Cathy's Art Diary

Pragmatic and fascinating online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at the 15th century artist working in Urbino, Justus of Ghent. Paula Nuttall guided us clearly through the life of the artist and various theories about his identity. There is some discussion that he may actually have been a Spanish artist, Pedro Berruguete who had possibly trained in the Netherlands. She then looked in detail at the paintings from Urbino which were attributed to Justus looking at their style and techniques. She discussed the fact that the paintings are in a poor condition and the technique is often not as pure as in the Netherlands. She theorised, in a pragmatic way, that this may be down to having to teach the methods to Italians in his workshop who were not as skilled as him. She also suggested it may have been due to his patron, Federico de Montefeltro’s demand for a large amount of work which didn’t suit the slow drying oil paints. She also discussed how in turn Justus may ha...

Fascinating online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at how and why souls were represented on 12th century effigies. Shirin Fozi from the University of Pittsburgh talked about how this research had come out of the work she did on her book on Romanesque effigies as she realised there were a number of pieces which depicted souls going to heaven often shown as being taken by angels. The phrase “guest of the body” to describe the soul comes from a poem by Hadrian written shortly before he died which appears on a number of tombs. She discussed a number of lovely images including the attached of the tomb of Presbyter Bruno in Hildesheim Cathedral from 1195. She also talked about how these images were also popular on reliquaries and she speculated that it may be iconography which is being used for people who their community hoped might become a saint.     

Fascinating online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at Titian’s painting “Concert Champêtre” from about 1510. Chriscinda Henry, from McGill University in Montreal and author of “Playful Pictures: Art, Leisure and Entertainment in the Venetian Renaissance Home” discussed the figure playing the lute at the centre of the picture and how his role as a member of one of the Compagnie della Calza, social groups of patrician young men, may have influenced the work. Despite my interest in Venetian art I’d not come across these groups before and now realise how many paintings I have seen them in in their brightly coloured doublets and hose with legs of different colours. Henry talked about how music and theatre were often a part of their parties and gatherings which were also attended by the leading courtesans of the time. They often intellectualism rural life in their poetry which is reflected in the picture. She also discussed whether this picture might have been commis...

Fascinating online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at the effect of a wedding in 1566 on the cultural exchanges between Florence and the Holy Roman Empire. Adriana Concin led us through some of the themes of the Phd she is working on which looked at the wedding of Francesco de Medici and Johanna of Austria, how Florence   used its cultural capital to raise it’s status in the negotiations, how those negotiations led to an exchange of ideas and artistic practice and how the event introduced the courtiers of the Holy Roman Empire to Florentine art leading to them starting to collect it. I had not known anything about this and was entranced. It’s so logical that if two courts and mixing in this was that they would exchanges ideas and, just like any of us going on a holiday, how the Austrians would want to take things they had seen back home with them. Most intriguing was the idea that the artists of the day, including Vasari and Bronzino, built and decorated arc...

Dense online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at an interview between the art critic Gene Swenson and Andy Warhol. Just occasionally I sign up to an online talk where I wish I knew a bit more about the subject before I’d joined in. The talk looked in depth at the art critical philosophy of Swenson but, I have to admit, I’d never heard of him so I was a little at sea. However I did look him afterwards and will look out for his work and ideas in future. The core of the talk looked at an interview with Andy Warhol which was used as the basis for a profile of the artist in the journal “Art News” and quoted in much of the later works on Warhol. However the speaker, Jennifer Sichel, from the Hite Art Institute at the University of Louisville, has recently discovered the original tapes which show that substantial sections of the interview were left out or adapted particularly around questions of homosexuality. She also looked at how this interview later led to Swenson ...

Interesting  online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at the meaning of the sea in paintings by Winslow Homer. Maggie Cao from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, took the picture “The Gulf Stream” from 1899 and used it to explore various social and political issues which Homer may have been alluding to. She referenced writing on the nature of the phenomena of the Gulf Stream and how it bought economic benefits to America, opening up trade from South America, but also conflict with the fishing disputes off Canada with the British. She also noted that it was shown shortly after the Spanish-American War. She also said the work may reference, the by then illegal, Slave Trade as it shows a black figure fighting the elements with sugar cane on the desk of the boat and sharks circling the boat. It makes the figure heroic but vulnerable. She introduced me to some beautiful pictures of sponge divers in the Bahamas and I was interest in the idea that most s...

Complex online lecture from the Courtauld Research Forum looking at Euguerrand Quarton’s Coronation of the Virgin in Avignon. I didn’t know this altarpiece from 1453 with a rather strange Trinity which shows the Father and Son as the same young, bearded man reversed. Emma Capron from the National Gallery took us through the various possible explanations of its iconography looking at how it reflects the wishes of the donor Jean de Montagny who had a devotion to the Trinity. She also looked at how it might reflect the visionary beliefs of the Carthusian monks as well as those of the mystic Bridget of Sweden. It does seem to closely follow Bridget’s writings. It was originally placed in the funeral chapel of Pope Innocent VI, the founder of the monastery, and elements of it may refer to the foundation story as well as encouraging people to pray for the soul of the founder. I do enjoy this sort of detailed analysis of a single image particularly one that is new to me.  

Insightful online lecture from Courtauld Research Forum and Ulster Museums on the fashions of the Belle Epoque and in particular an analysis of the dress in Renoir’s “La Loge”. This lecture marked two exhibitions at the Ulster Museums, a loan of various Renoir’s, including “La Loge” from the Courtauld and their own companion show on fashion in the Belle Epoque ie from 1870s to the start of the First World War. Charlotte McReynolds gave us a brief overview of the Belle Epoque exhibition then Ingrid Mida, a picture dating consultant, also known as The Dress Detective took us thought the finer detail of the dress in “La Loge”   revealing that at the date it was painted, 1874, the striped dress would have been slightly old fashioned. This may have been a deliberate statement about the woman by Renoir, or it might be that at this period he had to borrow outfits for his models. Mida compared the picture to real clothes, fashion plates and photographs of the time and looked at what...