Cathy's Art Diary

Learned exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery of drawings used by Flemish print makers in Antwerp in the 16th century. This is quite a niche show but you know me, I like niche. There are some exquisite drawings many of them shown with the final print also excellent commentaries telling you about the artist, engravers and publisher. The star of the show was the amazingly detailed Pieter Bruegel the Elder of The Fair at Hoboken from 1559. The copper plate for the print was used for 200 years. The print was clearer but more crude than the drawing. I loved a drawing by print maker Johannes Wierix from 1586 of the Pool of Bethesda and it was a nice touch there were also prints by him based on drawings by other artists. Also Jan Van def Staet’s view of the Arno with a river god from 1575 which had originally been a design for a tapestry for Grand Duke Cosimo I. The figure of the river god had been changed by cutting out the paper it was on an inserting a new version. Closes 25 Septemb...

Excellent six week online course form the National Gallery looking at the history and art of the main centres in Northern Europe in the Renaissance. Jo Walton took us clearly though the period splitting the lectures geographically starting with France focusing on Paris, Dijon and the Loire, moving on to Bruges and Flanders, the court of the Holy Roman Empire, Nuremberg and Durer, London and the Hanseatic League and finishing with Antwerp. This order did take us on a rough chronology of the time as well with some overlap. In each case Walton blended the history of the area and the art it produced showing how the two often went hand in hand for example when rulers used art to promote and control their image or competed with each other to commissioned the richest and best work. She tired things together clearly so I now have a much better overview of the history of the period although I’m not sure I will ever understand the intricacies of the Hapsburgs. Despite this being a period I ...