When a venerated medievalist who has contributed great insights into the cultural practices of late medieval elites pens a book that distills a life’s work, it is best to pay attention. This is the [...] Read More
14th and 15th Centuries
Living Pictures. Jan van Eyck and Painting’s First Century
In this ambitious book, Noa Turel argues for a new understanding of the original aims and perception of early Netherlandish painting. Rather than the phenomenal optical realism usually regarded as the [...] Read More
Tree of Jesse Iconography in Northern Europe in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries
In this book, Susan Green addresses the polyvalent and dynamic character of iconography, by focusing on how the depictions of the Tree of Jesse variously functioned in the late Middle Ages. According [...] Read More
Renaissance Metapainting
The very cover of this impressive new anthology sends out a contradiction: its images feature details of the Washington Jan van Eyck Annunciation shutter, yet its editors are noted specialists in [...] Read More
The Library of the Dukes of Burgundy
In September of 2020, the Royal Library of Belgium in Brussels opened a state-of-the-art museum to great fanfare. Its purpose is to offer the public the opportunity to enjoy a rotating exhibit of [...] Read More
Van Eyck
Many readers will have shared my disappointment at having missed the exhibition Van Eyck: An Optical Revolution, which opened at Ghent’s Museum voor Schone Kunsten on February 1st, 2020, and was [...] Read More