Josef Albers Book Life and Work - Thames & Hudson

While Klee and Kandinsky, Josef Albers's Bauhaus colleagues, are household names, Albers himself remains enigmatic. He is best known as the painter of Homages to the Square, “a painting I go crazy for because of the color” – a series of over two thousand meticulously controlled experiments in color interaction. However, he did not begin these paintings until he was in his sixties, after decades of his career as an artist, creator, and theorist, most of which he carried out in the United States following the Nazi closure of the Bauhaus in 1933.

Son of a painter and decorator, Albers was fascinated by everyday life: his early Homages are in unmixed oil paint applied to fiberboard with a palette knife, with outer squares that crackle, and their handcrafted surfaces emphasizing the apparent rawness of the series. They are raw but also deeply romantic.

The misunderstanding of Homages reflects a broader misinterpretation of Albers's life and work. He was married to influential textile and fiber artist Anni Albers, and his documents include letters from other artists: John Cage, Robert Rauschenberg, Richard Serra, and Eva Hesse; collaborators such as Buckminster Fuller and Philip Johnson; as well as fans and collectors, from composer Virgil Thomson to illustrator Saul Steinberg. While his network of influence was surprisingly broad, so too were his interests. Albers began his life at the Bauhaus as a glassmaker, ran a renowned wallpaper workshop, and designed furniture that remains in production eighty years later. He pioneered color research at Black Mountain College, organized the famous “Summer Sessions” with guest teachers from Willem de Kooning to Merce Cunningham, and later headed the design department at Yale.

Based on extensive unpublished writings, documents, and illustrations, Charles Darwent offers a broad insight not only into the artistic and political currents but also into the friendships and rivalries that formed the backdrop for Albers’s highly influential work.

Thames & Hudson 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 and leading scientific research accessible to the general public. To reflect international perspectives, the company’s name combined the rivers flowing through London and New York, represented in its logo by two dolphins symbolizing friendship and intelligence, one facing east, the other west, suggesting a connection between the Old World and the New.

Today, still an independent family-owned publisher, Thames & Hudson is one of the world’s leading publishers of illustrated books with over 2,000 titles printed. It publishes high-quality collectible books across all areas of visual creativity: arts (fine arts, applied arts, decorative arts, performing arts), architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and music, as well as archaeology, history, and popular culture. It is also expanding its list of children’s books. Headquartered in London with a sister company in New York and branches in Melbourne, Singapore, and Hong Kong. In Paris, another subsidiary, Interart, distributes English-language books in France.

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 brand founded by Viennese émigré Wolfgang Foges. Neurath and Foges developed an innovative concept now known as book packaging (or co-publishing), where book ideas are developed, ordered, produced, and sold to publishers operating across different markets and languages to create large editions and reduce unit production costs. Neurath’s concept was the first of many innovations introduced to the publishing world through Thames & Hudson.

Seeking to continue the packaging of collectible books in a second edition and recognizing the need to amortize the high costs of producing illustrated books, Neurath established his own publishing house with offices in London and New York in autumn 1949. Eva Neurath, who arrived in London from Berlin in 1939, was a co-founder.

Of the ten titles published on the first list by Thames & Hudson in 1950, *English Cathedrals*, with photographs by Martin Hürlimann, were the first and most successful. A testament to the brand’s strong conviction from the very beginning regarding the longevity of books, it remained in print until 1971. In the first year of publication, Albert Einstein’s *Out of My Later Years* also appeared, an early indicator of the program’s breadth. As the list gradually expanded—growing from ten titles in 1950 to 144 in 1955—the company moved its offices to High Holborn and in 1956 relocated to a Georgian townhouse at 30 Bloomsbury Street, near Bedford Square, then the epicenter of book publishing in London. The manufactory remained at this address, eventually expanding to five houses, until 1999, when it returned to High Holborn.

In 1958, Thames & Hudson launched one of its most renowned series, *World of Art*, which became the foundation of a highly diverse list. Characterized by pocket-sized editions with black spines, the series expanded in just seven years to include 49 titles. Nearly 60 years later, the series boasts over 300 titles, which, according to Christopher Frayling, are “stained with paint copies” in every art school across the country.

Other important series that added depth and prestige to the list include *Ancient People and Places*, edited by Glyn Daniel, who since the 1950s contributed to pioneering interest in archaeology, both in print and on television. Over 34 titles have been published in this series over 34 years. The large-format *Great Civilizations* series, published in 1961, featured contributions from esteemed scholars such as Alan Bullock, Asa Briggs, Hugh Trevor-Roper, A. J. P. Taylor, and John Julius Norwich.
After building one of the most significant 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 was “more than anyone else responsible for the revolution in art publishing” and was “one of those rare entrepreneurs who successfully combine business acumen with idealism.” Eva Neurath became chairwoman. Walter’s son, Thomas, who joined the company in 1961 along with his sister Constance, became managing director; Constance later served as artistic director for several decades. Both Thomas and Constance remain on the Thames & Hudson board, 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 innovations like “French folds” to the controversial documentation of graffiti art in *Subway Art*, Thames & Hudson has always been at the forefront, both culturally and technically.

The year 2016 marked an extraordinary new chapter for the company, announcing publishing partnerships with two of the world’s most important museums: the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Thus, the world of art and scholarship remains at the heart of Thames & Hudson’s publishing program, which remains true to its core principle: providing a “museum without walls.”
Today, Thames & Hudson is a recognizable international brand, a symbol of British publishing. They offer thousands of incredible book titles, many of which are prestigious collector’s editions.   Manufacturer information