books
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vii, 353 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 27 cm
New Haven : Yale University Press, ©2001.
The prime minister of taste : a portrait of Horace Walpole / Morris R. Brownell.
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vii, 353 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 27 cm
books
New Haven : Yale University Press, ©2001.
$25.95
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Between 1979 and 1981, Alfredo Jaar asked Chileans a deceptively simple question: "Are you happy?" Through private interviews, sidewalk polls and video-recorded forums, among other interventions, Jaar's three-year and seven-phase project, ''Studies on happiness'', addressed a furtive and fearful population living under Augusto Pinochet's military dictatorship. It also(...)
Alfredo Jaar: Studies on happiness
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Between 1979 and 1981, Alfredo Jaar asked Chileans a deceptively simple question: "Are you happy?" Through private interviews, sidewalk polls and video-recorded forums, among other interventions, Jaar's three-year and seven-phase project, ''Studies on happiness'', addressed a furtive and fearful population living under Augusto Pinochet's military dictatorship. It also spoke to a country in transition, as a newly adopted constitution remade Chile through privatisation and other neoliberal reforms. In its varied interventions and direct mode of address, ''Studies on happiness'' functioned as a feedback device meant to catalyse a critical awareness with its blunt questioning. Edward A. Vazquez contextualises Studies on Happiness within Jaar's early production and situates his practice within a Chilean art world haunted by the residues of political violence. This study foregrounds the project's historical embeddedness and the deep political stakes of its apparent sociality, recognising the crucial role that context has always played in Jaar's practice. By turning to the Santiago of Studies on Happiness, Vazquez explores the work's political and art historical environment and provides a wedge to realign current interpretations of Chilean art and hemispheric conceptualism with the openness central to Jaar's project.
Art Theory
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Alain de Botton considers how our private homes and public edifices influence how we feel, and how we could build dwellings in which we would stand a better chance of happiness. In this look at how we shape, and are shaped by, our surroundings, Alain de Botton applies Stendhal’s motto that "Beauty is the promise of happiness" to the spaces we inhabit daily. Why should we(...)
The architecture of happiness
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Alain de Botton considers how our private homes and public edifices influence how we feel, and how we could build dwellings in which we would stand a better chance of happiness. In this look at how we shape, and are shaped by, our surroundings, Alain de Botton applies Stendhal’s motto that "Beauty is the promise of happiness" to the spaces we inhabit daily. Why should we pay attention to what architecture has to say to us? de Botton asks. With his trademark lucidity and humour, de Botton traces how human needs and desires have been served by styles of architecture, from stately Classical to minimalist Modern, arguing that the stylistic choices of a society can represent both its cherished ideals and the qualities it desperately lacks. On an individual level, de Botton has deep sympathy for our need to see our selves reflected in our surroundings; he demonstrates with great wisdom how buildings — just like friends — can serve as guardians of our identity.
Architectural Theory
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Author Alain de Botton considers how our private homes and public edifices influence how we feel, and how we could build dwellings in which we would stand a better chance of happiness. In this look at how we shape, and are shaped by, our surroundings, Alain de Botton applies Stendhal’s motto that “Beauty is the promise of happiness” to the spaces we inhabit daily. Why(...)
The architecture of happiness
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$34.99
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Summary:
Author Alain de Botton considers how our private homes and public edifices influence how we feel, and how we could build dwellings in which we would stand a better chance of happiness. In this look at how we shape, and are shaped by, our surroundings, Alain de Botton applies Stendhal’s motto that “Beauty is the promise of happiness” to the spaces we inhabit daily. Why should we pay attention to what architecture has to say to us? de Botton asks. de Botton traces how human needs and desires have been served by styles of architecture, from stately Classical to minimalist Modern, arguing that the stylistic choices of a society can represent both its cherished ideals and the qualities it desperately lacks. On an individual level, de Botton has deep sympathy for our need to see our selves reflected in our surroundings; he demonstrates how buildings — just like friends — can serve as guardians of our identity. Worrying about the shape of our sofa or the colour of our walls might seem self-indulgent, but de Botton considers the hopes and fears we have for our homes at a new level of depth and insight. When shopping for furniture or remodelling the kitchen, we don’t just consider functionality but also the major questions of aesthetics and the philosophy of art: What is beauty? Can beautiful surroundings make us good? Can beauty bring happiness? The buildings we find beautiful, de Botton concludes, are those that represent our ideas of a meaningful life.
Architectural Theory
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Building Happiness discusses the nature of happiness within our built environment. In association with Building Futures, the book includes ideas and debates informed by architects such as Herman Hertzberger and Aldo van Eyck, with these brought up to date through the work of contemporary architects and commentators. The nature of our environment and how we use it and how(...)
Building happiness: architecture to make you smile
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Building Happiness discusses the nature of happiness within our built environment. In association with Building Futures, the book includes ideas and debates informed by architects such as Herman Hertzberger and Aldo van Eyck, with these brought up to date through the work of contemporary architects and commentators. The nature of our environment and how we use it and how we are conditioned by it is considered in detail, particularly the ways this affects our sense of wellbeing or happiness. Is this a personal feeling or is it how space is used in our community that constructs happiness? Is it green eco-houses, traditional cottages or 1970s modernism that makes you happy? Building Happiness comprises both short commentaries and longer essays concerned with the impact of our built environment. The book also provides a visual representation of the themes addressed through evocative illustrations, sketches and photography. With an introduction by Jane Wernick, and contributions by architectural and social critics such as Jeremy Till, Shami Chakrabarti, and Kirsty Wark, as well as commentaries from Glenda Jackson and prestigious architects and artists such as Richard Rogers and Richard Wentworth, amongst others.
