Exhibition and Exhibition Catalogue Reviews

Turning Heads (Krasse Koppen): Rubens, Rembrandt and (en) Vermeer

By Nico Van Hout, Koen Bulckens, Michael W. Kwakkelstein, Lizzie Marx, and Friederike Schütt, with Vicki Bruce & Andy Young, Sara de Bosschere, Cian McLoughlin, Elvis Pompilio, and Stephan Vanfleteren.

Exh. cat. Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, October 20, 2023 – January 21, 2024; National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, February 24 – May 26, 2024. Antwerp: Hannibal Books and KMSKA, 2023. 191 pp, 136 color illus. ISBN 978 94 6466 664 9.
English and Dutch editions (English reviewed here)

Review published September 2025

As psychologists have long known, there is no visual experience more powerful than coming face-to-face with another human being. It is not surprising, then, that human physiognomy has occupied artists [...] Read More

Rachel Ruysch: Nature into Art

By Robert Schindler, Bernd Ebert, and Anna C. Knaap (curators)

Munich, Alte Pinakothek, November 26, 204 – March 16, 2025; Toledo, OH, Toledo Museum of Art, April 13 – July 27, 2025; Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, August 23 – December 7, 2025. Exh. cat. edited by Robert Schindler, Bernd Ebert, and Anna C. Knaap. With contributions by Marianne Berardi, Charles C. Davis, Lieke van Deinsen, Josephina de Fouw, Nouchka de Keyser, Jorinda Koenen, Bert van de Roemer, and Katharina Schmidt-Loske. Boston, MA, MFA Publications, 2025. 248 pp, fully illustrated in color. ISBN 978-0-87846-899-7.

Review published August 2025

Every historian of Dutch art knows of Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750) but few know much about her. Flower painter, daughter of the famed anatomist Frederik Ruysch… and there it usually stops. There has not [...] Read More

Little Beasts. Art, Wonder, and the Natural World

By Alexandra Libby, Brooks Rich, and Stacey Sell (curators)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, May 18 – November 2, 2025 Exh. Cat. edited by Alexandra Libby, Brooks Rich, and Stacey Sell. Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2025. 224 pp, 105 color illus. ISBN 978-0-69127-130-9.

Review published May 2025

Insects have been enjoying increased visibility in early modern art history studies. After the late Janice Neri’s book, The Insect and the Image: Visualizing Nature in Early Modern Europe, 1500-1700 [...] Read More

The Allure of Rome: Maarten Van Heemskerck Draws the City; Maarten van Heemskerck: 1498–1574

By Tatjana Bartsch, Christien Melzer and Hans-Ulrich Kessler (curators); Ilja M. Veldman (guest curator)

The Allure of Rome: Maarten Van Heemskerck Draws the City
By Tatjana Bartsch, Christien Melzer and Hans-Ulrich Kessler (curators)
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, April 26 – August 4, 2024
Exhibition catalogue edited by Tatjana Bartsch and Christien Melzer. Munich: Hirmer, 2024. 352 pp, cat. fully illustrated in color. ISBN 978-3-7774-4344-7.

Maarten van Heemskerck: 1498–1574
By Ilja M. Veldman (guest curator)
Stedelijk Museum Alkmaar and Teylers Museum and Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, September 28, 2024 – January 19, 2025
Accompanying book by Ilja M. Veldman. Zwolle: WBOOKS, 2024. 303 pp, cat. fully illustrated in color. ISBN 9789462586567.

Review published March 2025

The books under review here support exhibitions of works by the Haarlem artist Maarten van Heemskerck (1498–1574) on the 450th anniversary of his death. With The Allure of Rome, spearheaded by Tatjana [...] Read More

Renaissance im Norden. Holbein, Burgkmair und die Augsburger Kunst im Zeitalter der Fugger | Renaissance in the North: Holbein, Burgkmair and the Age of the Fuggers

By Jochen Sander and Guido Messling (curators)

Frankfurt, Städel Museum, Frankfurt, November 2, 2023 – February 18, 2024; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, March 19 – June 30, 2024
Exh. cat. edited by Guido Messling and Jochen Sander. Munich: Hirmer Verlag, 2023, 360 pp, 287 illus., mostly in color. ISBN 978-3-7774-4203-7 (English), 978-3-7774-4202-0 (German).

Review published February 2025

Along with Nuremberg, Augsburg was a leading center of art production in the early sixteenth century in Upper Germany, one that until recently in the scholarship has tended to play second fiddle to [...] Read More

Revoir Van Eyck: Rencontre avec un chef d’oeuvre. La Vierge du chancelier Rolin

By Sophie Caron (curator)

Paris, Musée du Louvre, March 20 – June 17, 2024.

Exh. cat. Jan van Eyck: La Vierge du chancelier Rolin, edited by Sophie Caron. Paris: Louvre éditions / Lienart, 2024. 240 pp, 160 illus. ISBN 978-2-35906-430-8.

Review published August 2024

Entering the recent Louvre exhibition dedicated to the restored Virgin of Chancellor Nicolas Rolin by Jan van Eyck came with a sense of occasion, even drama. The narrow banners flanking the doorway [...] Read More

Historians of Netherlandish Art Reviews

Exhibition and Exhibition Catalogue Reviews