Showing posts with label stuff for the coffee table. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stuff for the coffee table. Show all posts

Sunday, 29 November 2009

visions of heaven

more coffee table books again, (i think i'm going to need a bigger coffee table) and while i'm not a religious person in the slightest, i've always been fascinated by the architecture, symbolism and theory behind some of the church's greatest buildings. if ever you go travelling through europe, you will notice all these ancient tiny little villages and towns scattered over the countryside that all have these amazing cathedrals that dwarf any other structure around. and one can only imagine how many more of these would still be around had it not been for the destructive bombings of world war ii. in particular, i am mesmerised by gazing up at the domed/vaulted structure and defintion that adorns the ceilings of these ancient giants. and while i always attempted to capture for myself some of these brilliant visions, i never quite had the photographic skills required to depict what i was seeing in all its glory. the autistic in me is fascinated by the complex mathematical geometry and abstract pattern involved in the construction, the vast majority of which were built using the primitive technologies of years gone by.
which is where david stephenson's book"visions of heaven" comes in handy. tasmanian photographer stephenson has kindly taken the liberty of saving me a sore neck, snapping over 120 of the most amazing images you will ever see. check out more of his images here

Monday, 28 September 2009

coffee table books


phaidon is reknowned for releasing some amazing books with lots of pretty pictures, i should know, my library is FULL of them. and it gives me fantastic excitement and spine chills when i check out the local bookstore in my lunchbreak (ariel at darlinghurst is absolutely phenomenal, for those who love art/philosophy/design etc, check out their collection!) and see that phaidon have released the third edition in their "10x10" series, whereby 10 design critics/architecture kingpins pick their 10 favourite up-and-coming architects (making for 100 in total) and cram this huge big book with lots of visual stimuli! also check out phaidon's other books in the series, "area"/"area 2" (meant to be little 2 to indicate area squared, but my typing skills are slightly lacking) which uses the same 10x10 concept, but with graphic designers as the topic of choice, and "cream"/"fresh cream"/"ice cream" from a few years back which went 10x10 on visual artists. makes for a well-wicked coffee table book for the design conscious mind, or for people who want to pretend to friends that they are actually "cultured".