Building a Bookshelf Sample

BUILDING A
BOOKSHELF

Art, Culture and Travel

eLucidAction | Registered in New South Wales, Australia | ACN 624 094 168
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CONTENTS

Request……………………………………………….4
Response…………………………………….….…..5
References…………………………………………16

Amazon Links of Books…………….16
Publisher Websites………………….18

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REQUEST

I am about to open a trendy café that will contain space
for painting workshops (for adults) adjacent to the eating
area. Between these two sections, I am planning to devote
a wall to books on art, culture and travel (not so much magazines
or informal guides but titles from reputable publishers having a
lasting value) that can educate and entertain my visitors. I want to
invest in at least 100 quality non-fiction volumes for now that can
appeal to a globally-minded clientele which, I expect, will
include professionals, students and tourists. How do I get
started? Could you recommend some really good books (around
30) and also a few publishers I could return to again and again?

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RESPONSE

Your choices "art", "culture" and "travel" make a rich and exciting
combination. As your primary business is a social place—a café—
where people will be meeting to relax, have some fun and indulge
in conversation, it is important that the titles you choose for
your library be visually stunning, easy to follow and capable
of easily stimulating discussions. Informative pictorially attractive
books well-arranged and well-presented (particularly within
a décor that is cosy and earthy) will invite customers into an
intimate space where they can unwind and feel encouraged
to learn something new. The volumes may also incite the visitors
to your café to get in touch with their creative sides and register
for your painting workshops.

If you are expecting a diverse clientele, then books on art
that are broad in their geographic and historical coverage are a
must. Look for the latest revised edition of (1) A World History of
Art (1982/2000s, Laurence King Publishing) by Cambridge art
historians Hugh Honour (1927-2016) and John Fleming (1919-
2001). This is an exploratory, rather than critical, project
that spans millennia and continents, giving the reader insights into
everything from pre-literate cave drawings to twentieth-century
modernist architecture. It is a total feast for the mind and the
eyes. A similarly ambitious and wide-ranging initiative
is (2) Gardner's Art through the Ages, first published in 1926,

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written by the American educator Helen Gardner (1878-1946).
Latest versions (Wadsworth Publishing) are authored by
Professor Fred S. Kleiner (1948-) of Boston University and
available in editions featuring both "Western" and "Global"
perspectives. Austrian-British art historian Ernst Gombrich’s
(1909-2001) (3) The Story of Art (1950, Phaidon) is a
fantastic introduction to the visual arts for young
readers. Gombrich also wrote the equally compelling
bestseller (4) A Little History of the World (1935/2005, Yale
University Press) which chronicles major events in the story of
human development in a language that can appeal to little
children and curious adults alike.

Other books that successfully illuminate human history through
works of art include (5) A History of the World in 100
Objects (2010, Allen Lane) by Neil MacGregor (1946-), who was
director of the British Museum from 2002 to 2015. This was
released as a companion volume to a 100-part radio series
produced by BBC Radio 4 and the British Museum in 2010,
delivered by MacGregor in 15-minute presentations over 20
weeks. A whole panoply of artifacts is opened before the reader –
of tools and tablets, astrolabes and axes, cups and coins, statues
and sculptures, credit cards and chargers – objects that are part of
the British Museum collection and speak of humankind's
ingenuity, give form to its sacred precepts and represent its
ambitions. Likewise, in 2014, Dorling Kindersley
released (6) History of the World in 1,000 Objects. DK

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has other great reference books (7) Art That Changed the
World (2013) and (8) Art: Over 2,500 Works from Cave to
Contemporary (2008) that can give the reader a good overview of
major creative movements and trends if they just casually flipped
through the pages.

