Reviewed: The Intelligence of Tradition in Rajput Court Painting
Recently added to caa.reviews:
Molly Emma Aitken, The Intelligence of Tradition in Rajput Court Painting (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010), 352 pages, ISBN: 9780300142297, $65.
Reviewed by Catherine Glynn; posted 21 October 2011.
“Why Rajput paintings look the way that they do” is the enormous concept that Molly Emma Aitken addresses in ‘The Intelligence of Tradition in Rajput Court Painting’. Fortunately for readers entering into her innovative and complex thinking, Aitken is especially gifted in her word choice, graphically evocative, and the book is filled with well-reproduced images of stunning Rajput paintings. Her descriptions of the paintings and the artists who produced them give both the seasoned scholar and uninitiated reader a series of intriguing ideas to ponder.
Aitken’s premise is concisely explained in her introduction: conventions used in Rajput painting were purposefully developed; painters made choices based on intent. As she posits, much past analysis by scholars of Indian painting has juxtaposed “a simple, archaic aesthetic [Rajput painting] against a technically advanced idiom [Mughal painting]” (11). It is Aitken’s contention that Rajput painters were skilled in their own aesthetic, taking what they deemed useful from Mughal painting and rejecting those elements that did not fit into their vision. It was not a question of ability—the Rajput painters were able to paint in any style that they chose—it was a question of choice.
The full review is available here» (CAA membership required)
New Title: Drew Armstrong on Julien-David Leroy
From the publisher:
Christopher Drew Armstrong, Julien-David Leroy and the Making of Architectural History (Routledge, 2011), 300 pages, ISBN: 9780415778893, $125.00
This book examines the career and publications of the French architect Julien-David Leroy (1724–1803) and his impact on architectural theory and pedagogy. Despite not leaving any built work, Leroy is a major international figure of eighteenth-century architectural theory and culture. Considering the place that Leroy occupied in various intellectual circles of the Enlightenment and Revolutionary period, this book examines the sources for his ideas about architectural history and theory and defines his impact on subsequent architectural thought. This book will be of key interest to graduate students and scholars of Enlightenment-era architectural history.
C O N T E N T S
Introduction: Positioning LeRoy
Part 1: Voyageur / Philosophe — 1. Traveler in the Academy 2. A Book by Its Cover 3. Measuring the Earth 4. Greek Architecture and the Doctrine of Vitruvius 5. Greece and the Orient 6. A New Way of Making History 7. Mentor in the Garden
Part 2: Academician / Mentor — 8. Architecture and Enlightenment 9. Science for the Public Good 10. Monument to a Revolutionary Hero. Select Bibliography
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Christopher Drew Armstrong is an Assistant Professor and Director of Architectural Studies in the Department of History of Art and Architecture at the University of Pittsburgh.
Exhibition: Monkeys and Dragons at Chantilly
The following press release comes from the Musée Conde. -HB
Singes et Dragons: La Chine et le Japon à Chantilly au XVIIIe Siècle
Musée Conde, Château de Chantilly, 14 September 2011 — 1 January 2012
Pour la rentrée de septembre 2011, le musée Condé propose une exposition qui s’inscrit dans la thématique du « voyage » qui sera développée jusqu’à la fin 2011 par le Domaine de Chantilly. En effet, les visiteurs sont invités à remonter le temps, au XVIIIe siècle, quand artistes et artisans réalisaient des œuvres peintes ou d’art décoratif sur commande, afin de combler un goût immodéré pour les décors asiatiques où singes et dragons se mêlaient parfois avec délicatesse aux animaux familiers de nos campagnes.
En ce début du XVIIIe siècle, alors que la France se passionne pour l’exotisme, le duc de Bourbon, prince de Condé (1692-1740), collectionne pour son Château de Chantilly les porcelaines, les indiennes – tissus peints ou imprimés fabriqués en Asie entre le XVIIe siècle et le XIXe siècle – et les meubles en laque de Chine et du Japon. Il les fait copier par des artisans français et crée pour ce faire trois manufactures. En mécène entrepreneur passionné, il commande en 1735 au dessinateur Jean-Antoine Fraisse (1680-1739) un album de modèles, gravés en taille-douce, d’après ses collections. Les artisans au service du prince s’en inspirent, notamment pour les porcelaines de Chantilly ; et ce jusqu’en 1740 à la mort du Prince et au tournant de cet engouement pour l’exotisme. C’est à partir de cet ouvrage in-folio rarissime que Nicole Garnier, conservateur général du patrimoine chargée du musée Condé, a conçu son exposition de rentrée où sont présentés outre les deux exemplaires enluminés provenant des collections du Château de Chantilly et de la Bibliothèque nationale de France (Bnf), des gravures de Fraisse (dont deux de plus de trois mètres sont extraites de l’exemplaire enluminé), d’autres de Jean-Baptiste Guélard (1698-1767), des peintures de Christophe Huet (1700-1759) et des pièces d’art décoratif représentatives de cette époque où l’Extrême-Orient était de mise à la Cour et dans les plus belles demeures. . . .
