Believing that artistic expression can and does play an important role in changing the way we perceive our relation to the world we live in, art critic John Grande takes an in-depth look at the work of some very unusual environmental artists in the United States, in Canada, and in Europe.

Dealing with everything from materials, to the politics of curatorship, the permanence of art works, to the artist's role as cultural critic, Balance: Art and Nature takes theory into action as it critically examines the works of Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley, Armand Vaillancourt, Bill...

Nature is the art of which we are a part.

"Do you reflect on the many incidents that happen in life, as I do. . .some tragedies, others strange, and a few quite funny?" asks John Grande in this highly readable, lighthearted, and often irreverent memoir of nearly four decades as Chief Librarian of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, one of the great world opera venues, after a career as a professional clarinetist. He reconsiders a life both in and out of his work with maestros from Leonard Bernstein to James Levine, and with hundreds of singers and musicians across the entire opera world.