Cathy's Art Diary

Charming online lecture from ARTscapades looking at the life of Isabella D’Este, the Renaissance patron of the arts. Sarah Dunant, introduced her new novel on Isabella, based on her extensive research in the archives in Mantua which holdover 30,000 of her letters. She took us thorough Isabella’s life with readings from her book. Given her audience, Dunant, concentrated on Isabella’s art collecting and building projects including her studiolo. She explained how she liked a bargain and would look further afield that Rome to buy ancient artefacts. Since listening to the talk I have read the book and thoroughly enjoyed it. I’d been looking for a good biography of Isabella for a while and this format felt accurate and a novel format made it more approachable to read. I loved the way she gave Isabella a voice, both from using the real text of her letters and making her a ghostly voice in the archive. This gave Dunant the chance to also look at changing approaches to history and to Isa...

A wonderful new acquisition at the National Gallery of an altarpiece dated around 1510. I’d seen this featured in the papers in the week and was so excited to see it and it didn’t disappoint. The figures in it are monumental and so realistic. I think I may be in love with the Saint Louis, surely he was a portrait.   The iconography is strange and innovative from the quirky dragon at the feet of Saint Margaret to the angel playing the Jews’ harp. The gallery have placed it in the Flemish room alongside Gossaert, Memling and Gerard David and I feel that is the right world for it although some press reports are hedging their bets by saying Flemish/French. I can’t wait to hear more about it and to the years of research work to be done. The instinct is try to attribute it to a known artist but it’s just a likely to be someone we’ve never heard of before and may never be able to name. My only moan is the highly reflective glass on it which didn’t work where it was placed opposit...

Charming exhibition at the national Gallery highlighting two cartoons for frescos by the Carracci Brothers. These two preparatory cartoons by Anibale and Agostino Carracci were used in the decoration of the Palazzo Farnese is Rome and had been owned by Joshua Reynolds before being acquired for the National Gallery. The show displayed them at eye level although the frescos were for a ceiling and accompanied them with good explanations of the art of fresco explaining how they were cut into sections for use but have been stuck back together. They were delicate drawings and I particularly liked a dog in one which seemed quizzical about what was happening to his pack leader. Closes 6 July 2025    

Comprehensive and fascinating four week online course from Paula Nuttall on the Sistine Chapel. As ever with Paula the talk was clear and well thought out with good illustrations. As usual she overran gloriously! Week one we looked at the early frescos after setting the scene and looking at the design of the chapel itself. I love the frescos but never thought about how the project was co-ordinated to give a consistency across the work of multiple artists. Paula’s theory was that Perugino was the master having already been working in Rome and as he painted the most prominent frescos and the altarpiece. Week 2 we looked up to the next stage of the decoration and Michelangelo’s ceiling. I had recently done a course on the young Michelangelo with Paula so this felt like an extension of that. We looked at how the artist painted this massive undertaking from its inception to its unveiling. I was particular interested in the section on his influences. Week 3 was Raphael’s tapestries a...

Useful online lecture from the National Gallery on the life and work of 16th century Venetian artist, Veronese. Sian Walters led us through the artists career with an emphasis on work in the National Gallery and excellent illustrations. She talked about how he fell out of fashion and how when the gallery proposed buying “The Family of Darius Before Alexander” in 1857 the purchase was discussed in Parliament and he was described as “second rate”. We discussed how he differed from his contemporaries Titian and Tintoretto as well as his collaboration with the architect Palladio on the decoration of palace and villas in and around Venice. The talk emphasised the range of his work from large frescos for monastery refectories to portraits of the merchants of the city and their wives.

Interesting five week online course from the London Art History Society looking in detail at the art of 16th century Rome. Led by Dorigen Caldwell from Birkbeck, University of London, we spent the first two weeks examining the idea of the High Renaissance, the overriding term for this period and what the city was like at the time. We then moved onto how classical antiquity was reived and how that influenced art. The next three weeks were spent looking in detail at the three great artists of the period in detail, Michelangelo, Raphael and the architect Bramante. I would like to have seen this widened out to look at other artists at work in the city to see how the ideas spread. The course was a good overview of the period but it is one on which I have done a lot of courses recently so I don’t feel I learnt a lot from this one although it would have made for good revision if I was doing an exam.  

Impressive exhibition at the King’s Gallery looking at Italian Renaissance drawings from the Royal Collection. The show struck a good balance between appealing to the art history geeks like me and being more popularist by including three artists in residence and tables for you to draw at within the show. I liked the way the show was themed, focusing on the subjects of the drawings ranging from studies of bodies, though nature, religious and secular compositional studies and designs for objects. Complimenting this they discussed why and how drawings were made. I liked the small displays of artists materials throughout the show. One moan, which is a common one for me, was the way the lighting reflected off the glass, making it hard to see the detail without seeing lights or looking at yourself! Highlights were this wonderfully complex Guilo Romano tapestry design, a beautiful portrait by Fra Angelico, a study for the Raphael Vatican tapestry using figures in contemporary dress a...

