Walton Ford: Pancha Tantra

This book at 15 inches tall is packed full of reproductions of panoramic wildlife paintings by Walton Ford. Ford is what you might loosely call a naturalist - a painter of nature with an old fashioned sense of fidelity to the anatomical proportions and whiskered details of God's creations. On top of that he is a fantasy artist who flings his animal subjects into crazy social situations of mischief, conflict and comic chaos. While some of the scenes he paints involve implausible situations, he gives the animals a credible sense of character. Vengeance, humour, calculation - these are just a few of the thought processes infused into the faces and the gestures of these animated beasts. The original artworks reproduced in this book are monstrous large, with many of the animals (alligators, great apes, tigers etcetera) at least as large as life. Prize of the herd in this book may be the multi-panel painting of a male elephant on heat, titled Nila. At 3.66 metres tall x 5.49 wide, the original artwork is quite literally the size of a young elephant. Playing upon the intimidating size and power of many of these wild animals, Ford often paints them in situations of victory over man. A painting dated 1596 shows a lumbering polar bear triumphant over the bones and personal effects of an explorer, while in the background a shattered sailing ship creaks against an arctic shore. Also unusual is that these works are all watercolours, painted onto huge sheets of paper. Watercolour normally lends itself to modest, even miniature work, because of the difficulty of handling the medium across large surfaces without washes drying in inconvenient places. Furthermore watercolour on paper is unforgiving when mistakes are made and the consequences of the risks are greater when the painting is on a gigantic scale. Ford works skilfully in the medium making heavy use of the "dry brush" technique - a method that avoids bleeding, helps keep brush lines precise and allows the overlay of variegated colour (for instance to paint a mass of silky fur). To admire the original massive works, which can cover whole gallery walls, viewers would need to stand several metres back. Ford aides the viewer with some sharp linework, a technique has a secondary benefit of allowing the works to reproduce wonderfully well in book format. Pancha Tantra includes a nice mix of cropped close-ups bled to the edge of the page - allowing us to study the overlay of wash and brushstrokes, with long shots of whole works - at a size where we can still appreciate the fine detail. On my count this book displays 72 artworks on single pages and a further 41 spread across double pages. In addition there are 43 pages with crops of interesting details, plus 17 double pages devoted to cropped highlights. Some artworks have several pages devoted to them, including the wide shot and multiple close-ups. The background washes on Ford's paintings include mock mould spotting and branching mildew, to make the paintings look ambiguously like nineteenth century prints. At first glimpse the effect is deceptive. But these artworks are far more lively than conventional stiff animal portraits. And the wit and allegory packed into some of the works can make the viewer do a double-take. While these images are show beautiful beasts and colourful fauna, the situations depicted include some moments of drama and visceral brutality. The only disappointment to this book is the absence of any chapter on Ford's working methods or career story. There is only a two page basic `Biography' that includes a chronology of exhibitions, awards and references to previous media stories on the artist. Perhaps the Collector's Edition with its additional 34 pages has a more rounded biographical treatment? Maybe I'll have to save for it and find out! This book provides a marvellous folio of artworks to the mass market and does this at an agreeable price. Many of the main competitors to Taschen would have charged at least twice this price for a book this scale. The post-release price won't last and shouldn't last, it is too good to be true for a book of this size and quality. This is an abridged version of my full review on Art Book News at blogspot. Book specs: Hardcover 320 pages, 15 x 11.4 inches, 173 colour illustrations (across 231 pages)

I was expecting a great book but this exceeded my expectations. It is large, with a great cover, and nicely reproduced illustrations inside. My only complaint is that the large paintings are placed in spreads with the gutter dividing the image in half. It would have been better to have gate folds so the entire painting could be viewed on one page. But that is probably too much to expect for a book of this price. On the positive side, the book is not bound overly tight so the spreads do open so you get a good view of the work (books bound too tightly obscure imagery in the gutter). In addition to Ford's paintings there are quite a few of his prints, which I had never seen before. They are remarkably similar to Audubon prints (with a bizarre twist, of course). There are excellent close-ups of nearly every image and the collection seems like a nice overview of Ford's work. I haven't read the text yet but plan to do so soon, but suffice it so say that the text doesn't overwhelm the visuals. In short, it is a great book at a great price.

In most of his paintings Ford depicts the more twisted and ironic elements of nature: perverse portraits of murderous birds with mouthfuls of frogs, drunken monkeys, and wounded rhinos. The most wonderfully disturbing element of his style is its technicality; the paintings are spot on as far as biological and anatomical correctness to the point where they resemble cold, anatomical drawings out of scientific textbooks. In a very upfront way, Ford delves headfirst into ideals of Darwinism, nature vs nurture, symbiosis, cycles of life, biodiversity, and all that happens when nature goes completely awry, all the while telling stories from the Hindu epic Pancha Tantra. Beautiful, harrowing, dramatic, thought provoking, obscene and definitely memorable. The perfect companion for any eclectic coffee table.

A beautifully illustrated book that will bring enlightenment to anyone who enjoys beautiful art and thoughtful text. This book is really big and full of colorful water color paintings in the style of the classic Audubon jumbo portfolio. Many animals now exticnt and others which are on the way to extinction are posed in sometimes disturbing situations that makes one realize how fragile our planet is. Thought provoking, timeless and sure to be a favorite, many hours will be spent inspecting the details of the art and reading the fascinating text. The Passenger Pigeon is one example of how this artist has managed to illustrate how all life is so precious. His painting of a strong tree limb breaking under the weight of millions of these birds is followed by a text that shows the very last bird named Martha, stuffed and put under glass on display in the Smithsonian Institution ... commented on by John James Audubon, himself, at the tragedy of it all. My book, ordered through Amazon arrived badly damaged from a over sized box without sufficient packing. I sent it back and ordered another. While the second book arrived in better condition, it was still slammed around and the corners of this hard bound edition were still bent. I wish that Amazon would take better care in the packaging before sending out these books.

*Es un libro maravilloso, digno de un maestro lo cual Ford lo evidencia con sus acuarelas magistrales. Vale la pena adquirirlo y apreciar la calidad del trabajo de este artista. El formato del libro, la calidad de las hojas y la impresión son de primera. Hay bastantes close ups que ocupan toda la página. El libro me llegó en excelentes condiciones y en el tiempo indicado. Gracias Amazon *It's a fascinating book, worthy of a great master which is evidenced by Ford with its skillfull watercolors. I think I made an excelent buy and I really appreciate the quality of work of this artist. The format of the book, the quality of the paper and printing are first rate. There are several close ups (full page). The book reached me in excellent condition and at the right time. Thanks Amazon

My girlfriend has had her eye on this for a while and so it made a great gift. She sat and went through the book cover to cover as soon as she got it. Walton Ford is a fascinating artist, working in the Audubon style of illustration and has received a Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, US & Canada.

This is a well made book with high quality illustrations of Walton Ford's work. I would recommend this to anyone with an interest in natural history and illustration. I have in the past recommended this book to people with an interest in art who are implacably opposed to contemporary art as Ford's work is at a great intersection between natural history & art. My only criticism is that like a lot of books by taschen I feel it would be improved by treating its subject matter in a slightly more academic and less coffee table book fashion.

I'm a huge fan of Ford's work, and I've been trying to get some printed resources for a year. All the calendars and previous boooks are out of print or too expensive, so when this edition became available at this price I almost went nuts. And this beautiful book does not disappoint. The color plates are gorgeous, the wonderful pages showing details are crisp, and the superb text by Bill Buford is illumnating. I am ecstatic about this purchase. One of the best deals I have ever had on Amazon.com.