© 2021 Sally Whitman Coleman, PhD. All rights reserved.
Sandro Botticelli’s Portrait of a Young Man Holding a Roundel from c. 1480, sold at Sotheby’s this past Thursday, January 28th with a hammer price of $80 ($92.2 million with the buyer’s premium). For a good article about the auction, including information about … Continue reading
Gentile da Fabriano, The Adoration of the Magi, 1423, tempera paint and gold on panel, 80
Epiphany, the church festival that celebrates the visit of the three Wise Men twelve days after the birth of Jesus, was for centuries the most important festival of the Christian year because it is the event that marks the revelation … Continue reading
Attributed to Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Landscape with the Fall of Icarus, c. 1655, oil on panel, 2' 5
Landscape with the Fall of Icarus by William Carlos Williams (1962) According to Brueghel when Icarus fell it was spring a farmer was ploughing his field the whole pageantry of the year was awake tingling near the edge of … Continue reading
Sandro Botticelli, Detail of Venus, c. 1490, Oil on canvas, Galleria Sabauda, Photo via Wikimedia Commons
If you are in Boston anytime before July 9th, make the time to see the exhibition, “Botticelli and the Search for the Divine” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Sandro Botticelli is today, as he was during his lifetime, … Continue reading
Michelangelo, Moses from the Tomb of Pope Julius II, 1512, San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome, Artwork in the Public Domain
The Italian Renaissance Master Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni was born on this day in 1475. He arguably is one of the greatest artists of all time. Before anything else, Michelangelo was a sculptor, his finest achievements in painting and architecture also having a … Continue reading
Suor Plautilla Nelli, The Lamentation, 1550, oil on canvas, Museum of San Marco, Florence, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
On March 8, 2017, the Uffizi in Florence will dedicate an exhibition to the earliest known female Renaissance painter, Suor Plautilla Nelli. This is part of an initiative of the museum’s new director, Eike Schmidt, to highlight work by women … Continue reading
Hieronymus Bosch, Arrest of Christ and Christ Carrying the Cross from the Exterior of the Triptych of The Temptation of St. Anthony, 1505-1506, oil on panel, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon, Artwork in the Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
French for the word gray, grisaille is the technique of painting in a muted monochrome palette. As would be expected, this technique often was used for the underpainting of a work of art; however, in the 15th century artists painted many exteriors of … Continue reading
Sandro Botticelli, Primavera, c. 1482, tempera on panel, 80
The Italian painter Sandro Botticelli was a master of the Early Renaissance, which means that people saw a new naturalism in his art as well as the influence of Classical Antiquity in subject matter and style. Botticelli landed a great job working in Florence … Continue reading
Abraham Bloemaert, The Adoration of the Shepherds, 1612, 113
Abraham Bloemaert (Dec. 25, 1564 – Jan. 27, 1651), the Dutch painter and printmaker living in Utrecht, was born on Christmas Day. A devout Catholic living in the Netherlands, Bloemaert had a thriving business creating religious works of art for the few Catholic churches … Continue reading
Donatello, St. George and the Dragon , c. 1416, marble, 15.25
Schiacciato is the Italian word for “flattened.” In the history of art, it describes a very low relief sculpture, for example those created by the Italian Renaissance sculptor, Donatello.
Levina Teerlinc, Portrait of Katherine Grey, Countess of Hertford, c. 1555-60, 1.3” diameter, watercolor on vellum, London, Victoria and Albert Museum, Artwork in the Public Domain.
Levina Teerlinc is credited with the rise of miniature painting of royals in the 16th century. She was born in Bruges and probably received her artistic training from her father, the well-known illuminator Simon Bening. In 1545, she and her husband … Continue reading
Marcantonio Raimondi, Orpheus Charming the Animals (Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci?), 1505, engraving, 21.4 x 17.3 cm, Cleveland Museum of Art, Photo via artnet news.
Live Science reported yesterday that Ross Duffin, a music professor at Case Western University, claims that the figure playing the lira da braccio (a stringed instrument) in a print created by Marcantonio Raimondi is not the Greek hero Orpheus but … Continue reading