Antoni Gaudi

Rating:
Summary: Flash with little substance
Review: The biggest problem here is layout and design. 17 of the 80 pages are text, the rest photos; the text itself about Gaudi is average, being "spiced up" by using a variety of color background paper, and the insertion of large oddball font quotes about Gaudi, supposing to be avant-garde in presentation, but annoying and hard to read. The bulk of the book is photographs, which suffer from 3 major problems. First, the paper used is matte paper, not glossy, so even the photos taken in bright sunlight have a dull appearance (some of the photos are taken in shadows, as if the photographer did not want to come back later to get a good shot). Secondly, the photos do not support the text: With 17 pages of text and 60 or so of photos, you would think that when the text is describing Gaudi's invention and use of the parabolic arch there would be some photos near by to show what they are talking about. Thirdly, a poor choice of photos which are not labeled as to what they are, you have to look all the way in the back to find out what the photo is of (there is a full two page photo of Casa Mila, and the entire photo is out of focus. Unexcusable.)
Basically, average text with photos thrown in without thought to the whole, disguised as being hip with colored paper and hard to read quotations. If you are very interested in Gaudi, the best analysis of him I have found yet is the last 90 pages or so of Robert Hughes' book Barcelona, learned and insightful.