Fascinating exhibition at the Royal Academy focusing on the years in the early 16th century when these three great Renaissance artists were working in Florence. I have done various courses and lectures which have covered this period and I was grateful that I had as I would have liked a bit more scene setting in the narrative and display. A roundup of what the two established artists, Michelangelo and Leonardo, had done before this point would have been useful as well as some more sense of what the city was like and where it was politically. That said, to an art history geek like me, the show was a joy, focusing on a short period of time and covering some iconic projects. I liked the contrast between the mature artists and the young Raphael who was learning from looking at their works. The first room looked at Virgin and Child works and how they were influenced by the “Taddei Tondo” owned by the RA. I liked the depth of this examination. It led into the second room which looked i...

Opulent exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum which looked at the golden age of Mughal art which lasted from about 1580 to 1650. The show was clearly described and included a fabulous selection of art and objects which were beautifully displayed. I loved the way dramatic large carpets were used both as exhibits and as feature walls in some of the spaces. I love the small Mughal paintings which remind me of Medieval illuminations. As these are small, they did create some bottle necks but showing them around the edge of rooms with objects in the centre helped the flow. There were some stunning items such as these enamel dishes, a beautiful selection of jewels, a shield which was in the armory of Grand Duke Ferdinando I de Medici in Florence and some fabulous rock crystal. As this is the same period as lot of the Western Renaissance art I study, I couldn’t help but make comparisons. I was interested to see mention of where the art was influenced by Western prints or where ...

Excellent three-week online course from the National Gallery focusing on Parmigianino’s “Vision of St Jerome” from 1526 which was the subject of a small exhibition at the gallery at the time. Richard Stemp used the six sessions to gradually broaden out from the painting itself to the life of the artist and then onto themes which the painting highlighted. It was cleverly structured and covered a lot of ground. Week one focused on the painting and the exhibition discussing its context, influences and composition. He then looked at the life of the artist and his other works. In week two we looked at the role of women linked to the painting beginning with a useful overview of the history of painting the Virgin Mary and the different archetypal images placing this work within ideas of the Immaculate Conception. We then looked at women as commissioners of art as this work had been commissioned by a widow, Maria Bufalini in memory of her husband. Stemp ran though examples of paintings ...

Useful exhibition at the National Gallery focusing on an altarpiece by Parmigianino during his time in Rome. This strange tall picture has been off display for 10 years and has been conserved before this show. My previous blog post was on a curators’ talk on the show which shone a light on the drawings included in the show. The altarpiece is still powerful and people were standing in awe before it. The strange composition and in particular the powerful figure of John the Baptist draws you in. It was lovely to see it with a selection of drawings by the artist, made to work out the composition in a variety of styles. They helped to understand the choices he made. Closed 9 March 2025 Re views Times Guardian  

Useful online lecture from the National Gallery introducing their exhibition on a painting from 1526 by Parmigianino. Maria Alambritis, the project curator and Mattias Wivel, a former curator at the gallery, told us the history of the work including telling us how Parmigianino was working on it during the Sack of Rome but the German soldiers were so impressed by the work that they let him finish it. The show also includes a number of the drawings for the project and they outlined what each had been used for and how we can see him working out problems in the composition. They also looked at possible influences for the work. They spent some time discussing some of the theological ideas behind the work in particular “The Immaculate Conception” and the “Woman of the Apocalypse”. I went to the exhibition the following day so look out for the next blog post describing it!

Excellent three week online course from Paul Nutall looking in detail at the first thirty years of Michelangelo’s career. As ever Paula was very clear with excellent illustrations and quotes. Of course she ran over time but she always does and that’s part of the fun of her courses. Week one we looked at Michelangelo’s life until he left for Rome in 1496, a short period he spent in Bologna and the first few years after he arrived in Rome. We discussed how we know so much about him, what his influences were and where he might have trained, even if he claimed he hadn’t. Week two concentrated on the early masterpieces in Rome the Bacchus and the Pieta shown here then the David made on his return to Florence and the Bruges Madonna. We also looked at other work done in this period between these iconic works such at the National Gallery’s two panel paintings. Finally week three looked at his years back in Florence and in particular the battle of the battle scenes for the Palazzo Vecch...

