A Gallery Without Walls: Selling Art in Alternative Venues
by Margaret Danielak
“This book is about selling art in alternative venues and in innovative, cost-effective ways” based on the author’s experience as an artist’s representative. What I like most about this book is that it opens the door to nontraditional sales channels, so you are not competing in the same sandbox with everyone else.
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Vision and Art: The Biology of Seeing
by Margaret Livingstone
Unexpectedly, the most fascinating art book I’ve ever read is written by a Harvard Medical School professor of neurophysiology. “This book is about vision—the process of receiving and interpreting light reflected from objects—and what art reveals about how we see.”
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The 3rd Way: Building Inclusive Capitalism through Employee Ownership
by Upendra Chivukula and Veny W. Musum
The subject of The 3rd Way sounds intriguing: addressing income inequality by expanding incentives for Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and reforming the corporate tax code. While I think the authors have good intentions, their thesis is flawed.
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The Artist’s Complete Guide to Figure Drawing: A Contemporary Perspective on the Classical Tradition
by Anthony Ryder
Anthony Ryder presents a thorough and meticulous process for drawing the human figure. This is definitely not a quick sketch approach. “On average, I put in about twelve three-hour sessions for each finished drawing.” Ryder works with either pencil on white paper or pencil and white charcoal on toned paper.
The Artist’s Model: From Etty to Spencer
by Martin Postle and William Vaughan
This book is a catalog of figurative artwork produced in Britain from the mid-1800s to the early-1900s, published in conjunction with an exhibition held in 1999. The works, featuring nude and clothed figures, range from anatomical studies to finished drawings and paintings, as well as a few photographs and sculptures. In addition to the artwork, there are four interesting chapters about artists, models, and attitudes of this period. Extensive captions provide additional insights about particular artists and models. A sampling of the artwork follows this review.
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100 Words Almost Everyone Confuses and Misuses
by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries
Here are some examples of frequently misused words from the book.
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Congratulations, By the Way: Some Thoughts on Kindness
by George Saunders
This book is an expanded version of a commencement speech to the Syracuse University class of 2013.
“What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.”
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Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World
by General Stanley McChrystal with Tantum Collins, David Silverman, and Chris Fussell
When General Stanley McChrystal took command of the Joint Special Operations Task Force in 2003, he was fighting a 21st-century war with a 20th-century military. This engaging book is about the reconfiguration which led to faster decisions and greater results. McChrystal’s mission was to defeat Al Quaeda in Iraq (AQI), but his leadership insights are applicable to business as well.
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A Painter’s Progress: A Portrait of Lucian Freud
by David Dawson
A Painter’s Progress is a collection of 241 behind-the-scenes photographs taken by David Dawson, who was Lucian Freud’s assistant for nearly twenty years. Many of the photos taken in Freud’s studio include nude models, portrait sitters, and his whippets, Pluto and Eli. There are photos documenting several iterations of works in progress. Other photos include Freud viewing artwork in museums, meeting prominent people, having breakfast, and relaxing at home. There are also photos showing Freud’s posthumous exhibition being installed at the National Portrait Gallery in London.
The messy walls are a quirky feature of Freud’s studio.
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Disrupt Yourself: Putting the Power of Disruptive Innovative to Work
by Whitney Johnson
Clayton Christensen introduced the concept of disruptive innovation in The Innovator’s Dilemma, his seminal book which focused on the computer industry. His successive books applied the concept to health care and education. Now, Whitney Johnson writes about disrupting your own career.
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The Key Point 