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Out of darkness, light: The development of chiaroscuro 2
In the first of these two articles looking briefly at the history of ‘compositional’ chiaroscuro in painting, I traced some early examples from the Renaissance before showing a selection from its...
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Jerusalem Delivered: 14 Heroes and Heroines
Tasso’s Jerusalem Delivered features six leading characters, three men and three women. In this my final article looking at this epic and its paintings, I’m going to look at their stories and fate. The...
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Fjords and Munch: In memory of Adelsteen Normann 1
Some artists, though their own work never has any great impact, change the course of art. Next week I will be commemorating the centenary of the death of the Norwegian landscape painter Eilert...
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Painting Reality: 3 Spread
Naturalism may have emerged in France, thanks at least in part to the Third Republic, but it rapidly became established internationally. This was largely due to Paris, in particular, and France more...
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The Decameron: The flowerpot’s grisly secret
Some stories in Boccaccio’s Decameron attained fame less in the original, but in much later retelling. A good example is the tragic tale of Lisabetta related by Filomena on the fourth day, when it was...
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Collins and Copping: Words, paintings, and Charles Dickens
Ever since Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol was published in 1843, its character Scrooge, author Dickens and Christmas have been strongly associated in the English-reading world. It happens this year...
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In memoriam: Charles Edward Perugini 1839-1918
In 1863, Frederic Leighton, as he was then, was an up-and-coming artist who moved in Pre-Raphaelite circles. Well-travelled in Europe, he had studied in both Florence and Paris, but was then living and...
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Dickens’ A Christmas Carol in paintings
A Christmas Carol was not Charles Dickens’ first attempt at a Christmas story, but probably remains the most successful of any writer in the English language. Published on 19 December 1843, the first...
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The Annunciation, old and new
The festival of the Annunciation is overshadowed by Lent and Easter. As tomorrow is Christmas Day, here is a look at some more unusual paintings of the annunciation to the Virgin Mary: one of the most...
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The Modern Christmas, paintings 1867-1921
For previous Christmases, I have shown collections of nativity scenes. This year, following on from the theme of a Dickensian Christmas, my selection shows Christmas festivities during the latter half...
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Fjords and Munch: In memory of Adelsteen Normann 2
In 1892, the Norwegian landscape painter Eilert Adelsteen Normann (1848-1918) had invited the young Edvard Munch to exhibit in Berlin, and launched Munch on his way to the success which he deserved....
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Painting Reality: 4 Art and the State
Many Naturalist paintings depicted the plight of the rural poor during the early years of the French Third Republic, which was hailed for the reforms which its politicians promised. One of the major...
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The Decameron: The wrong way to a man’s heart
Last week, I looked at the tragic tale of Lisabetta which was told by Filomena on the fourth day of Boccaccio’s Decameron. The first story that day was equally tragic. Although it is less familiar in...
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Painting Goethe’s Faust: 0 Introduction to a new series
Narrative painters in the nineteenth century seldom painted contemporary stories, taken from the great and popular authors of that century, such as Victor Hugo, Charles Dickens, or Émile Zola. The...
View ArticleComments disabled for older articles, a temporary measure
At present, this blog is being subjected to a very high volume of spam comments, advertising all sorts of products and being a thorough nuisance. For the next day or so, I am turning off the ability to...
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The best of 2018’s paintings and articles 1
Last year I greatly enjoyed looking at a very wide range of paintings, particularly those from the nineteenth century, and those bearing narrative. In this article and tomorrow’s, I look back at some...
View ArticleComments on all articles permitted again
I have now enabled commenting on all articles again, in the hope that those posting comment spam have gone away. So please feel free to comment on whatever you wish.
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The best of 2018’s paintings and articles 2
Although there remains some uncertainty over the exact year of his birth, modern opinion is that Jacopo Tintoretto was born half a millenium ago, in 1518. I therefore took the opportunity to celebrate...
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Next Year in Paintings: da Vinci, Courbet, Renoir, and more
There are some major anniversaries of artists this year, most notably the five hundredth since the death of Leonardo da Vinci, the bicentenary of the birth of Gustave Courbet, and centenary of the...
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William Powell Frith 1: Dickens and Social Panoramas
Many British artists of the nineteenth century painted motifs quite independent of their age, but William Powell Frith (1819–1909) was quintessentially Victorian. His paintings captured the spirit and...
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