The Italian philosopher, semiotician, novelist and literary critic
Umberto Eco (1932-2016) is indispensable for your bookshelf.
Four generously illustrated works of his – all published by Rizzoli -
meant for the general audience that must be part of your
collection are: (9) History of Beauty (2010), On
Ugliness (2011), The Book of Legendary Lands (2013) and The
Infinity of Lists (2009). Eco's style is pithy, enlightening and very
enjoyable. In these four volumes – all mainly Western in scope -
he gives us tours of the following, respectively: (i) how society's
conception of the beautiful has been defined and changed over
time (from ancient Greece statues to medieval manuscripts to
Renaissance ideals to Romantic introspection to the industrial age
to Marilyn Monroe and beyond), (ii) how society's conception of
the ugly has been defined and changed over time (in its
engagement with physical deformity and moral depravity, through
its treatment of demons and monsters, witches and freaks, its
consideration of death and kitsch and more), (iii) the great utopias
and dystopias, the kingdoms and islands, stuff of both dreams and
nightmares that have existed in our fables and folktales (from
Atlantis to Alice's Wonderland), (iv) the Western man's
preoccupation with cataloguing and collecting, his love for

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encyclopedia and lists both practical and poetic (saints, angels,
demons, plants, animals, even bottom wipes).

If you want to include some material related to film, you could try
these two important books that are academic in rigour and also
easy to read: (10) Film History (1994/2009, McGraw Hill) by
pioneering film scholars David Bordwell (1947-) and Kristin
Thompson (1950-) of the University of Wisconsin-
Madison and (11) 1001 Movies You Must See Before You
Die (2003/2017, Cassell Illustrated/Barron's/ABC Books) edited by
Harvard and NYU-educated film critic, scholar and
producer Steven Jay Schneider. Monographs and memoirs from
great photographers could be added to the collection as well.
Consider (12) The Man, the Image and the World (2003,
Thames & Hudson) featuring various contributors on Henri-Cartier
Bresson (1908-2004), master of candid photography. Steve
McCurry (1950-), the American photographer most famous for his
portrait of the green-eyed Afghan girl on the cover of a 1985
National Geographic edition, has a body of work that "spans
conflicts, vanishing cultures, ancient traditions and contemporary
culture alike - yet always retains the human element."
Phaidon has a number of titles on McCurry: (13) The Unguarded
Moment (2009), The Iconic Photographs (2012), Untold: The
Stories Behind the Photographs (2013) and Portraits
(2013). Diane Arbus (1923-1971) who captured
marginalised people like dwarfs, giants, transgender people,
nudists, circus performers could be explored in (14) Diane Arbus:

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An Aperture Monograph (1972/2012, Aperture). Then there are
pioneers of colour like William Eggleston (1939-), Stephen Shore
(1947-) and Fred Herzog (1930-) about whom you can learn
in (15) William Eggleston Portraits (2016, Yale University
Press), (16) Stephen Shore: Uncommon Places: The Complete
Works (1982/2015, Aperture) and (17) Fred Herzog: Modern Color
(2017, Hatje Cantz). There are several enterprising
Millennial photographers who have initiated projects that
document people with their stories. Some well-known examples
are (18) Brandon Stanton's Humans of New York (2013/2015, St.
Martin's Press) (19) Mihaela Noroc's The Atlas of Beauty: Women
of the World in 500 Portraits (2017, Ten Speed Press)
and (20) John Thackwray's My Room (2017, Graines d'ailleurs
publishing).

Cartography makes for a wonderful subject if you are interested in
blending art with geometry. Maps are impermanent documents,
no projection is absolute or free of bias. Each flat representation
of our spherical earth that has a supposedly fixed centre and
sense of north and south betrays a political perspective. If we go
through historical maps, we will see that different people at
different places in different periods have had orientations that are
considerably dissimilar from our own. Often maps in the past took
into account not only the political reality of a culture, and
the scientific information available but also the dominant
religious/philosophical worldview. The greater the number and
variety of atlases a person is exposed to the more equipped are