The full press release is available here»
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Catalogue: Manuela Finaz de Villaine and Nicole Garnier-Pelle with assistance from Eléonore Follain, Singes et Dragons: La Chine et le Japon à Chantilly au XVIIIe siècle (Chantilly: Édité par la Fondation pour la Sauvegarde et le Développement du Domaine de Chantilly, 2011), 64 pages, ISBN: 9782953260335, 12€.
Exhibition: The Young Tiepolo, The Discovery of Light
Xavier Salomon reviews the exhibition in the October issue of The Burlington (pp. 698-99). From the Udine website:
Il giovane Tiepolo: la scoperta della luce
Civic Museum of Udine, Castello, Udine, 4 June — 4 December 2011
Curated by Giuseppe Pavanello and Vania Gransinigh
ISBN: 9788895752112
Che cosa caratterizza l’esordio di un giovane pittore di genio? Quali percorsi mentali e creativi presiedono alla formazione di un artista di talento? A questa e ad altre domande proverà a dare risposta la mostra che i Civici Musei di Udine inaugurano il 4 giugno 2011 all’interno della terza edizione delle Giornate del Tiepolo. L’esposizione, dal titolo Il giovane Tiepolo: la scoperta della luce, è rivolta proprio a ricostruire, attraverso le opere più significative, il periodo giovanile dell’attività di Tiepolo, prima del suo soggiorno udinese del 1726.
Se, nel corso del suo apprendistato presso la bottega del pittore accademico Gregorio Lazzarini, l’artista ebbe modo di confrontarsi con i modelli offerti dalla tradizione figurativa veneta del Cinquecento, egli si dimostrò particolarmente attento anche a quanto i suoi contemporanei andavano sperimentando, e alle nuove teorie sulla luce di ispirazione newtoniana. Le opere di Federico Bencovich e Giambattista Piazzetta rappresentarono per il giovane Tiepolo un punto di riferimento ugualmente importante che egli seppe assimilare in maniera originale, in sintonia con il suo essere “tutto spirito e foco,” attraverso un linguaggio pittorico costruito sull’interpretazione luminosa dell’immagine. Ed è proprio su questa peculiare visione tiepolesca della luce che l’esposizione udinese si focalizza, ripercorrendo il tracciato di un’attività che dalle tele dipinte per la chiesa veneziana dell’Ospedaletto si dipana, per il tramite delle decorazioni di Palazzo Sandi, fino al ciclo di affreschi realizzati a Udine nel Palazzo Patriarcale.
I dipinti in esposizione permettono così di documentare il passaggio da una pittura costruita nella luce, secondo precise fonti di illuminazione interne all’immagine, a una pittura costruita dalla luce, nella quale forme e volumi appaiono generati, come vetro soffiato, dall’interna energia luminosa della materia. In mostra sono presentate opere provenienti dai musei di Venezia, Milano, Torino e da alcune delle più prestigiose collezioni pubbliche e private internazionali.
Comitato scientifico: Svetlana Alpers, William L. Barcham, Linda Borean, Caterina Furlan, Peter O. Krückmann, Giuseppe Pavanello e Catherine Whistler.
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Catalogue: Giuseppe Pavanello and Vania Gransinigh, eds., Il Giovane Tiepolo. La Scoperta della Luce (Udine: Civici Musei e Gallerie di Storia e Arte di Udine, 2011), 207 pages, ISBN: 9788895752112, €45 / $87.50.
The Irish Country House
From the Irish Georgian Society:
The Irish Country House: Its Past, Present and Future
Lettsom House, London, 20 October 2011
ISBN: 9781846822346
Since the founding of the IGS over fifty years ago, considerable change has taken place in the fortunes of and attitudes to the Irish country house and these changes have been discussed each year at the Annual Historic Houses of Ireland Conference and now published in a book of essays titled The Irish Country House: Its Past, Present and Future, edited by Dr Terence Dooley and Dr Christopher Ridgway and published by Four Courts Press.
