Annotated Mona Lisa

The Annotated Mona Lisa takes art history out of the realm of dreary textbooks to a world of dynamic design, succinct page-length essays, and instructive sidebars. These graphic devices heighten the reader's ability to retain an impressive amount of information, even through a cursory reading. A brief run-through of the book's captions and sidebars provides a mini crash course in art history. Incorporating more than 300 illustrations (one-third in full-color), The Annotated Mona Lisa draws on the very elements of art—composition, movement, balance, color, and design—to achieve a visual and textual approach to the subject that no ordinary textbook could approximate. From Stonehenge to the Guggenheim, from Holbein to Warhol, the language of art is clarified through five sections:

• The Birth of Art: Prehistoric Through Medieval
  
• The Rebirth of Art: Renaissance and Baroque
  
• The Nineteenth Century: Birth of the "Isms"
  
• The Twentieth Century: Modern Art
  
• The Twentieth Century and Beyond: Contemporary Art

Please note that, like most other art reference books, this title does contain some statue and painting nudity.