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Great Artists
- Part 1
- Narrated by: Janet Lawrence
- Length: 5 hrs and 47 mins
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Great Artists
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Publisher's summary
A perfect introduction for anyone interested in the rich history of Western Art. Great Artists takes its listeners on a comprehensive journey through the history of art. This book, part one, provides a dedicated chapter on each of the following artists: Giotto, Leonardo da Vinci, Dürer, Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian, and Bruegel. These major painters of Western art are considered, placed in their social context, and discussed in terms of the most recent scholarship. The book explores how and why these painters were significant in changing how the world was seen and represented. Intelligent and accessible, this book ties in with the DVD series from the authors, an ideal work for would-be connoisseurs seeking a pathway into the lives of the great painters.
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Caravaggio
- A Life Sacred and Profane
- By: Andrew Graham-Dixon
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 18 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 462
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 401
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 401
In the tradition of John Richardson's Picasso, a commanding new biography of the Italian master's tumultuous life and mysterious death. For four hundred years Caravaggio's (1571-1610) staggering artistic achievements have thrilled viewers, yet his volatile personal trajectory - the murder of Ranuccio Tomasini, the doubt surrounding Caravaggio's sexuality, the chain of events that began with his imprisonment on Malta and ended with his premature death - has long confounded historians.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Interesting life
- By Jean on 08-28-13
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Turner
- The Extraordinary Life and Momentous Times of J. M. W. Turner
- By: Franny Moyle
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 17 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 74
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 66
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 66
J. M. W. Turner is one of the most important figures in Western art, and his visionary work paved the way for a revolution in landscape painting. Over the course of his lifetime, Turner strove to liberate painting from an antiquated system of patronage. Bringing a new level of expression and color to his canvases, he paved the way for the modern artist.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Balanced biography of a complex artist
- By Thomas S. on 05-05-17
By: Franny Moyle
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What Are You Looking At?
- The Surprising, Shocking, and Sometimes Strange Story of 150 Years of Modern Art
- By: Will Gompertz
- Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 135
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 111
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 110
What is modern art? Who started it? Why do we either love it or loathe it? And why is it such big money? Join BBC Arts Editor Will Gompertz on a dazzling tour that will change the way you look at modern art forever. From Monet's water lilies to Van Gogh's sunflowers, from Warhol's soup cans to Hirst's pickled shark, hear the stories behind the masterpieces, meet the artists as they really were, and discover the real point of modern art.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Outstanding History of Modern Art
- By Earth Lover on 07-24-20
By: Will Gompertz
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The Ugly Renaissance
- Sex, Greed, Violence, and Depravity in an Age of Beauty
- By: Alexander Lee
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 15 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 118
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 99
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Story4 out of 5 stars 98
Renowned as a period of cultural rebirth and artistic innovation, the Renaissance is cloaked in a unique aura of beauty and brilliance. Its very name conjures up awe-inspiring images of an age of lofty ideals in which life imitated the fantastic artworks for which it has become famous. But behind the vast explosion of new art and culture lurked a seamy, vicious world of power politics, perversity, and corruption that has more in common with the present day than anyone dares to admit.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Author falls into the pit he digs for others
- By Sean on 01-23-16
By: Alexander Lee
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Botticelli's Secret
- The Lost Drawings and the Rediscovery of the Renaissance
- By: Joseph Luzzi
- Narrated by: Keith Szarabajka
- Length: 6 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 121
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 92
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Story4 out of 5 stars 92
Some 500 years ago, Sandro Botticelli, a painter of humble origin, created work of unearthly beauty. An intimate associate of Florence’s unofficial rulers, the Medici, he was commissioned by a member of their family to execute a near-impossible project: to illustrate all 100 cantos of The Divine Comedy by the city’s greatest poet, Dante Alighieri. A powerful encounter between poet and artist, sacred and secular, earthly and evanescent, these drawings produced a wealth of stunning images but were never finished.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great story
- By Chris M on 12-09-22
By: Joseph Luzzi
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Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling
- By: Ross King
- Narrated by: Alan Sklar
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,083
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 844
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 841
In 1508, despite strong advice to the contrary, the powerful Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo Buonarroti to paint the ceiling of the newly restored Sistine Chapel in Rome. During the four extraordinary years that Michelangelo spent laboring over the ceiling, power politics and personal rivalries swirled around him. He battled ill health, financial and family difficulties, inadequate knowledge of the art of fresco, and the Pope's impatience - a history that is more compelling than most novels.
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5 out of 5 stars
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History brought to life!
- By Anne on 05-17-03
By: Ross King
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The Sistine Secrets
- Michelangelo's Forbidden Messages in the Heart of the Vatican
- By: Benjamin Blech, Roy Doliner
- Narrated by: James Cameron Stewart
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 32
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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Story5 out of 5 stars 28
Five hundred years ago, Michelangelo began work on a painting that became one of the most famous pieces of art in the world - the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Every year millions of people come to see Michelangelo's Sistine ceiling, which is the largest fresco painting on earth in the holiest of Christianity's chapels; yet there is not one single Christian image in this vast, magnificent artwork.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Well-researched!