Launched earlier this year at the 9th Historic Houses of Ireland Conference, this marvelous collection of essays looks at dozens of houses across a range of time periods, covering a diversity of topics relating to the architecture of these buildings, the people who lived in them, and the position and perception of the Big House in Ireland. Essays include, Terence Dooley – “Social life at Castle Hyde, 1931–88”, Christopher Ridgway – “Making and meaning in the Historic House: new perspectives in England, Ireland and Scotland” and Allen Warren – “The Twilight of the Ascendancy and the Big House.” The London Chapter is delighted to welcome Drs Dooley and Ridgway to discuss these and other aspects of the Irish country house.
Dr Dooley, MA, Ph.D. (NUI), H. Dip. Ed. is senior lecturer at National University of Ireland at Maynooth and Director of the Centre for the Study of Historic Irish Houses and Estates, of which one of its key functions is the organisation of the Annual Historic Houses of Ireland Conference with the aim of promoting focus and recognition for new scholarship and other developments in the field of built heritage studies. Dr Dooley is responsible for the MA in Historic House Studies at Maynooth and author of The Decline of the Big House in Ireland: A Study of Irish Landed Families, 1860-1960 (2001) and A Future For Irish Historic Houses: A Study of 50 Houses (2003) among others. Dr Ridgway, FSA, has been curator at Castle Howard since 1985 and has written and lectured widely on its architecture, gardens and collections. Dr Ridgway is a member of the Board of the National Trust for Scotland and Adjunct Professor in the History Department at the NUI.
The lecture is at Lettsom House, 11 Chandos Street, London W1G 9EB. The nearest tube station is Oxford Circus. Wine will be served from 6.30pm with the lecture commencing at 7pm and costs £12 per person. If you would like to attend, please send your completed application form and cheque to Colm Owens, Apartment 50, Kilner House, Clayton Street, London SE11 5SE. Please note that tickets will not be issued.
Exhibition and Colloquium: The Hôtels Particuliers of Paris
As noted by Hélène Bremer, from the museum’s website:
The Townhouse: A Parisian Ambition / L’hôtel particulier: Une ambition parisienne
Cité de l’Architecture & du Patrimoine, Palais de Chaillot, Paris, 6 October 2011 — 19 February 2012
Curated by Alexandre Gady
The townhouse is a key part of Paris’s architectural character, and we can trace the story of the capital by studying the development of the townhouse in different districts of the city.
The Parisian townhouse made its first appearance in the Middle Ages and became more popular during the 16th century when, thanks to François I, Paris again became the political capital where the monarchic state assembled and settled. It was important to be at court, near the king, and, therefore, at Paris. This golden age continued throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. The last of the townhouses were built in the period between the two world wars, marking the end of a long history, but they still exist in today’s 21st-century Paris and are very much in use: (museums, embassies, ministries). This exhibition aims to explore this history and takes the visitor on three complementary and illuminating journeys, in a bid to discover the secret of the Parisian townhouse.
The first section features a small reconstructed townhouse, between garden and courtyard, with different authentically decorated rooms for the visitor to explore. In this way, each visitor can enjoy a sense of familiarity with, and ownership of, the building. The building is not an exact replica of an existing townhouse but aims rather to convey a general impression, an overall picture, with each “external” and internal space specifically designed for educational purposes.
In the second section of the exhibition, the visitor will take a journey through the history of the townhouse, this time organized chronologically, from the Middle Ages to the Belle Epoque. This part of the exhibition, displayed in a vast open space, presents a series of large models of townhouses, specifically chosen for their distinctive characteristics – hôtels de Cluny, Lambert, Thélusson and finally the Palais-Rose (these last two buildings no longer exist) – complete with an interactive terminal with wonderfully illustrated information on some 300 town houses.
The last section offers themed reading, examining the Parisian hotel as an architectural object. Three “alcoves” will be devoted to the relationship between the city and the townhouse – a relationship which was both passionate and destructive. A further three sections allow the visitor to explore the external architecture of the townhouse (façades overlooking gardens and courtyards), its interior décor, gardens and finally internal layout. To complete the display, there is a multi-touch screen on the layout and organization of the townhouse, presented in a fun way.
Alexandre Gady, L’hôtel particulier de Paris: Du Moyen Age à la belle époque, second edition (Paris: Parigramme, 2011), 320 pages, ISBN: 9782840967040, €49.
