Saturday, April 14, 2007

Another Nifty Book

When I was in Toronto recently I visited YYZ gallery in the amazing 401 Richmond complex (a converted factory space with five floors of media centers, galleries, shops, gardens & arts organizations). They publish some great books including this one:
Crime and Ornament: The Arts and Popular Culture in the Shadow of Adolf Loos
Opening the book is the original text from Loos' incendiary (and quaintly, queezily racist) 'Ornament is Crime' diatribe, which laid the ground for the Modernist repudiation of decoration. The authors seem to take a pretty broad view of these ideas as they lay out their theses and projects, but so far it's a great read & a wonderfully designed little tome...the layout & type is actually quite classic & clean, rather ironic, I thought...

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