Architectural Theory
books
Ecovillages : new frontiers for sustainability / Jonathan Dawson ; foreword by Caroline Lucas.
Description:
94 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : color illustrations ; 21 cm.
Totnes : Green Books, 2006.
Ecovillages : new frontiers for sustainability / Jonathan Dawson ; foreword by Caroline Lucas.
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94 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : color illustrations ; 21 cm.
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Totnes : Green Books, 2006.
$22.99
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In an era of increasing individualism, we have never been more isolated and dispirited. A paradox confronts us. While research and technology find new ways to measure contentment and popular culture encourages us to think of happiness as a human right, misery is abundant. Segal believes we have lost the art of “radical happiness”—the liberation that comes with(...)
Radical happiness: moments of collective joy
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In an era of increasing individualism, we have never been more isolated and dispirited. A paradox confronts us. While research and technology find new ways to measure contentment and popular culture encourages us to think of happiness as a human right, misery is abundant. Segal believes we have lost the art of “radical happiness”—the liberation that comes with transformative, collective joy. She argues that instead of obsessing about our own well-being we should seek fulfilment in the lives of others. Examining her own experience in the women’s movement, Segal looks at the relationship between love and sex, and the scope for utopian thinking as a means to a better future. She also shows how the gaps in care that come from the diminishing role of the welfare state must be replaced by alternative ways of living together and looking after one another.
Social
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Why are we so obsessed by the pursuit of happiness? With new ways to measure contentment we are told that we have a right to individual joy. But at what cost? In an age of increasing individualism, we have never been more alone and miserable. But what if the true nature of happiness can only be found in others? In Radical Happiness, leading feminist thinker Lynne Segal(...)
Radical happiness: the search for movements of collective joy
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Why are we so obsessed by the pursuit of happiness? With new ways to measure contentment we are told that we have a right to individual joy. But at what cost? In an age of increasing individualism, we have never been more alone and miserable. But what if the true nature of happiness can only be found in others? In Radical Happiness, leading feminist thinker Lynne Segal believes that we have lost the art of radical happiness— the art of transformative, collective joy. She shows that only in the revolutionary potential of coming together it is that we can come to understand the powers of flourishing. Radical Happiness is a passionate call for the re-discovery of the political and emotional joy that emerge when we learn to share our lives together.
Critical Theory
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Revolutionary developments in economics are rare. The conservative bias of the field and its enshrined knowledge make it difficult to introduce new ideas not in line with received theory. Happiness research, however, has the potential to change economics substantially in the future. Its findings, which are gradually being taken into account in standard economics, can be(...)
Happiness: a revolution in economics
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Revolutionary developments in economics are rare. The conservative bias of the field and its enshrined knowledge make it difficult to introduce new ideas not in line with received theory. Happiness research, however, has the potential to change economics substantially in the future. Its findings, which are gradually being taken into account in standard economics, can be considered revolutionary in three respects: the measurement of experienced utility using psychologists’ tools for measuring subjective well-being; new insights into how human beings value goods and services and social conditions that include consideration of such non-material values as autonomy and social relations; and policy consequences of these new insights that suggest different ways for government to affect individual well-being.
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Welcome to Blubberland--a world of quadruple-garaged mansions, vast malls, gated communities, stretch limos, and posh resorts. Blubberland is a place, but it is also a state of mind: we expect to be happy (trophy house, SUV in the driveway, home entertainment system, pension fund, cosmetic surgery), but in fact we've grown increasingly bloated, bored, and miserable. In(...)
Blubberland: the dangers of happiness
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Welcome to Blubberland--a world of quadruple-garaged mansions, vast malls, gated communities, stretch limos, and posh resorts. Blubberland is a place, but it is also a state of mind: we expect to be happy (trophy house, SUV in the driveway, home entertainment system, pension fund, cosmetic surgery), but in fact we've grown increasingly bloated, bored, and miserable. In Blubberland, award-winning critic Elizabeth Farrelly looks at our "superfluous superfluity," our huge eco-footprint, and asks why we find it so hard to abandon habits we know to be destructive. Why can't we build human-scale cities, design meaningful public spaces, eat reasonable meals, and stop assaulting nature? Farrelly, trained as an architect, begins this story with architecture, urban sprawl, and housing, but she does not end there. She also looks at "affluenza," childhood asthma, diabetes, addiction, beauty, ugliness, narcissism, climate change, mega-churches, big box retailers, sustainability, depression, anorexia, and the links that collect all of these issues under the same roof--the roof, as it were, of the McMansion. As "big" becomes more and more pervasive, and success is seen in increasingly measurable and material terms, the goal of happiness jeopardizes our survival. Blubberland is a smart, thoughtful, and stylish argument for turning things around.
Urban Theory