The Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg possesses around 250 German and Austrian paintings from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Most pictures are by now anonymous masters who are, not [...] Read More
Germany and Central Europe
Perfection’s Therapy. An Essay on Albrecht Dürer’s Melencolia I
Mitchell B. Merback’s most recent book, Perfection’s Therapy: An Essay on Albrecht Dürer’s Melencolia I, argues that this celebrated and much-discussed engraving incites a therapeutic or healing [...] Read More
Perspectives on Wenceslaus Hollar
Only the most renowned printmakers ever seem to get closer analysis. But Wenceslaus Hollar, the multinational etcher (1607 Prague-1677 London), has chiefly received exhibition attention only, so this [...] Read More
Albrecht Dürer & the Epistolary Mode of Address
This intriguing and ambitious book seeks to make a major contribution to the field by proposing the existence and importance of an “epistolary mode of artistic address,” which Dürer “played a large [...] Read More
Aus aller Herren Länder. Die Künstler der “Teutschen Academie” von Joachim von Sandrart
Until very recently, one of the most neglected of all foundational primary sources in European painting history remained Sandrart's Teutsche Academie (1675; Latin edition 1683), including a reliable [...] Read More
Michael Pacher: Zwischen Zeiten und Räumen
In German art, the question a "Northern Renaissance" and when (or if) it occurred usually centers around such turn-of-the-epoch figures as Albrecht Dürer and the magic year 1500. Moreover, dominant [...] Read More
Bella Figura: Europäische Kunst in Süddeutschland um 1600
Bronze sculpture of the late sixteenth century tends to be associated with Italy, specifically with the work of Giambologna, so an exhibition of bronzes originating mostly from southern Germany [...] Read More
Visual Acuity and the Arts of Communication in Early Modern Germany (Visual Culture in Early Modernity)
Made up of an established core and a changing array of international contributors, Frühe Neuzeit Interdisziplinär gathers every three years. Scholars present new research on early modern Germany, and [...] Read More
Georg Pencz. Künstler zu Nürnberg
If we consult received wisdom (I used Giulia Bartrum's reliable survey, German Renaissance Prints 1490-1550, 1995), we find several accepted facts about Georg Pencz (vital statistics given, c. [...] Read More
Fantastische Welten. Albrecht Altdorfer und das Expressive in der Kunst um 1500
I always thought that the term "expressive" was a modernist or twentieth-century concept, in which the depiction of figure types and formal elements conjured up a peculiar state of mind or conveyed [...] Read More
Men of Taste. Essays on Art Collecting in East-Central Europe
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
Two New Studies on Dürer
Stephanie Buck and Stephanie Porras, The Young Dürer: Drawing the Figure. Cat. exh. Courtauld Gallery, London, October 17, 2013 – January 12, 2014. London: Courtauld Gallery 2013. 287 pp, fully [...] Read More
Albrecht Dürer. His Art in Context
Hard on the heels of the blockbuster Nuremberg exhibition, The Early Dürer, of last year (reviewed in this journal November 2012), Frankfurt now presents its own reassessment with a wider reach. Let [...] Read More
Hans von Aachen in Context
The major 2010-11 exhibition, Hans von Aachen (1552-1615): A Court Artist in Europe generated widespread interest at its three venues (Aachen-Prague-Vienna) and occasioned an international conference [...] Read More
Imperial Augsburg: Renaissance Prints and Drawings 1475-1540
During the Renaissance, the imperial city of Augsburg in southern Germany became an important artistic center. Its financial prosperity in banking and trade – as seen in the enormous wealth of the [...] Read More