Enfilade

José de Madrazo y Agudo, The Dispute between Apollo and Cupid, detail, ca. 1812, pencil and grey-brown wash on wove paper, 29 × 22 cm
(Madrid: Prado, D006523)

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From press release for the exhibition:

Changing Forms: Myth & Metamorphosis in the Roman Drawings of José de Madrazo

Cambio de forma: Mito y metamorfosis en los dibujos romanos de José de Madrazo

Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, 10 March — 22 June 2025

Changing Forms: Myth and Metamorphosis in the Roman Drawings of José de Madrazo showcases the intriguing works of José de Madrazo y Agudo (1781–1859), the first artistic director of the Museo Nacional del Prado. The exhibition offers a unique glimpse into Madrazo’s fascination with classical mythology and its reflection of a turbulent era. During a time when Europe was reshaped by Napoleon and Goya captured the horrors of war, Madrazo, then in exile in Rome, explored the transformative power of myth.

José de Madrazo y Agudo, Josefa Tudó with Her Sons Manuel and Luis Godoy, in a Garden, ca. 1812, oil on panel 20 × 16 cm (Madrid: Prado).

The exhibition features a collection of drawings and portraits from the Daza-Madrazo collection, acquired by the Prado in 2006, highlighting Madrazo’s ability to interpret ancient stories through a contemporary lens. The exhibition is structured around two distinct sets of works, prompting questions about their original purpose. One set appears to be preparatory sketches for engravings, while the other, semicircular compositions, suggests they were intended for decorative purposes, possibly for the exiled court of Charles IV in Rome. Themes like the contest between Apollo and Cupid are prominent, revealing Madrazo’s personal and scholarly approach to myth.

A notable inclusion is Madrazo’s Portrait of Josefa Tudó and Her Children, where they are depicted as mythological figures. This highlights how Madrazo incorporated mythological symbolism into his portraiture, adding layers of meaning to his works. The exhibition also delves into Madrazo’s self-representation, featuring his silhouette, a lithographic portrait, and a photograph, demonstrating his interest in evolving artistic technologies. These pieces span different periods of his life, showcasing his experimental nature.

Changing Forms goes beyond a simple display of technical skill, inviting visitors to consider the historical context in which Madrazo worked, a period marked by significant change. The exhibition emphasizes how Madrazo’s exploration of metamorphosis was not just a theme in his art, but a reflection of his own ability to adapt and reinvent himself. The Daza-Madrazo collection, a key resource for understanding Madrazo’s drawing practice, is central to the exhibition. It reveals his creative process, aesthetic choices, and the complexities of his Roman period.

Madrazo’s deep engagement with classical texts and art history is evident in his detailed drawings. He combined diverse sources to enrich his narratives, demonstrating a rigorous study of both past and present artistic trends. The exhibition aims to provide a deeper understanding of José de Madrazo’s artistic vision and his ability to navigate a time of significant historical and artistic change. Visitors are encouraged to explore the connection between myth, transformation, and the artist’s own journey.

View of the exhibition The Most Formidable Weapon against Errors: The Sid Lapidus ’59 Collection and the Age of Reason, as installed at Princeton’s Firestone Library, 2025.

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Now on view at Princeton:

The Most Formidable Weapon against Errors

The Sid Lapidus ’59 Collection and the Age of Reason

Firestone Library, Princeton University, 19 February — 8 June 2025

Curated by Steven Knowlton

Thinking of the start of his long career as a collector of rare books, Sid Lapidus recalled, “My first antiquarian book was purchased in 1959. In a bookseller’s dusty window, I noticed a small book, a 1792 edition of Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man. The principal theme of my collection was even embedded in the title of [this first purchase].”

That principal theme is the documenting of new conceptions of human liberty, political order, and scientific reasoning that emerged in the Anglo-American intellectual world between the 17th and 19th centuries. It resulted in a large book collection now dispersed in libraries on the East Coast. This exhibition attempts to provide an overview of Sid Lapidus’s overall achievement.

• Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason
• Thomas Paine, Rights of Man
• The Stamp Act Crisis
• Slavery and Emancipation
• Jewish Oppression and Liberation in England and the United States
• Medicine
• Astronomy and Atomic Science

A dedicated philanthropist, Lapidus has donated his books to several libraries, including Princeton University Library, the American Antiquarian Society, the Wolf Law Library at William & Mary Law School, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the Center for Jewish History, the New York Historical, and the New York University Health Sciences Library. His contributions have strengthened the existing collections at those libraries, helping create collections of research value, with works that often are in conversation with one another.

The entire Sid Lapidus ’59 Collection on Liberty and the American Revolution in Princeton University Library has been digitized. You’re invited to browse or search within the collection here»

From the V&A press release:

Wedgwood and Darwin

V&A Wedgwood Collection, Barlaston, Stoke-on-Trent, 24 February — June 2025

This display will explore the story of Josiah Wedgwood’s grandson Charles Darwin (1809–1882) and how the family link inspired Wedgwood ceramics creative output. Thirty-five historic objects from the collection will go on display alongside the acquisitions from Wedgwood’s new range inspired by Darwin’s Voyage of the Beagle. The display forms part of an ambitious new public events programme for 2025, marking ten years since the Wedgwood Collection was saved for the nation following a successful fundraising campaign spearheaded by Art Fund. Housed alongside the working Wedgwood factory at World of Wedgwood in Stoke-on-Trent, the collection celebrates the legacy of British potter and entrepreneur Josiah Wedgwood (1730–1795) and forms a unique record of over 260 years of British ceramic production, evolving tastes, changing fashions, and manufacturing innovation.