- By Natalie K. on 08-28-17
By: Benjamin Blech, and others
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Da Vinci's Ghost
- Genius, Obsession, and How Leonardo Created the World in His Own Image
- By: Toby Lester
- Narrated by: Stephen Hoye
- Length: 6 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 185
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 152
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Story4 out of 5 stars 151
Toby Lester, author of the award-winning The Fourth Part of the World, masterfully crafts yet another century-spanning saga of people and ideas in this epic story of Vitruvian Man, Leonardo da Vinci’s iconic drawing of a man inscribed in a circle and a square. Over time, the nearly 550-year-old ink-on-paper sketch has transformed into a collective symbol of the nature of genius, the beauty of the human form, and the universality of the human spirit.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Haunting Expierience
- By Paul on 02-10-12
By: Toby Lester
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Venice
- Pure City
- By: Peter Ackroyd
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 14 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 92
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 70
The Venetians' language and way of thinking set them aside from the rest of Italy. They are an island people, linked to the sea and to the tides rather than the land. This latest work from the incomparable Peter Ackroyd, like a magic gondola, transports its listeners to that sensual and surprising city. His account embraces facts and romance, conjuring up the atmosphere of the canals, bridges, and sunlit squares, the churches and the markets, the festivals and the flowers.
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2 out of 5 stars
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An endless droning list.....
- By jack on 03-15-11
By: Peter Ackroyd
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The Florentines
- From Dante to Galileo: The Transformation of Western Civilization
- By: Paul Strathern
- Narrated by: Roger Clark
- Length: 14 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 79
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 72
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 72
Between the birth of Dante in 1265 and the death of Galileo in 1642, something happened that transformed the entire culture of Western civilization. Painting, sculpture, and architecture would all visibly change in such a striking fashion that there could be no going back on what had taken place. Likewise, the thought and self-conception of humanity would take on a completely new aspect. Sciences would be born - or emerge in an entirely new guise.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Narrator ruins the narrative
- By amavita on 03-24-22
By: Paul Strathern
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Eye of the Beholder
- Johannes Vermeer, Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, and the Reinvention of Seeing
- By: Laura Snyder
- Narrated by: Tamara Marston
- Length: 13 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 50
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
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Story4 out of 5 stars 45
"See for yourself!" was the clarion call of the 1600s. Natural philosophers threw off the yoke of ancient authority, peered at nature with microscopes and telescopes, and ignited the scientific revolution. Artists investigated nature with lenses and created paintings filled with realistic effects of light and shadow. The hub of this optical innovation was the small Dutch city of Delft.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Historical book about the evolution of optics through the eyes of two geniuses
- By Memi on 04-12-17
By: Laura Snyder
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Twelve Caesars
- Images of Power from the Ancient World to the Modern (Bollingen Series)
- By: Mary Beard
- Narrated by: Mary Beard
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 64
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
What does the face of power look like? Who gets commemorated in art and why? And how do we react to statues of politicians we deplore? In this book - against a background of today’s “sculpture wars” - Mary Beard tells the story of how for more than two millennia portraits of the rich, powerful, and famous in the Western world have been shaped by the image of Roman emperors, especially the “Twelve Caesars”, from the ruthless Julius Caesar to the fly-torturing Domitian.
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1 out of 5 stars
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This foray into art history is a disappointment.
- By Stephen J Chiulli on 11-10-21
By: Mary Beard
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What the Ermine Saw
- The Extraordinary Journey of Leonardo da Vinci's Most Mysterious Portrait
- By: Eden Collinsworth
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 5 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 31
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 29
Five hundred and thirty years ago, a young woman sat before a Grecian-nosed artist known as Leonardo da Vinci. Her name was Cecilia Gallerani, and she was the young mistress of Ludovico Sforza, duke of Milan. Sforza was a brutal and clever man who was mindful that Leonardo’s genius would not only capture Cecilia’s beguiling beauty but also reflect the grandeur of his title. But when the portrait was finished, Leonardo’s brush strokes had conveyed something deeper by revealing the essence of Cecilia’s soul.
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4 out of 5 stars
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So Many Names
- By Sue Solomon on 12-13-22
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Tom and Jack
- The Intertwined Lives of Thomas Hart Benton and Jackson Pollock
- By: Henry Adams
- Narrated by: Wayne Thompson
- Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 46
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 41
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
The drip paintings of Jackson Pollock, trailblazing Abstract Expressionist, appear to be the polar opposite of Thomas Hart Benton's highly figurative Americana. Yet the two men had a close and highly charged relationship dating from Pollock's days as a student under Benton. Pollock's first and only formal training came from Benton, and the older man soon became a surrogate father to Pollock.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I suggest you READ, not listen...
- By Grace O'Malley on 07-01-16
By: Henry Adams
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The Renaissance
- A Captivating Guide to a Remarkable Period in European History, Including Stories of People Such as Galileo Galilei, Michelangelo, Copernicus, Shakespeare, and Leonardo da Vinci
- By: Captivating History
- Narrated by: Richard L. Walton
- Length: 3 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 36
If you want to discover the captivating history of the Renaissance, then pay attention.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Monotone reader
- By Harry R. Martin on 08-07-19