As fascinating as a real visit to the world's famous museums and architectural sites, GARDNER'S ART THROUGH THE AGES: THE WESTERN PERSPECTIVE gives you a comprehensive, beautifully illustrated tour of the world's great artistic traditions--plus all the study tools you need to excel in your art history course! Easy to read and understand, this 13th Edition of the most widely read history of art book in the English language is the only textbook that includes a unique "scale" feature (accompanying the book's photographs of paintings and other artworks) that will help you better visualize the actual size of the artworks shown in the book. Three levels of review including extended image captions, "The Big Picture" overviews at the end of every chapter, and a special global timeline will help you study for your exams. You'll also find materials that will help you master the key topics quickly in the ArtStudy Online (a free interactive study guide that includes flash cards of images and quizzes).
Helen Gardner (1878–1946) was an American art historian and educator. Her Art Through the Ages remains a standard text for American art history classes.
Gardner was born in Manchester, New Hampshire and attended school in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago. In 1901 she graduated with a degree in classics from the University of Chicago. After an interval as a teacher, she returned to the same university to study art history, and received a master's degree in 1918. In 1920 she began lecturing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she would spend the rest of her career, with the exception of short appointments at UCLA and the University of Chicago.
Her major work, Art Through the Ages, was the first single-volume textbook to cover the entire range of art history from a global perspective. Frequently revised, it remains a standard textbook at American schools and universities. In 1932 she also published Understanding the Arts, an art appreciation text directed toward educators.