Useful online lecture from the London Art History Society looking at the different reasons artists drew in the Renaissance. Grant Lewis from the British Museum proposed that as well as drawing being a way of working out compositions and for use within the studio as artists tried to enhance their prestige they became collectable by patrons. He outlined Vasari’s principle of disegno or design and how being able to see the intellectual thought behind a work became important in raising the status of artists. Lewis showed us how some artists, including Raphael, made works which looked like spontaneous preparatory work but were actually   constructed with underdrawings which were rubbed out. They were playing with these ideals and using the drawings as an act of performance. He also talked about how a market developed for finished drawings with some by Michelangelo talking up to 6 months to produce although he also told us about Luca Cambiaso whose drawings were so popular he set ...

Fascinating exhibition at the Academia Gallery in Venice recreating the ceiling Giorgio Vasari painted for Palazzo Corner Spinelli. Over the last 40 years the gallery has been acquiring the nine panels shown here which were shown together in a new display   which will enter the permanent museum itinerary in a dedicated hall. It was being shown with two short videos about how it had been recreated and installed. I would have liked to know a bit more about where all the panels had been acquired and where they had been. No end date given unveiled 28 August 2024

Exquisite small exhibition at the British Museum putting their new acquisition of a drawing by Rembrandt of a sleeping child in context. The show looked at pictures of children in Dutch and Flemish 6th and 17th centuries works in the context of art and social history. They ran chronologically placing Rembrandt in the centre of the timeline. I loved the early drawings by Henrick Goltzius as well as his engraving of Frederick de Vries who was his apprentice while the boys artist father was in Venice. It was done to send to his father to Sue him there but was well! There was a good selection of Rembrandt drawings from the collection featuring children and the commentary talked about how he often saved drawings of everyday life to reuse the images in religious works. The focal drawing, shown here, was so delicate. Finally the show looked at followers of Rembrandt and a new find for me were some beautiful, coloured interiors by Adriaen Van Ostade. Closed 6 October 2024   ...

Well-constructed online lecture from the National Churches Trust looking at the 15th and 16th century phenomena of cadaver tombs in England. I have always been fascinated by these tombs since seeing that of Alice de la Pole in Ewelme as a child. Morgan Ellis Leah from the Trust’s engagement team described a selection of them and developed the argument that in England these were not corpses and a memento mori but instead represented the starvation of the soul and show emaciated bodies. She looked at the turbulent history of the period due to wars, poor crops an economic crisis post Black Death. She pointed out that one effect of the plague was a shortage of chaplains which led to people relying on themselves for spiritual support and turning back to old ideas. She also talked about the tradition of eating at burial sites dating back to the Romans and idea of Sin Eating as well as the inclusion of dishes and food in Saxon burials.

Fascinating online discussion from the British Museum looking in detail at Michelangelo’s Epifania cartoon. Sarah Vowels and Grant Lewis, curators of the excellent exhibition “Michelangelo: The Last Decades” at the museum, introduced us to the cartoon dated from around 1550-3 and its possible iconography. They also talked about the painting based on it by Condivi which was also in the show. Art historian Daniel Godfrey then took us through the history of the cartoon after Michelangelo’s death and how it got to be in the museum’s collection. Finally conservator, Emma Turner led us through the six year conservation project with some great pictures of all the processes and explained what had been discovered during the project. All the talks added to a more rounded view of the picture and its history.

Thoughtful exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery looking at Henry VIII’s wives. The show cleverly started by looking at the afterlife of the women and how their stories have been told on stage and screen and in literature. It discussed how each era has projected their own values onto them. As a child of the 70s I was excited to see costume designs for the tv series on them which I loved and which probably sparked my interest in history. These were shown alongside costumes from other productions including the current “Six”. The show then went on to set the scene of what the court was like and in particular the role of mythical and biblical stories in the art and literature. The meat of the show then went through the Queens in order discussing their lives and the people around them and giving a flavour of what they collected and had around them. There were beautiful objects and paintings including good use of miniatures. The show was full of excited Tudor geeks when I wa...

Fabulous exhibition at the British Museum focusing on the last three decades of Michelangelo’s life and career. The show was beautifully arranged with a clear narrative for a complicated subject. The labels not only told you about the image but also told you where it fitted into the story with some charming details such as the fact one picture was painted for the children of his servant, Urbino, who died. The show covered major projects, such as the Sistine Chapel “Last Judgement”, but also looked at his architectural projects and private drawings. There were sections of his friendships with Tommaso de'Cavalieri and Vittoria Colonna including a clear description of the latter’s poetry and religious beliefs. There was a good analysis of his collaboration with other artists including Marcello Venusti and Daniele da Volterra outlining how he produced drawings for them to work from. Most moving was the last section of drawings which were probably made as part of his meditative p...