Product Description

John Pugh has created more than 200 murals and is considered to be the leading proponent, authority, and practitioner of Narrative Illusionism, a term coined to describe his particular mural style. This full-color collection showcases Pugh's most famous pieces, discusses how he revitalized the trompe l'oeil ("trick of the eye") genre into a vital mode of artistic expression, and illuminates the artist's creative process from sketch to finished mural.A full-color collection of master trompe l'oeil muralist John Pugh's art, alongside detailed analysis-from conception to unveiling-with an emphasis on how his work relates to and enhances its setting.Includes more than 40 full-color photos of the murals depicting architectural, natural, and pictorial settings.John Pugh's murals appear in more than 30 cities throughout the country, including San Francisco, Miami, Honolulu, and Anchorage.Pugh's work has been featured in publications worldwide, including Time magazine, Artweek, Art Business News, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and the San Francisco Examiner.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #336344 in Books
• Published on: 2006-08-01
• Released on: 2006-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 168 pages

From the Publisher
* A full-color collection of master trompe l’oeil muralist John Pugh’s art, alongside detailed analysis—from conception to unveiling—with an emphasis on how his work relates to and enhances its setting. * Includes more than 40 full-color photos of the murals depicting architectural, natural, and pictorial settings. * John Pugh’s murals appear in more than 30 cities throughout the country, including San Francisco, Miami, Honolulu, and Anchorage. * Pugh’s work has been featured in publications worldwide, including Time magazine, Artweek, Art Business News, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and the San Francisco Examiner.

About the Author
JOHN PUGH has been creating mural artistry since the late 1970s. He attended California State University Chico, receiving his BA in 1983 and the Distinguished Alumni Award in 2003. He has received numerous public and private commissions in the United States, Taiwan, and New Zealand. He lives in Santa Cruz, California. Visit www.illusion-art.com


KEVIN BRUCE is a native Californian born in San Francisco in 1941. Author of THE MURALS OF JOHN PUGH, he is currently engaged as an art historian and author with a focus on chronicling the contemporary mural. He resides with his wife and fellow mural archivist, Pauline, in Scottsdale, Arizona, and Berkeley, California.

 THE AUTHOR SCOOP

Read any good books lately?I am a fan of Michael Connelly, Lee Childs, Elizabeth George, P.D. James, and art historian Wanda Corn. What are you working on now?I may be working on a book on the largest mural in the world, which may be created in Dubai. What's the farthest you've ever traveled?The longest trip I have taken was a 104-day round–the-world cruise on the Saga Rose in 2002. It was over 37,000 miles on the ocean and about 10,000 miles over it. What was the first book you can remember reading?The first “real” book I remember was Dr. Dolittle by Hugh Lofting. I read all his books one summer.If you had to boil the message of Large Art in Small Places down to a couple sentences, what would it be?With this book as your guide, it is my hope that you discover the richness of the California mural towns and all that they have to offer the enlightened traveler. It is also my hope that you seek out mural towns elsewhere in your travels: with murals as a central focus, the history and culture of the world are on the walls for you to enjoy.

Customer Reviews

World famous muralist has roots in Chico, California
Author Kevin Bruce writes that he first met John Pugh in a Los Gatos pub in 1984. The two became fast friends, and now Bruce has expanded his Stanford University master's thesis on seven of Pugh's murals into a breathtaking study of 35 of Pugh's finest works. "The Murals of John Pugh: Beyond trompe l'oeil" ($35 in hardcover from Ten Speed Press) features stunning full-color spreads of Pugh's art along with telling close-ups of areas the eye might well miss.

The term "trompe l'oeil" means "trick of the eye," and it's applied to two-dimensional art that fools the eye into seeing a three-dimensional space. Though such techniques were practiced in ancient Greece, as Bruce notes in his historical overview, Pugh's real precursor was the Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, who in 1931 "produced a trompe l'oeil mural ... at the California School of Fine Arts" that saluted "the 'skyscraping' construction in the United States."

Pugh himself got his start at Chico State University majoring in art. In his senior year he received a commission "to create a mural on a wall of Taylor Hall, which housed, most appropriately, the Chico State Art Department." As Bruce writes, "Begun in the fall of 1980 and completed in the spring of 1981, this mural would receive international recognition and launch Pugh's career in a spectacular fashion." The mural was called "Academe" (acrylic on concrete, 24 feet by 36 feet).

Bruce writes that "at Taylor Hall, Pugh's first step was to establish a site-specific conceptual scheme: 'I kept looking at the wall thinking of how to best reveal in a mural the meaning of the art building both architecturally and conceptually.' He decided that the best symbol to accomplish this dual statement would be to 'go all the way back to the original Doric-style Greek column. ... My intention was ... to tap into the concept of the Greek academe as the essence of our western educational system'."

Rather than simply paint a realistic-looking series of columns, Pugh was influenced by a dream to "break open" the wall on Taylor and, as Bruce puts it, "fill this fictive space with relevant narrative creations -- intended to engage the viewer on deeper levels."

It is this narrative element in Pugh's work that sets it apart from mere trickery. Since his Chico State experience Pugh has painted many public art pieces, murals for hospitals, parking garages and libraries that attract the mind as well as the eye. Some are controversial, like his 2005 piece, "Drain," in Bishop, which evoked strong emotions about the "water wars" in the late 1900s. Other pieces, such as the mural in a San Jose café, "Art Imitating Life, Imitating Art, Imitating Life," are stunningly complex in their narratives.

"The Murals of John Pugh" includes chapters on his studio, techniques and future projects, a fitting 3D tribute to a visionary artist -- which is no illusion at all.

Copyright 2006 Chico Enterprise-Record. Used by permission.

Unbelievable Magic
John Pugh should be named a national treasure. His works are not only supremely well executed but also intriguing. So many muralists fail in their ability to render perspective both visually and mentally. You can truly "step into" Pugh's works and when you do, you enter into a new world.

Amazing works that require study to be believed
This is simply a fantastic book of the art of muralist I've grown to admire over the years. After following his work on the web and around California and other states, I was very excited to find a book devoted to his work alone. And I was not disappointed. The quality of the text and images is superb as well.And as an artist I frequent the book to get those creative juices flowing.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys Trompe l'oeil and murals.