Best Art Books of 2010

This is the first in-depth biography of American artist Chuck Close (rather than a monograph of his work). The story of his life is as big, detailed, and mesmerizing as one of his huge portraits. It's peppered with facts and life anecdotes, yet never gets stuck in artspeak or tedious details.

Having nearly 450 pages, this isn't a book you're going to read in an afternoon. But then it does look at contemporary painting over the past 40 years, showing how painting continues to evolve and work with its long traditions (despite regularly being declared dead!). It's arranged thematically rather than chronologically, making it easier to read up on your favorite subjects.

This series of little books from the National Gallery in London is an introduction to various subjects in art such as faces, saints, angels, and color. Each is full of photos of paintings from the gallery's collection, including full paintings and close-up details. If you want to know more than you do now, but not be overwhelmed by information, they're perfect.

The subtitle of this book by Suzanne Brooker says it all: "Old Master Techniques and Contemporary Applications". It's packed with information, with clear illustrations. While it's written for oil painters, you could easily adapt it for other mediums. The chapters cover studio practices, color, essential techniques, facial anatomy, the painting process, and demonstration paintings.

This is a really big book about those really big painting exhibitions that get mentioned when you read about the life and times of famous painters, starting with the Salon in 19th-century Paris. It's not a book of essays analyzing the impact of each show, it's a sourcebook of photos and documents, so you get a firsthand feel for the exhibition.

I find Matisse's paintings intriguing, and admire them for reasons related to what he's doing in them rather than because it's art I'd want to hang on my walls. So I guess I shouldn't have been surprised I enjoyed this book which looks at some 50 of his paintings on the same theme ("room with a view"). Alongside full-page reproductions of the paintings are some photos of Matisse in his studios or a photo of the actual view out the window.

I used this photo reference book quite a lot this year for figure studies and quick drawing exercises using various techniques. There's a lovely range of poses, with lighting that shows detail in the figure but also gives shadows for form. A friend and I arranged some model-less life painting sessions, each working from our own copy of the book.

Quirky, strange, curious, compelling ... it's a peep in to the small details of daily life, the trivial-yet-meaningful to the originator, all of them artists. There's a photo of each item, a transcript and a short contextual explanation. I found it great for dipping into for a short artistic distraction.

While there's no shortage of books offering selected highlights from collections, I like this one for its accessible language and the length of information on each painting. Each of the 100 paintings has a spread, with text on one side and an image on the other. You find out something about the artist and their life, then learn about that particular painting. How to understand what you're looking at, without being patronized by oversimplified text or daunted by jargon.

And slipping a DVD at the bottom of this list... What I like most about this DVD is watching Richard Rogers apply artistic license to the reference photo. He doesn't merely copy what's in the photo is a realistic style, but interprets the scene in a looser way, using bold color choices and expressive mark-making.