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1) There are VERY few books about Renaissance drawing.
2) This book is by far the best of the lot.
Probably Carracci is nobody's favorite artist, and I'm sure I would never have bought this book if I hadn't had the chance to leaf through it first. Photos of preparatory sketches by a not-so-famous painter for $90? Yeah right.
But this book is great. Carracci's paintings may be stiff, but the drawings are definitely not. He was a master of the kind of drawing that just doesn't exist anymore -- elegant, accurate, offhand but truly observed. I don't suppose he was a better draftsman than Titian, say, or Raphael, but this book shows him to be among the real masters.
And the book is a model for what art books should be. It is big but not painful, with pages that are almost square so that the drawings can be shown to their advantage and not run into the gutter. Each drawing is shown compete, but it is the details that make the book. Many are reproduced full-page and in true color, so that the real feel of the paper and touch of the line come across.
Though all the works in this book are by Carracci, it still comes across as a kind of survey course in drawing because this one artist drew in so many ways. Every kind of drawing is here, from the quickest preparatory scribbles to Holbein-like portrait drawings, clearly intended as finished works. The text is of the "This drawing was formerly attributed to Mr. X but now is attributed to Mr. Y" variety, but the text is not why you buy a book like this.
In the end I came home from New York without any books, ordered this one from Amazon, and felt that I had accomplished my mission.
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Perkins has applicable background, in Vietnam and management consulting and teaching which make this book doubly fascinating.
I found his style and wit so easy to read and yet remember the points being made. There are many one can take away from this and use, however two that stand out in my mind are: great leaders don't enter knowing everything, e.g. Shackleton had never even slept in a sleeping bag before, much is learned; second, in At Edge experiences, overcome uncertainly with structure and distractions.
So much more could be said about this excellent contribution to leadership. It is well structured with Shackleton's lessons first, then biz cases which are each unique and contribute to illustrations of these leadership lessons. After each section there is reflection, while at the book's end, more intense follow-up excercies and resources to be pursued.
One great leadership adventure!
There are bound to be comparisons between the author's 10 Leadership Strategies and Covey's 7 Habits. While there may be differences in focus (the 7 Habits are focused on development of personal succes while Perkins' 10 Strategies are focused on leading a successful organization), Perkins steps into the cold, hard world of real life drama played out in boardrooms, production facilities and corporate culture by demonstrating the key 10 leadership strategies he has gleaned from Shackleton's overwhelming drive to get his crew home safely against odds that could easily have crushed the bravest of souls. With the addition of other real-life survival anecdotes, Perkins adds more captivating illustrations for his leadership strategies.
A specifc point made which bears noting is the curious fact that leadership is often easier to exercise in a clear crisis than when no specific danger is on the horizon. When no dire need for change is evident, most people are satisfied with the status quo, even if the organization is getting sloppy and inefficiencies are beginning to limit organizational flexibility. I have been fond of saying, "We are so into crisis management, that unless the situation is a crisis, we can't manage it." Perkins covers this point wonderfully with a case study on how a top forest products corporation remade itself when the need for change was still only evident to a few people, and long beofore a major crisis was looming overhead.
This is a "meaty" book with no fluff and a quick read, organized in a way that makes it simple to reference specific points in the future. All the books in the world on corporate and marketing strategies are useless if the corporate leadership culture is sick. This book hits organizations in the center of gravity - the mindset of the leadership, and that is where all effective change has to start. I cannot recommend the book more highly.
Perkins carefully organized the book into four inter-related parts. After briefly summarizing the Shackleton expedition, in Part One Perkins presents his 10 strategies for leading at the edge:
1-Vision and Quick Victories: Never lose sight of the ultimate goal, and focus energy on short-term objectives.
2-Symbolism and Personal Example: Set a personal example with visible, memorable symbols and behaviors.
3-Optimism and Reality: Instill optimism and self-confidence, but stay grounded in reality.
4-Stamina: Take care of yourself: Maintain your stamina and let go of guilt.
5-The Team Message: Reinforce the team message constantly: "We are one - we live or die together."
6-Core Team Values: Minimize status differences and insist on courtesy and mutual respect.
7-Conflict: Master conflict - deal with anger in small doses, engage dissidents, and avoid needless power struggles.
8-Lighten Up!: Find something to celebrate and something to laugh about.
9-Risk: Be willing to take the Big Risk.
10-Tenacious Creativity: Never give up - there's always another move.
Interwoven with these strategies are detailed accounts from Shackleton's expedition and real world business examples to fully illustrate the strategies' applicability to today's leadership environments.
Part Two is case studies of four organizations that successfully applied the strategies and achieved remarkable success. In Part Three, Perkins "outlines a number of qualities and actions that...contribute to living, learning, and thriving at "The Edge."" Part Four provides the reader with some tools to further develop individual leadership skills.
Written by a former combat Lieutenant of Marines in Vietnam and current "President of The Syncretics Group, a consultancy that focuses on effective leadership in demanding environments," this book was a very enjoyable and informative study of leadership. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning about, and seeing if they have what it takes for, leading at the edge.
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