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they to register the fact that groups of human beings, no matter
how biologically similar we may be, may on a psychological
level forge meaning independently. For cartography, check
out (21) Great Maps (2014, DK) complied by Jerry
Brotton (Professor of Renaissance Studies at the University of
London) that covers Western and Eastern maps from Ptolemy's
efforts to Jain cosmologies to the medieval Hereford
mappa mundi with Jerusalem as its heart to NASA's lunar
territories to Google Earth. Useful additions would
be (22) Mapping the World: The Story of Cartography (2014,
Andre Deutsch) by Beau Riffenburgh, a specialist
in polar exploration and (23) Great City Maps (2016, DK). You
should also see (24) Atlas Obscura: An Explorer’s Guide to the
World’s Hidden Wonders (2016, Workman Publishing Company),
the first book by the online magazine and digital media company
Atlas Obscura (www.atlasobscura.com) that aims to "inspire
wonder and curiosity about the incredible world we all share"
and publishes "best-in-class journalism about hidden places,
incredible history, scientific marvels, and gastronomical wonders".
The book takes us all over the globe, presenting natural wonders,
architectural marvels, unbelievable events and strange customs
put together by a community of explorers, reminding us that even
in this information age of big data and social media, there is way
too much about our world that remains hidden and bizarre and
unknown.

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So we have moved to travel. It's good to begin with Lonely
Planet's (25) The Travel Book: A Journey Through Every Country
in the World (2016) National Geographic's (26) Destinations of a
Lifetime (2015) both of which will open up spectacular
destinations before the reader and provide plenty of inspiration
for their next trip. Practical tips are provided by projects like Matt
Kepnes' (27) How to Travel the World on $50 a Day: Third
Edition: Travel Cheaper, Longer, Smarter (2015, TarcherPerigee)
and Rolf Potts' (28) Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the
Art of Long-Term World Travel (2002, Villard). If you are looking
for some quality travel writing by acclaimed authors then
Pico Iyer (1957-) is unparalleled. This British-born American
novelist and essayist of Indian descent who has a Japanese wife is
an out-and-out cosmopolitan. His knowledge of both the West
and the East is deep and thorough, his thinking and writing
are infused with an energetic sense of adventure and a sincere
quest for spiritual truth. His works include (29) 100 Journeys for
the Spirit (2017, Watkins Publishing), The Global Soul: Jet Lag,
Shopping Malls, and the Search for Home (2001, Vintage), Falling
Off the Map: Some Lonely Places of the World (1994,
Vintage), Tropical Classical: Essays from Several Directions (1998,
Vintage) and Sun After Dark: Flights into the Foreign (2005,
Vintage). Andrew Solomon (1963-), professor of clinical
psychology at Columbia University who is most famous for his
award-winning book on depression, has been an avid
world traveler over the decades and has collected his experiences
in the beautiful memoir (30) Far and Away: How Travel Can

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Change the World (2016, Scribner). Like Solomon’s other writings,
this chronicle of his world travels through the years is deeply
personal, full of intelligent literary references and incisive
observations on politics, culture and the human condition. You fill
find here material on the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the
fall of the Taliban, Tahitian islands, even expeditions to Antarctica.
He wisely observes:

Travel is an exercise partly in broadening yourself and partly
in defining your own limits. Travel distils you to
a decontextualised essence. You never see yourself more
clearly than when immersed in an entirely foreign
place...Familiar landscape cushions you from self-knowledge
because the border between who you are and where you
are is porous. But in a strange place, you become more fully
evident: who you truly are is what persists at home and
abroad.

