enseñan a través de los siglos, una cátedra de realismo y de simbolismo en el arte.
En la actualidad no se han vuelto a hacer libros tan bellos como estos.
Conviene buscarlos en librerías de viejo.
January 31, 2025
No chance I was going to read every word in this tome, but I did look at all the pictures, at least the ones that hadn't been ripped out by people who checked them out before me.
The pictures are about their many gods, kings, fighting animals, battles, booty.
The pictures are about their many gods, kings, fighting animals, battles, booty.
January 16, 2014
Plenty of wonderful images which I why I have given it a high rating. However I did found the text rather too light and like many French writers given to flamboyant descriptions like 'here all is blind ferocity, elemental chaos'. That may be how a modern art critic may see some of these images but I wanted to know about ancient sensibilities. The author gives us a history of art that is restricted to style, figuration and form but with no real content as to the meanings attached to ancient icons.
October 2, 2010
it was perfect! I do like it!
and recommend everybody interested in art or ancient history to read it!
it is full of pictures of amazing masterpieces from Prehistoric,Sumerian, Akkadian, Neo-Sumerian, Amorite"Babylonian", Kassite and Elamite arts!
it would take you to the atmosphere of that times!
and recommend everybody interested in art or ancient history to read it!
it is full of pictures of amazing masterpieces from Prehistoric,Sumerian, Akkadian, Neo-Sumerian, Amorite"Babylonian", Kassite and Elamite arts!
it would take you to the atmosphere of that times!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews