Joanna Woodall

'Painting contains a divine force which not only makes the absent present, as friendship is said to do, but moreover makes the dead seem almost alive.' Taking up Alberti's connection between divine power, mimesis and friendship, this study explores the artistry of the Utrecht portrait specialist Antonis Mor. It considers Mor's work in relation to reformation debates, and to the challenges to dynastic authority that took place during his lifetime, tracing the breakdown and transformation of belief in 'friendship' or love as a means of binding abstract authority and the embodied world together. Although Mor succeeded Titian as principal portraitist to the Habsburgs, his ambition was not limited to portrayal in a narrow sense. His work enters into dialogue with the elevated conceptions of the artist being enunciated by his humanist friends, and with devotional and allegorical imagery. The book brings Mor's arresting vision to a wider public and reveals its centrality to a broader understanding of how authority was conceived and reshaped in the sixteenth-century.

Art and Authority

Anthonis Mor

Peter Paul Rubens

Gosudarstvennyĭ Ėrmitazh (Russia)

Stephanie-Suzanne Durante

"Two celebrated and complementary collections of Rubens' sketches - in the Courtauld Institute of Art in London and The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg - are brought together to form the basis of this study of the artist's work." "Often regarded as one of the most compelling and remarkable aspects of the artist's work, Rubens' oil sketches reveal the genesis of many of his most important commissions. This book, published to coincide with a major exhibition at the Hermitage Rooms, Courtauld Institute of Art, focuses on Rubens' projects where the Hermitage and Courtauld holdings are exceptionally rich, including the ceiling of the Banqueting House at Whitehall, and the now lost ceiling of the Jesuit church in Antwerp. By bringing together preparatory material from a number of major commissions this book aims to provide a concentrated account of the role of the oil sketch in Rubens' work."--Jacket.

Oil Sketches and Related Works from the State Hermitage Museum and the Courtauld Institute Gallery

Peter Paul Rubens, a Touch of Brilliance

Anthony Bond

Joseph Leo Koerner

Timothy J. Clark

L. J. Jordanova

With 140 images from collections all over the world, from Van Eyck to Chuck Close, this book includes pioneering essays on self-portraiture by leading art historians as well as informative analyses of almost sixty major works. The artists are shown constructing their identity, setting the scene for their life and times and above all showing themselves as creative individuals often captured in the act of conjuring their own image in the studio.

Renaissance to Contemporary

Self Portrait

Claus Zittel

Thomas Balfe

Ad Vivum? explores the issues raised by this Latin term and its vernacular cognates al vivo, au vif, nach dem Leben and naer het leven with reference to a variety of visual materials produced and used in Europe before 1800.

Visual Materials and the Vocabulary of Life-Likeness in Europe before 1800

Ad vivum?

Portraiture, the most popular genre of painting, occupies a central position in the history of Western art. Despite this, its status within academic art theory is uncertain. This volume provides an introduction to major issues in its history.

Facing the Subject

Portraiture

Courtauld Institute of Art

James Cuno

Mikhail Piotrovksy

Gosudarstvennyi Ermitazh

Ernst Vegelin van Claerbergen

Musée de l'Ermitage (Saint-Pétersbourg, Russie).

Two celebrated and complementary collections of Rubens' sketches - in the Courtauld Institute of Art in London and The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg - are brought together to form the basis of this study of the artist's work. Often regarded as one of the most compelling and remarkable aspects of the artist's work, Rubens' oil sketches reveal the genesis of many of his most important commissions. This book, published to coincide with a major exhibition at the Hermitage Rooms, Courtauld Institute of Art, focuses on Rubens' projects where the Hermitage and Courtauld holdings are exceptionally rich, including the ceiling of the Banqueting House at Whitehall, and the now lost ceiling of the Jesuit church in Antwerp. By bringing together preparatory material from a number of major commissions this book aims to provide a concentrated account of the role of the oil sketch in Rubens' work.

Walter Melion

Michael Zell

The Reflexive Imagery of Love in Artistic Theory and Practice, 1500-1700

Ut pictura amor

Joanna Woodall

About

Books

Join the club