Symbols
A Handbook for Seeing
Mark Fox author Angie Wang author
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Monacelli Press
Published:8th Nov '16
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
A wide-ranging and entirely fresh approach to the symbols resource volume, packed with hundreds of visual references old and new.
A new pictorial reference book for artists and designers, with over 400 images from sources ranging from Greco-Roman art to Benjamin Franklin and Wes Anderson - Symbols offers a fresh approach to understanding symbolism in the visual arts.
A new pictorial reference book for artists and designers, with over 400 images from sources ranging from Greco-Roman art to Benjamin Franklin and Wes Anderson - Symbols offers a fresh approach to understanding symbolism in the visual arts.
Symbols are embedded everywhere in our global visual culture, from oil paintings to biscuit packaging, monuments to mass-produced ashtrays. Designers and California College of the Arts instructors Mark Fox and Angie Wang recognize sources both historical and contemporary, high and low, revealing the narrative riches of symbolism found in a range of media and across times, places, and cultures.
Whether human or animate, natural or man-made - each symbol (from sun, moon, lightning, and serpent to lozenge, spiral, and swastika) is illustrated with both classical and archetypal examples and often surprising contributions from textiles, fine art photography, ceramics, African sculpture, ancient coins, modern architecture, Native American crafts, European heraldry, Soviet propaganda, bookplates, film stills, military insignia, and much more. A beautiful, visually arresting compendium that both informs and inspires, Symbols is a vital resource.
"As graphic designers who specialize in logos and trademarks, Mark Fox and Angie Wang have done a splendid job in their richly illustrated compendium Symbols: A Handbook for Seeing of reinterpreting the classic images in the context of here and now. The book is a means of identifying, categorizing, and explaining the multiple meanings of seminal archetypes. A unique mix of Jung interpretation and Randian functionality, the book sifts through everyday things and rare artifacts that comprise a sign language that designers use to communicate throughout the universe of ideas." - Steven Heller, Print magazine, The Daily Heller
“Fox and Wang are collaborators at Design is Play, a studio in San Francisco, and Symbols showcases Fox’s mastery of logos and Wang’s mastery of typography. The book’s elegant design and intelligent wit create an enjoyable reading experience. With so many examples, an index helps readers find work by the artists of their choosing, including Maya Lin, Leni Riefenstahl and Ed ‘Big Daddy’ Roth.” - Ruth Hagopian, Communication Arts
"Symbols is a richly illustrated and fascinatingly told visual encyclopedia… To understand a culture, understand how it uses universal symbols. In today’s age of radical cultural upheaval, a book like Symbols, though it is overtly apolitical, feels like a necessary companion. It’s a reminder that ultimately the language we use, both visual and verbal, is what shapes our discourse." - Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan, Fast Co.Design
"A compendium to help artists, designers, and curious readers gain more complex understanding of symbolism in the visual arts…. The examples are wonderfully omnivorous." - Allison Meier, Hyperallergic
"This glorious paperback is the perfect reference guide for artists, designers, and the visually inclined. With more than 400 images from sources as diverse as Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining to Stonehenge, Symbols is a crash course in the nature of the collective unconscious and the vocabulary it uses to manifest its ideas." - Sara Rosen, Crave Online
ISBN: 9781580934725
Dimensions: 279mm x 212mm x 47mm
Weight: 1210g
256 pages