{"product_id":"marks-of-opulence-9780006531562","title":"Marks of Opulence","description":"\u003cp\u003eA sweeping, beautifully written history of artistic patronage from 1000 to the present day by a Wolfson Prize-winning historian.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Marks of Opulence' is a magisterial survey of European art and artistic patronage from 1000 until the birth of modernism. Tracing the history from the discovery of silver in the Harz mountains, through the catastrophic effects of plague in the 14th-century, to the studied magnificence of papal and royal courts in the 16th- and 17th-centuries, Platt shows how the great and the good have always used art to bolster political power.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eArguing that the acquisitive instinct - felt by all of us in different ways - is central to the history of Western art, Platt traces how art began to move out of the palaces of the aristocracy into the homes of merchants, bankers and industrialists. From the mid 19th-century onwards, and in the pre-war Belle  poque in particular, it was the immensely wealthy 'robber barons' and their widows - in London and Paris, in Berlin and Vienna, in Moscow and Barcelona, in Philadelphia and New York - who collected the work of the most innovative artists and broke the hold of the Academies on Western art.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eProfessor Platt's ambitious sweep through a thousand years of artistic endeavour in the West argues throughout that a superfluity of money is the chief driver of high achievement in the arts, and for the transforming power of great riches.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Colin Platt\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Harper Perennial\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 01\/17\/2005\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 402\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.67lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 7.78h x 5.16w x 1.01d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780006531562\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e 03\/13\/2006\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eColin Platt is Professor of Art History at Southampton University. He is the author of many books including King Death: A History of the Plague, The Architecture of Medieval Britain, which was awarded the Wolfson Prize for History, and the classic The Medieval Town. He lives in Devon.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThis title is not returnable\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper Perennial","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":40679837171827,"sku":"9.78001E+12","price":14.47,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0555\/9255\/0515\/products\/img_71c35842-3c77-46c9-a0a3-bfec3478f8a0.jpg?v=1674661293","url":"https:\/\/bookstorenmore.com\/products\/marks-of-opulence-9780006531562","provider":"Bookstore N More","version":"1.0","type":"link"}