It's good to close with three other terrific thinkers and writers.
First, the Mexican diplomat Sergio Pitol (1933-2018), winner of
the prestigious Cervantes Prize. His book (31) The Art of
Flight (2015, Deep Vellum) is a collection of observations, set of
diaries, travelogue and much more. It defies categorisation and
cannot be summarised. Only experienced. Here we find
discussions on the “interpretation of dreams” and the
“fossilisation of mindsets”. As Pitol goes around
the world constantly losing and finding his glasses, he is able to

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effortlessly talk about Sartre and Marx, Hieronymus Bosch and
Rothko, Borges and Thomas Mann, the Romantics and the
Expressionists, neo-Nazis and the Cold War, the Arabian Nights
and Shakespeare, Orson Welles and Quentin Tarantino, the Bible
and everything/everyone else. He declares his at-homeness in the
world with the bold exclamation "Everything is all things!" English
fiction and non-fiction author Geoff Dyer (1958-) and
environmental journalist Gaia Vince (197?-) are totally worth
reading as well. While the former, in his (32) White
Sands: Experiences from the Outside World (2016, Canongate)
demonstrates how the see-saw of hope and despair animate us
into movement and exploration, the latter, in her (33) Adventures
in the Anthropocene (2016, Vintage) globe-trots – from
the Himalayas, to the Amazon, to Patagonia, to drought-hit
African lands and deltas of South-East Asia - to help us engage
with the planet "we" have made. She explains:

Geologists are calling this new epoch the
Anthropocene, recognising that humanity has become a
geophysical force on a par with the earth-shattering
asteroids and planet-cloaking volcanoes that defined past
eras.

Vince's objective is to make us consider how we may negotiate a
path between the competing demands of the natural world and
our human world. She reminds us more than once that there is
only "one" living world in the end and hopes that the future we

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plan is a "shared" one where we are able to harmonise our needs
with those of the rest of the planet.

Recommended publishers for art, culture and travel:

(1) Thames & Hudson
(2) Phaidon
(3) Rizzoli
(4) National Geographic
(5) Lonely Planet
(6) Dorling Kindersley
(7) The British Museum Press
(8) Taschen Books
(9) I. B. Taurus
(10) Bloomsbury
(11) Hoxton Mini Press
(12) Cornerhouse Publications
(13) Cambridge Scholars Publishing
(14) Laurence King Publishing
(15) Hatje Cantz
(16) Prestel Publishing
(17) The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
(18) Distributed Art Publishers, Inc. (D. A. P.)
(19) The Monacelli Press
(20) Penguin Random House
(21) Yale University Press

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(22) Black Dog and Leventhal
(23) Kerber Verlag
(24) Vendome Press
(25) Abbeville Press

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REFERENCES

AMAZON LINKS OF BOOKS

1. https://www.amazon.com/World-History-Art-Hugh-
Honour/dp/1856695840

2. https://www.amazon.com/Gardners-Art-Through-Ages-
History/dp/1285837843/

3. https://www.amazon.com/Story-Art-H-Gombrich/dp/0714832472/
4. https://www.amazon.com/Little-History-World-

Histories/dp/030014332X/
5. https://www.amazon.com/History-World-100-

Objects/dp/0143124153/
6. https://www.amazon.com/History-World-1-000-

Objects/dp/1465422897/
7. https://www.amazon.com/Art-That-Changed-World-

DK/dp/1465414355/
8. https://www.amazon.com/Art-Over-Works-Cave-

Contemporary/dp/0756639727/
9. https://www.amazon.com/History-Beauty-Umberto-

Eco/dp/0847835308/
10. https://www.amazon.com/Ugliness-Umberto-Eco/dp/0847837238/
11. https://www.amazon.com/Book-Legendary-Lands-Umberto-

Eco/dp/0847841219/
12. https://www.amazon.com/Infinity-Lists-Illustrated-

Essay/dp/0847832961/
13. https://www.amazon.com/Film-History-Introduction-Kristin-

Thompson/dp/0073386138/
14. https://www.amazon.com/1001-Movies-You-Must-

Before/dp/1438050062/
15. https://www.amazon.com/Henri-Cartier-Bresson-Image-World-

Retrospective/dp/0500542678/
16. https://www.amazon.com/Steve-McCurry-Unguarded-

Moment/dp/0714846643/

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17. https://www.amazon.com/Steve-McCurry-Iconic-
Photographs/dp/0714865133/

