Book Reviews

Carel Fabritius 1622-1654

By Frederik J. Duparc

With contributions by Ariane van Suchtelen and Gero Seelig. [Cat. exh. Royal Cabinet of Paintings Mauritshuis, The Hague, September 24, 2004 – January 9, 2005; Staatliches Museum, Schwerin, January 28 – May 16, 2005.] Zwolle: Waanders Publishers, 2004. 160 pp, 80 col. illus., 35 b&w illus. German ed: ISBN 90-400-9029-7 (pb); Dutch ed: ISBN 90-400-8987-6 (pb); English ed. ISBN 90-400-95-8989-2 (hb)/ 90-400-95-8988-4 (pb)

Review published November 2005

On the morning of Monday, October 12, 1654, the former sexton of the Oude Kerk in Delft was sitting to Carel Fabritius for his portrait in the latter’s studio on the Doelenstraat. Between 10 and 10:30 [...] Read More

Am Anfang war das Wort. Das Ende der “stommen schilderkonst” am Beispiel Rembrandts

By Christiane Häslein

Weimar: VDG, Verlag und Datenbank für Geisteswissenschaften, 2004. 317 pp, 13 b&w illus. ISBN 3-89739-427-8

Review published November 2005

The point of departure for Christiane Häslein is the observation that in many of his works, Rembrandt attempts to visualize the intangible: the spoken word. She explains this phenomenon as the [...] Read More

Time and Transformation in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art

By Susan Donahue Kuretsky

With contributions by Walter S. Gibson, Catherine Levesque, Erik P. Löffler, Lynn Federle Orr, and Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr. [Cat. exh. Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY, April 8 – June 19, 2005; John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, FL, August 20 – October 30, 2005; J.B. Speed Museum, Louisville, KY, January 10 – March 16, 2006.] Poughkeepsie, NY: Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, 2005; distributed by the University of Washington Press, Seattle. 299 pp, 161 b&w illus., 81 color plates. ISBN 0-964426-37-4

Review published November 2005

Scholarship on seventeenth-century Dutch art has tended to be conservative, for the most part sticking to the well-trodden paths of archival research, iconography, and Stilgeschichte. On the rare [...] Read More

Dutch Seventeenth-Century Genre Painting: Its Stylistic and Thematic Evolution

By Wayne Franits

New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004. 328 pp, 247 illus. ISBN 0-3001-0237-2

Review published November 2005

Dutch Seventeenth-Century Genre Painting: Its Stylistic and Thematic Evolution represents a publishing event: a new survey devoted solely to the eponymous phenomenon, “from its first manifestations in [...] Read More

The Learned Eye. Regarding Art, Theory, and the Artist’s Reputation. Essays for Ernst van de Wetering

By Marieke van den Doel, Natasja van Eck, Gerbrand Korevaar, Anna Tummers and Thijs Weststeijn (eds.)

Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2005. 228 pp., 50 color, 36 b&w illus. ISBN 90-5356-713-5

Review published November 2005

The Learned Eye takes its name from a passage in Franciscus Junius's treatise on painting (1641) in which he argues for informed viewing as the essential skill on which critical aesthetic judgments [...] Read More

Collected Opinions: Essays on Netherlandish Art in Honour of Alfred Bader

By Volker Manuth and Axel Rüger (eds.)

London: Paul Holberton Publishing, 2004. 296 pp, 96 color plates, 40 b&w illus. ISBN I903470358. Distributed by University of Washington Press, Seattle

Review published November 2005

As a discerning collector, generous benefactor, and perceptive scholar, Alfred Bader has made a lasting and significant contribution to the study of Netherlandish art. His autobiography Adventures of [...] Read More

Historians of Netherlandish Art Reviews

Book Reviews