The book New World Figurative Painting in the 20th Century - Thames & Hudson

Figurative painting requires a reassessment. In this passionately discussed volume, the eminent writer and artist Timothy Hyman carves a new path through the maze of twentieth-century art. World New Made examines the works of over fifty individual painters, presenting a collective "Resistance" that together offers a human-centred alternative to the dominance of Abstraction or Conceptual in conventional narratives of contemporary art. This richly illustrated book, constructed not as a survey but as an in-depth study of over 130 specific works, places these often marginalised artists in the spotlight: not only Alice Neel and Balthus, Max Beckmann and Frida Kahlo, but also Marsden Hartley and Charlotte Salomon, Bhupen Khakhar and Jacob Lawrence. A rich cast is brought to life, partly through their own writings. As the author asserts: "Worldwide, isolated artists found new idioms for human-centred painting in modern life."

Starting with the "new representation of representation" that followed Cubism (with artists such as Léger, Chagall, and Carrà), The World New Made guides the reader through "New Thingness" [Neue Sachlichkeit], where individuals as diverse as Dix, Grosz, and Burra rejected expressionist histrionics. A new emphasis is placed on the artist as the main protagonist of painters, from Pierre Bonnard to Stanley Spencer, while visionaries and "outsiders" (such as Rabindranath Tagore, Ken Kiff, and Henry Darger) present new challenges. In the aftermath of abstract expressionism, in the works of artists from R. B. Kitaj to Leon Golub and William Kentridge, a new "history painting" is evident. This powerful new book, distilled from many decades of looking, painting, and writing, gathers free spirits who provide a counter-argument to Western formalism and form a foundation for twenty-first-century figurative painters.

The Thames & Hudson brand was founded in 1949 by Walter and Eva Neurath. Their greatest passion and mission was to create a "museum without walls" and to make the world of art accessible to a wide audience, as well as the research of leading scholars. To reflect international perspectives, the company's name combined the rivers flowing through London and New York, represented in its logo by two dolphins symbolising friendship and intelligence, one facing east, the other west, suggesting a link between the Old World and the New.

Today, still an independent, family-owned company, Thames & Hudson is one of the world's leading publishers of illustrated books with over 2000 titles in print. It publishes high-quality books in all areas of visual creativity: the arts (fine, applied, decorative, performing), architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and music, as well as archaeology, history, and popular culture. The list of children's books is also growing. Based in London with a sister company in New York and subsidiaries in Melbourne, Singapore, and Hong Kong. In Paris, another subsidiary, Interart, distributes English-language books in France.

The history of Thames & Hudson

Walter Neurath was born in Vienna in 1903. In 1938, he left his hometown - where he ran an art gallery and published illustrated books - for London. Initially, he worked as a production director at Adprint, a company founded by Viennese émigré Wolfgang Foges. Neurath and Foges developed the pioneering concept of what is now called book packaging (or co-edition publishing), in which book ideas are developed, commissioned, produced, and sold to publishers operating in different markets and languages to create large print runs and thus lower unit production costs. Neurath's concept was the first of many innovations he introduced to the publishing world through Thames & Hudson.

Wishing to continue book packaging in a second edition and recognising the need to amortise the high production costs of illustrated books, Neurath established his own publishing house, with offices in London and New York in the autumn of 1949. Eva Neurath, who had arrived in London from Berlin in 1939, was a co-founder.

Of the ten titles that were published on the first Thames & Hudson list in 1950, English Cathedrals, with photographs by Martin Hürlimann, was the first and most successful. A testament to the company's strong belief in the longevity of books from the very beginning, it remained in print until 1971. In the first year of publication, "Out of My Later Years" by Albert Einstein also appeared, an early indicator of the programme's breadth. With the gradual and successful expansion of the list, which grew from ten titles in 1950 to 144 in 1955, the company moved its offices in High Holborn and in 1956 relocated to a Georgian townhouse at 30 Bloomsbury Street, near Bedford Square, then the epicentre of book publishing in London. The operation remained at this address, eventually expanding to five houses, until 1999, when it returned to High Holborn.

In 1958, Thames and Hudson launched one of its most renowned series, World of Art, which became a cornerstone of a very diverse list. Characterised by their pocket size and black spines, the series expanded in just seven years to include 49 titles. Nearly 60 years later, the series featured over 300 titles, of which, according to Christopher Frayling, "there are 'paint-splattered copies' in every art school in the country".

Other important series that added depth and prestige to the list include Ancient People and Places, edited by Glyn Daniel, which since the 1950s has contributed to pioneering interest in archaeology, both in book form and on television. Over 34 titles were published in the series over 34 years. The large-format series Great Civilizations, published in 1961, included contributions from such esteemed scholars as Alan Bullock, Asa Briggs, Hugh Trevor-Roper, A. J. P. Taylor, and John Julius Norwich.
After building one of the most important publishing houses in Europe in less than two decades, Walter Neurath died in 1967 at the age of 63. Sculptor Henry Moore wrote that "his death was a loss to our cultural life". Sir Herbert Read noted that Neurath "more than any other person was responsible for the revolution in publishing art books" and was "one of those rare entrepreneurs who successfully combined business acumen with idealism". Eva Neurath became chairperson. Walter's son, Thomas, who joined the company in 1961 along with his sister Constance, became managing director; Constance later served as art director for several decades. Both Thomas and Constance remain on the board of Thames & Hudson, as do Thomas's daughters, Johanna and Susanna.
From producing the first commercial edition of The Book of Kells to the triumphant publication of the six-volume Vincent van Gogh - Letters, from such technical innovations as "French folds" to the controversial documentation of graffiti art in Subway Art, Thames and Hudson has always been at the forefront, both culturally and in production techniques.

The year 2016 opened an extraordinary new chapter for the company, heralding a publishing partnership with two of the world's most important museums: the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The world of art and scholarship thus remains at the heart of Thames & Hudson's publishing programme, which remains true to its core principle: providing "a museum without walls".
Today, Thames & Hudson is a recognisable international brand, a symbol of English publishing. In its wide range, it offers thousands of original book titles, many of which are exclusive collector's editions.