The press release marking the 10th anniversary of the V&A Wedgwood Collection is available here»

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Francisco Muntaner, The Spinners, detail, 1796, engraving
(Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett / Dietmar Katz)

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From the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin:

Get to Work! The Work and Toil of Women

An die Arbeit! Vom Schaffen und Schuften der Frauen

Kupferstichkabinett, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin 18 February — 18 May 2025

Curated by Dagmar Korbacher, Mailena Mallach, and Christien Melzer

Women’s contributions to society are often unseen and seldom considered in art. Many women’s names and their stories have long since been forgotten. Using French, German, Italian, Spanish and Dutch works on paper, this exhibition looks behind the allegorical scenes to shed light on women’s work in early modern Europe.

Louise Madeleine Cochin, after Charles-Nicolas Cochin the Younger, Le Chanteur de Cantiques, 1742, engraving and etching, 38 × 28 cm (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett / Dietmar Katz).

This small thematic exhibition presents 25 French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch prints from the 16th to 18th centuries preserved in the Kupferstichkabinett’s (Museum of Prints and Drawings) rich holdings. Works have been selected that show women in everyday activities, working as peasants, farmhands, teachers, maids, midwives and courtesans. One focus provide insight into the professions practised by women, including attending to births as midwives; another shows those areas of society where men and women went about their daily tasks side by side (as equals?). Beneath the allegorical layers of meaning, the viewer often discovers self-confident women going about their lives, yet the hardship of everyday travail is evident. To this day, so-called care work for children and the elderly receives little recognition; efforts are being made to reconcile work and family life and to achieve equality between women and men, including in financial matters, but these goals have yet to be fully attained. At the same time, it becomes clear that many of the depictions displayed were created by men—Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, and Rembrandt—to name just a few. Their (male) view of women characterised societal perspectives for centuries. Also represented, however, are two women artists, Louise Magdeleine Horthemels (1686–1767) and Marguerite Ponce (1745–1800), who earned their livings creating art.

An die Arbeit! Vom Schaffen und Schuften der Frauen is the Kupferstichkabinett’s contribution to Women’s Month in March, as well as to Equal Pay Day (7 March) and Labour Day (1 May in Europe). The exhibition is curated by Dagmar Korbacher, director; Mailena Mallach, curator of German art before 1800; and Christien Melzer, curator of Dutch and English art before 1800, Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

Opening in May at Historic Deerfield:

Body by Design: Fashionable Silhouettes from the Ideal to the Real

Historic Deerfield, Deerfield, Massachusetts, 3 May 2025 — 22 February 2026

Gown or robe à la française, made in France or Amsterdam, ca. 1765; blue and white brocade weave silk (paduasoy?, bleached plain weave linen lining, and silk knotted fringe (Historic Deerfield, F.355).

This exhibition explores the enduring interest in clothing our bodies to achieve fashionable shapes. It will feature twenty-five ensembles from the 18th to 21st centuries drawn predominantly from Historic Deerfield’s renowned clothing collection. Displayed along with the historical garments will be the understructures—stays, corsets, hoops skirts, and bustles—that helped shape, exaggerate, or reduce bodies to fit fashionable ideals. The show follows a loose chronological organization starting with two garments from the 1760s: a woman’s formal dress with exaggerated wide skirt supported by hooped petticoats and a man’s pink and gold brocaded suit. Fashions from the 19th century highlight huge sleeves, corseted torsos, and skirts that were supported by crinolines and bustles. Fashion plates from the museum’s collection will help contextualize styles within their time while select modern fashions, juxtaposed with historical garments, offer interesting connections between the past and today.

Opening next month at the Yale University Art Gallery:

Romney: Brilliant Contrasts in Georgian England

Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, 17 March — 14 September 2025

Organized by Brooke Krancer with the assistance of Martina Droth and Laurence Kanter

George Romney, A Conversation (or The Artist’s Brothers Peter and James Romney), 1766, oil on canvas (New Haven: Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection).

Romney: Brilliant Contrasts in Georgian England, co-organized by the Yale University Art Gallery and the Yale Center for British Art to celebrate the YCBA’s reopening, features the work of the British portrait painter George Romney (1734–1802). Remembered today for his fashionable likenesses of wealthy patrons, Romney was rivaled in late eighteenth-century London only by the now better known artists Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds. His aspirations to be a history painter were never realized, but his many drawings serve as a testament to those greater ambitions. These swiftly executed sketches reveal a mastery of form, line, and light, while his proficiency as a musician and early experience building musical instruments distinguish him among his polymath contemporaries. To fully explore the era’s subjects and sensibilities, paintings and drawings by Romney from both museums are shown alongside selections from the Morris Steinert Collection of Musical Instruments. Unveiling the contrasts in his artistic practice, the exhibition presents a forceful vision—one that has resonated with admirers through the centuries, from William Blake in Romney’s own time to the portraitist Kehinde Wiley today.

This exhibition is made possible by the Wolfe Family Exhibition and Publication Fund and is organized by Brooke Krancer, Senior Curatorial Assistant, Yale Center for British Art, with the assistance of Martina Droth, Paul Mellon Director, Yale Center for British Art, and Laurence Kanter, Chief Curator and the Lionel Goldfrank III Curator of European Art.