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Colloquium: L’hôtel particulier des capitales régionales, une ambition française
Cité de l’Architecture & du Patrimoine, Palais de Chaillot, Paris, 2-3 December 2011
Ce colloque placé sous la direction scientifique de Pascal Liévaux, conservateur en chef à la Direction générale des patrimoines et Alexandre Gady, professeur à l’université de Nantes, commissaire de l’exposition L’Hôtel particulier. Une ambition parisienne, fait écho à cette manifestation.
Il propose d’en élargir la thématique à l’ensemble du territoire national et donnera la parole à des chercheurs et à des professionnels du patrimoine. Ces spécialistes témoigneront des dernières avancées dans la connaissance, la conservation, la restauration et la mise en valeur de ces édifices complexes qui, associant au plus haut niveau d’excellence l’architecture, l’art des jardins et celui du décor, témoignent de trois siècles de vitalité et de diversité de l’architecture urbaine sur l’ensemble du territoire national.
Exhibition: Master Drawings from the Crocker Art Museum
From The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar:
A Pioneering Collection: Master Drawings from the Crocker Art Museumm
Portland Art Museum, Oregon, 12 June — 19 September 2010
Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, 10 October 2010 — 6 February 2011
Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, 16 September — 11 December 2011
Hubert Robert, "Massacre of the Innocents," 1796, chalk, brown, and red, on paper, 8 1/4 in. x 7 1/4 in. (Sacramento: Crocker Art Museum)
A Pioneering Collection: Master Drawings from the Crocker Art Museum includes 57 rarely seen works by artists such as Albrecht Durer, Fra Bartolommeo, Anthonie van Dyck, Francois Boucher, and Jean-Auguste-Cominque Ingres. The exhibition is divided thematically into four sections of drawings from Italy, the Low Countries, France, and Central Europe.
These drawings date from the late 15th- to the mid-19th centuries and were purchased between 1869-71 by forward-thinking railroad magnate E. B. Crocker, forming the basis of the Crocker Museum’s master drawings collection. In total, the Crockers purchased 1344 master drawings and 700 paintings during their time in Europe and these formed the basis of their private art gallery, which opened in 1872, featuring visitors like the queen of Hawaii and former U.S. President Grant. Following the death of Edwin Crocker, his wife Margaret transferred the gallery to the California Museum Association, now the Crocker Art Museum. Their old master drawing collection was one of the first historically to be opened to the
public in 1885.
This exhibition was organized in celebration of the Crocker’s Anne and Malcolm McHenry Works on Paper Study Center and exhibition space, designed to significantly enhance public access to this collection of master drawings.
A catalogue by lead author and Crocker Art Museum curator Wiliam Breazeale; Cara Dufour Denison, curator at the Morgan Library and Museum; Stacey Sell, associate curator of Old Master drawings at the National Gallery of Art, and Freyda Spira, research associate at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, accompanies the exhibition and will be available at the Art Center gift shop (Paul Holberton Publishing, 2010, $35).
A full checklist for the exhibition is available here»
The Eighteenth Century in the October Issue of The Burlington
The Burlington Magazine 153 (October 2011)
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Editorial
• The Holburne Museum, Bath
. . . Earlier this year, the Museum received extensive publicity when it re-opened after renovation and an extension carried out by Eric Parry Architects. This has included the daring and entirely successful moving of the central staircase of the house, to a few feet to the left, unblocking the vista through the ground-floor entrance to the gardens at the back; a beautiful full-height glass extension to the rear of the building that creates temporary exhibition rooms and a greater feeling of light and air; and the almost complete redisplay of the collections. While it has to be admitted that the Museum is distinctly eclectic and charmingly provincial (and in places still fussily crowded), in its renovated state its former shabby gentility has been vanquished. It now presents itself like Gainsborough’s Lord and Lady Byam, stepping out with the next generation, all in their finery, to greet the future.
The full editorial is available here»
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Articles
• Antonello Cesareo, “New Portraits of Thomas Jenkins, James Byres and Gavin Hamilton” — Two new portraits of Thomas Jenkins and James Byres by Anton von Maron and a self-portrait by Gavin Hamilton.
• Christopher Baker, “Robert Smirke and the Court of the Shah of Persia” — A watercolour study by Robert Smirke in the National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, for a painting of the court of the Shah of Persia.