18. https://www.amazon.com/Untold-Stories-Photographs-Steve-
McCurry/dp/0714864625/

19. https://www.amazon.com/Portraits-Steve-
McCurry/dp/0714865370/

20. https://www.amazon.com/Diane-Arbus-Aperture-Monograph-
Fortieth-Anniversary/dp/1597111759/

21. https://www.amazon.com/William-Eggleston-Portraits-Phillip-
Prodger/dp/0300222521/

22. https://www.amazon.com/Stephen-Shore-Uncommon-Places-
Complete/dp/1597113034/

23. https://www.amazon.com/Fred-Herzog-Modern-
Color/dp/377574181X/

24. https://www.amazon.com/Humans-New-York-Brandon-
Stanton/dp/1250058902/

25. https://www.amazon.com/Atlas-Beauty-Women-World-
Portraits/dp/0399579958/

26. https://www.amazon.com/My-Room-portrait-generation-
English/dp/B0777N1ZZ8/

27. https://www.amazon.com/Great-Maps-Smithsonian-Jerry-
Brotton/dp/1465424636/

28. https://www.amazon.com/Mapping-World-Cartography-Beau-
Riffenburgh/dp/0233004394/

29. https://www.amazon.com/Great-City-Maps-DK/dp/146545358X/
30. https://www.amazon.com/Atlas-Obscura-Explorers-Worlds-

Wonders/dp/0761169083/
31. https://www.amazon.com/Travel-Book-Journey-Through-

Country/dp/178657120X/
32. https://www.amazon.com/Destinations-Lifetime-Worlds-Amazing-

Places/dp/1426215649/
33. https://www.amazon.com/How-Travel-World-50-

Day/dp/0399173285/
34. https://www.amazon.com/Vagabonding-Uncommon-Guide-Long-

Term-Travel/dp/0812992180/

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35. https://www.amazon.com/100-Journeys-Spirit-Mysterious-
Enlightening/dp/1780280319/

36. https://www.amazon.com/Global-Soul-Shopping-Malls-
Search/dp/0679776117/

37. https://www.amazon.com/Falling-Off-Map-Lonely-
Places/dp/0679746129/

38. https://www.amazon.com/Tropical-Classical-Essays-Several-
Directions/dp/0679776109/

39. https://www.amazon.com/Sun-After-Dark-Flights-
Foreign/dp/1400031036/

40. https://www.amazon.com/Far-Away-Travel-Change-
World/dp/1476795053/

41. https://www.amazon.com/Art-Flight-Sergio-Pitol/dp/1941920063/
42. https://www.amazon.com/White-Sands-Experiences-Outside-

World/dp/110197012X/
43. https://www.amazon.com/Adventures-Anthropocene-Journey-

Heart-Planet/dp/1571313583/

PUBLISHER WEBSITES

1. https://thamesandhudson.com/

2. http://phaidon.com/

3. https://www.rizzoliusa.com/

4. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/books/

5. https://www.lonelyplanet.com/

6. https://www.dk.com/

7. http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_us/services/the_british_

museum _press.aspx

8. https://www.taschen.com/

9. https://www.ibtauris.com/

10. https://www.bloomsbury.com/

11. https://www.hoxtonminipress.com/

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12. https://www.cornerhousepublications.org/
13. http://www.cambridgescholars.com/
14. https://www.laurenceking.com/
15. https://www.hatjecantz.de/
16. https://prestelpublishing.randomhouse.de/
17. https://www.moma.org/research-and-learning/publications/
18. http://www.artbook.com/dap.html
19. http://www.monacellipress.com/
20. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/
21. https://yalepress.yale.edu/
22. https://www.blackdogandleventhal.com/
23. https://www.kerberverlag.com/en/
24. https://www.vendomepress.com/
25. https://www.abbeville.com/

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