Winter 2010

In discussions of twentieth-century design and art on Long Island, the Hamptons have always hogged the spotlight. Long Island Moderns—a catalogue for two exhibits at the Heckscher Museum of Art in the town of Huntington—provides a useful counterpoint, focusing on the central portion of the island, where architects such as Albert Frey, Marcel Breuer, and Paul Rudolph built, and Fernand Léger, George Grosz, and Lee Krasner made art. (Heckscher Museum of Art, 128 pages, $30)

Textile design is an often overlooked but, ironically, deeply affecting area of the decorative arts. In her new book, Shirley Craven and Hull Traders: Revolutionary Fabrics and Furniture, 1957-1980, design historian Lesley Jackson celebrates a collaboration perfectly in tune with the spirit of the 1960s. Vivid illustrations capture the electric Op Art fabrics that Craven and others designed for Hull Traders, as well as the firm’s sleek cardboard “throwaway” furniture. (Antiques Collectors Club, 220 pages, $50)

Broadway has its “angels,” museums have people like Ben and Natalie Heineman. In 2006, the Chicago residents donated their 240-piece collection of late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century glass sculptures and vessels to the Corning Museum of Glass. While the catalogue Voices of Contemporary Glass: The Heineman Collection, edited and largely written by Tina Oldknow, the museum’s curator of modern works is, naturally, a “thank-you” for the Heineman’s gift, the book more importantly offers a survey of the best in studio glass art and design produced between 1969 and 2005. At the heart of the catalogue are snapshot biographies of all 87 artists in the collection, accompanied by copious photographs of their work—a useful tool for newcomers to the field and aficionados alike. (The Corning Museum of Glass, 382 pages, $85)