• Duncan Bull and Anna Krekeler, with Matthias Alfeld, Doris Jik, and Koen Janssens, “An Intrusive Portrait by Goya” — The discovery of an earlier three-quarter length portrait of a man by Goya beneath his Portrait of Ramón Satué (1823) in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
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Books
• Philip McEvansoneya, Review of N. Glendinning and H. Macartney, eds., Spanish Art in Britain and Ireland, 1750–1920: Studies in Reception in Memory of Enriqueta Harris Frankfort.
• Mark Stocker, Review of M. Kisler, Angels and Aristocrats: Early European Art in New Zealand Public Collections.
• Luke Herrmann, Review of M. and J. Payne, Regarding Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827): His Life, Art & Acquaintance and P. Phagan, Thomas Rowlandson: Pleasures and Pursuits in Georgian England.
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Exhibitions
• Xavier F. Salomon, Young Tiepolo
Fashioning the Early Modern: Creativity and Innovation
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To judge from reactions to the Enfilade posting on the eighteenth-century shoe workshop, I would guess a number of you are quite keen on the topic. If so, you may be interested in this essay by Peter McNeil and Giorgio Riello, “Walking the Streets of London and Paris: Shoes in the Enlightenment,” in Shoes: A History from Sandals to Sneakers, edited by Giorgio Riello and Peter McNeil (London: Berg, 2006), which has just been released in paperback (448 pages for $30).
I learned of the book while perusing the ‘News’ section of the website, Fashioning the Early Modern: Creativity and Innovation in Europe, 1500-1800. The site is the public face of a multi-stage scholarly project. Workshops #3 and #4 are taking place in October and November in Copenhagen and Stockholm with a symposium to be held next year in London. -CH
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The following summary comes from the site:
Why did men from Spain to Sweden start to shave their heads and wear someone else’s hair in the mid-seventeenth century? Why did women decide that it was necessary to wear masks and other full-face coverings in public towards the end of the century? What was the economic and social impact of the sudden proliferation of ribbon-making machines?
Funded by the Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA), this project takes fashion seriously, asking the simple question: how and why did certain goods such as wigs, new textiles, ribbons, ruffs and lace become successful in early modern Europe while others failed? How far did these goods travel and how were they transmitted across linguistic, social and geographic borders? These are questions that remain relevant and our project demonstrates how a study of creativity and innovation as an economic and cultural force in the past can help our understanding of the same issues today.
Exhibition: ‘Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape’
From the Ashmolean:
Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape
Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford, 6 October 2011 — 8 January 2012
Städel Museum, Frankfurt, 3 February — 6 May 2012
Curated by Jon Whiteley
Claude Lorrain, "Landscape with Ascanius Shooting the Stag of Sylvia," 1682 (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum)
The Ashmolean’s major exhibition this autumn will be Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape, rediscovering the father of European landscape painting, Claude Gellée (ca. 1600–1682), or Claude Lorrain as he is best known.
In partnership with the Städel Museum, Frankfurt, the exhibition will bring together 140 works from international collections, created at different points in the artist’s career. By uniting ‘pairs’ of Claude’s paintings and making a comprehensive survey of his work in different media, the exhibition brings new research to bear on his working methods, to reveal an unconventional side to Claude which has previously been little known.
Born in France, Claude travelled first to Italy at the age of 13 or 14, settling in Rome for the rest of his life in 1627. The scenery of his great compositions was based on his studies of the ancient ruins and the rolling country of the Tiber Valley and the Roman Campagna. Claude’s ability to translate his vision of the countryside and the majesty of natural light with the aid of his brush won him the admiration of his contemporaries, above all else, as a ‘natural painter’. It has been his signature treatment of classical landscape and literature which has impressed itself on generations of artists and collectors, and which has made his name synonymous with great landscape painting.
ISBN: 9781848220928, $80
The cult of Claude which grew up in the 18th and 19th centuries, begun by British ‘Grand Tourists’, has left a profound mark on our history and landscape. English country houses are well stocked with both originals by Claude and with copies. Responding to aristocratic taste and fashion, designers such as Capability Brown, Henry Hoare and William Kent reproduced his ideal views in the parklands of great houses from Blenheim Palace, Rousham House and Stowe, to Stourhead and Chatsworth. Claude’s drawings were collected with no less enthusiasm by English connoisseurs, as a result, over 40% of his drawings are now in the British Museum. Claude’s influence on later artists is apparent in the work of Gainsborough, Turner and Constable, who described him as ‘the most perfect landscape painter the world ever saw’.
