Book Reviews

‘A la mode italienne’. Commerce du luxe et diplomatie dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux, 1477-1530. Edition criticque de documents de la Chambre des comptes de Lille

By Federica Veratelli

Lille: Presses universitaires du Septentrion. Archives départementales du Nord Villeneuve d’Ascq, 2013. 418 pp, illustrated. ISBN 978-2-77574-0424-9

Review published April 2015

This book comes as a surprise, as it is an unusual book, both in terms of its subject matter and in terms of its method. The Italian art historian Federica Veratelli undertook several years of [...] Read More

Men of Taste. Essays on Art Collecting in East-Central Europe

By Ingrid Ciulisová

Bratislava: VEDA 2014. 174pp, 58 illus, most color. ISBN 978-80-224-1338-1

Review published November 2014

A milestone in art history scholarship was laid down a quarter-century ago with the founding of the Journal of the History of Collections, and incrementally our gaps of knowledge of provenance and [...] Read More

Deaf, Dumb & Brilliant: Johannes Thopas Master Draughtsman

By Rudi Ekkart

Cat. exh. Suermondt-Ludwig Museum, Aachen, March 13 – June 22, 2014; Museum Het Rembrandthuis, Amsterdam, July 12 – October 5, 2014. London: Paul Holberton Publishing 2014. 200 pp., 166 illus., some in color. ISBN 978-1-907372-67-4

Review published November 2014

Books that focus attention on unheralded masters of talent and historical significance are rarities these days. For that reason alone, Rudi Ekkart’s Deaf, Dumb & Brilliant deserves special notice. [...] Read More

Rembrandt in perspectief. De veranderende visie op de meester en zijn werk

By Jaco Rutgers and Mieke Rijnders, eds

Zwolle: Waanders Uitgevers, 2014. 359 pp, 20 b&w, 392 color illus. ISBN 978-94-91196-60-7

Review published November 2014

This lively book examines the history of critical responses to Rembrandt from the artist's own time to the present day. All ten contributors are Dutch, and the text was designed primarily for students [...] Read More

The Wake of Iconoclasm: Painting the Church in the Dutch Republic

By Angela Vanhaelen

University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press 2012. 222 pp, 56 illus. ISBN 978-0-271-05061-4

Review published November 2014

In her important new book, Angela Vanhaelen argues that seventeenth-century Dutch church interior paintings address a particular moment in history – one of transition – in which the Dutch attempted to [...] Read More

Art and Science in the Early Modern Netherlands (Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek / Netherlands Yearbook for the History of Art 61, 2011)

By Eric Jorink and Bart Ramakers, eds.

Zwolle: WBooks 2011. 367 pp, fully illustrated. ISBN 978-90-400-7808-0

Review published November 2014

Volume 61 of the NKJ is devoted to “Art and Science in the Early Modern Netherlands,” focusing upon topics from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In the Introduction, the editors stress that [...] Read More