Walls Of Light

Although his art took form in many mediums, this lush and colorful book focuses on Walter Anderson's murals, further expanding our understanding of the life work of this richly complex artist. 84 full-color photos. 20 illustrations.

Stone walls, concrete walls, chain-link walls, border walls: we live in a world of walls. Walls mark sacred space and embody earthly power. They maintain peace and cause war. They enforce separation and create unity. They express identity and build community. Yard to nation, city to self, walls define and dissect our lives. And, for Thomas Oles, it is time to broaden our ideas of what they can—and must—do. In Walls, Oles shows how our minds and our politics are shaped by–and shape–our divisions in the landscape. He traces the rich array of practices and meanings connected to the making and marking of boundaries across history and prehistory, and he describes how these practices have declined in recent centuries. The consequence, he argues, is all around us in the contemporary landscape, riven by walls shoddy in material and mean in spirit. Yet even today, Oles demonstrates, every wall remains potentially an opening, a stage, that critical place in the landscape where people present themselves and define their obligations to one another. In an evocative epilogue, Oles brings to life a society of productive, intentional, and ethical enclosure—one that will leave readers more hopeful about the divided landscapes of the future.

“A lively popular history of an oft-overlooked element in the development of human society” (Library Journal)—walls—and a haunting and eye-opening saga that reveals a startling link between what we build and how we live. With esteemed historian David Frye as our raconteur-guide in Walls, which Publishers Weekly praises as “informative, relevant, and thought-provoking,” we journey back to a time before barriers of brick and stone even existed—to an era in which nomadic tribes vied for scarce resources, and each man was bred to a life of struggle. Ultimately, those same men would create edifices of mud, brick, and stone, and with them effectively divide humanity: on one side were those the walls protected; on the other, those the walls kept out. The stars of this narrative are the walls themselves—rising up in places as ancient and exotic as Mesopotamia, Babylon, Greece, China, Rome, Mongolia, Afghanistan, the lower Mississippi, and even Central America. As we journey across time and place, we discover a hidden, thousand-mile-long wall in Asia's steppes; learn of bizarre Spartan rituals; watch Mongol chieftains lead their miles-long hordes; witness the epic siege of Constantinople; chill at the fate of French explorers; marvel at the folly of the Maginot Line; tense at the gathering crisis in Cold War Berlin; gape at Hollywood’s gated royalty; and contemplate the wall mania of our own era. Hailed by Kirkus Reviews as “provocative, well-written, and—with walls rising everywhere on the planet—timely,” Walls gradually reveals the startling ways that barriers have affected our psyches. The questions this book summons are both intriguing and profound: Did walls make civilization possible? And can we live without them? Find out in this masterpiece of historical recovery and preeminent storytelling.

Half a century ago a rag-tag group of innovators was building a foundation for modern American rock climbing from a makeshift home base in Yosemite. Photographer Glen Denny was a key figure in this golden age of climbing, capturing pioneering feats on camera while tackling challenging ascents himself. In entertaining short pieces enlivened by his iconic black-and-white images of Yosemite's big wall legends, Denny reveals a young man's coming of age and provides a vivid look at Yosemite’s early climbing culture. He relates such precarious achievements as hauling water in glass gallon jugs up the east face of Washington Column, nailing the 750-foot Rostrum in a punishing heat wave, and dangling overnight on El Capitan’s Dihedral Wall in a lightning storm. Each true tale captures the spirit of historic Camp 4, where Denny and others plan the next big climb while living on the cheap and dodging park rangers.

Technological evolution and revolution are both driven by the discovery of new functionalities, new materials and the design of yet smaller, faster, and more energy-efficient components. Progress is being made at a breathtaking pace, stimulated by the rapidly growing demand for more powerful and readily available information technology. High-speed internet and data-streaming, home automation, tablets and smartphones are now "necessities" for our everyday lives. Consumer expectations for progressively more data storage and exchange appear to be insatiable. Oxide electronics is a promising and relatively new field that has the potential to trigger major advances in information technology. Oxide interfaces are particularly intriguing. Here, low local symmetry combined with an increased susceptibility to external fields leads to unusual physical properties distinct from those of the homogeneous bulk. In this context, ferroic domain walls have attracted recent attention as a completely new type of oxide interface. In addition to their functional properties, such walls are spatially mobile and can be created, moved, and erased on demand. This unique degree of flexibility enables domain walls to take an active role in future devices and hold a great potential as multifunctional 2D systems for nanoelectronics. With domain walls as reconfigurable electronic 2D components, a new generation of adaptive nano-technology and flexible circuitry becomes possible, that can be altered and upgraded throughout the lifetime of the device. Thus, what started out as fundamental research, at the limit of accessibility, is finally maturing into a promising concept for next-generation technology.

With inspiring photos, specially commissioned illustrations, and expert advice, House Beautiful can help make everyone’s dream of a beautiful home come true--starting from the ground up and with the very foundations of decorating: the walls and floors. Every home decorating question is answered: How do you use color to create a mood? Which works better in a given situation: wallpaper or paint? Should you refinish the original wood floors or put down ceramics? Where does it make sense to have carpeting and where should you think about using mosaic tiles? Hundreds upon hundreds of great ideas show how to add style, beauty, and warmth to any space, whether it’s a modern or traditional home, a country cottage or sleek urban apartment.