A lesser-known side to Claude is the eccentricity of his graphic art. Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape will exhibit 13 paintings alongside related drawings and etchings from international and private collections, and from the Ashmolean’s own extensive holdings. Claude was a dedicated graphic artist. He drew for the sake of mastering the world of nature but also because drawing was a pleasure in itself. Many of his drawings were made as works of art in their own right. During his own lifetime Claude’s fame grew rapidly. As a guard against forgeries, he made copies of his paintings in a book, the Liber Veritatis (Book of Truth), which, by the time of his death, contained 200 drawings. The book also gave him a collection of ideas which he could reuse when necessary. Although he made only 40 prints in total, all of which are on display, he took a serious interest in printmaking. Similar to his drawings, his principle focus was to explore the potential of the medium. His exceptional technique – a painterly brush-and-ink style replicating natural effects – was a novelty in contemporary printmaking. The spectacular ‘Fireworks’ series, ten etchings made during a week of firework displays in Rome, illustrate his experimental style and will be on show together in the Ashmolean’s exhibition.
Unlike contemporaries who had an academic training, Claude’s style and artistic process were unique to him. He worked frequently with existing materials progressing from one painting to another through a process of variation and combination. His sketching excursions provided him with a stock of motifs, including trees, hills, rivers and antique ruins, which became constant accessories in his paintings. Figure groups were shifted from one composition to another. Landscapes, like stage scenery, were taken out for reuse with a different set of characters. Elsewhere he would cut compositions in two or enlarge them with separate sheets. Occasionally, he would pick up a discarded study and add detail to make it a finished work of art, often with peculiar results.
Claude was also the first artist to specialise in painting ‘pairs’. Approximately half his compositions were made as companion pieces, the earliest of which, on display here, are Landscape with the Judgement of Paris and Coast View (both 1633). The idea of pairs is also found among his prints. While many of his pairs show a compositional correspondence, contrast played as great a role as similarity. Often an Arcadian landscape is combined with a maritime view, or a morning scene with an evening setting. The pairs were not always executed concurrently: his very last painting, the Ashmolean’s great Ascanius and the Stag of Sylvia (1682), was made 5 years after its companion, Aeneas’s Farewell to Dido in Carthage (1676) now in Hamburg.
Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape will display some of Claude’s greatest masterpieces, works which have made his art familiar and well-loved. In placing these beside his graphic art and exploring his singular methods of working, the exhibition aims to expose an unexplored dimension to one of the western canon’s most famous names.
“Claude’s art is recognisable to almost all of us, even if we are less familiar with his name, and this important exhibition will reintroduce us to one of the greatest painters of all time.” Dr Jon Whiteley, Exhibition Curator and Senior Assistant Keeper of Western Art, Ashmolean Museum.
Catalogue: Martin Sonnabend, Jon Whiteley, and Christian Rumelin, Claude Lorrain: The Enchanted Landscape (London: Lund Humphries, 2011), 200 pages, ISBN: 9781848220928, $80.
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S E L E C T E D P R O G R A M M I N G
Colin Harrison (Senior Assistant Keeper of Western Art, Ashmolean Museum), Claude, Wilson, Turner
Saturday, 12 November, 11:00
Claude’s landscape paintings had a profound influence on British artists in the 18th and 19th century. This lecture focuses on his long-lasting inspiration, most apparent in the work of Richard Wilson (1714–1782) and J.M.W Turner (1775-1851).
Michael Clarke (Director of the Scottish National Gallery), Arcadia Revisited – Claude’s Enduring Legacy
Wednesday, 16 November, 2:00
Generally acknowledged as the founder of the European landscape tradition, Claude Lorrain was admired by many of the great European painters, especially Constable and Turner. His work exerted an enormous influence on later generations even eliciting praise from the Impressionist Camille Pissarro. This lecture charts the perennial attraction of an artist who ‘conducts us to the tranquility of Arcadian scenes and fairy land’ (Sir Joshua Reynolds).
Christopher Woodward (Director of the Garden Museum), Claude Lorrain and the Making of the English Landscape Garden
Wednesday, 7 December, 5:00
How did a French artist working in Rome in the 17th-century inspire the creation of 18th-century gardens such as Blenheim, Rousham and Stourhead? Christopher Woodward, Director of The Garden Museum and author of “In Ruins”, explores how Claude’s idyllic Italian scenes inspired the transformation of English gardens into visions of Arcadia.
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