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Showing posts from March, 2023

Rembrandt & van Hoogstraten: The Art of Illusion

It takes a split second these days to create an image, and how many millions are recorded daily on mobile phones, possibly never to be looked at again? You can see it all happening in the palatial surroundings of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, definitely one of those tick-off destinations on many travellers' bucket lists, where those in search of instant pictorial satisfaction throng the imposing statue-lined staircase for a selfie or pout for a photo in the café under the spectacular cupola. But we're not in Vienna for a quick fix, we're at the KHM to admire something more enduring in the shape of art produced almost 500 years ago by Rembrandt and his pupil Samuel van Hoogstraten that was intended to mislead your eyes into seeing the real in the unreal. Artistic deception is the story at the centre of  Rembrandt--Hoogstraten: Colour and Illusion , one of the most engrossing and best-staged exhibitions we've seen this year. And, somewhat surprisingly, a show wi...
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Opening and Closing in April

The Pre-Raphaelites -- their lives, their loves and their art -- have a lasting attraction, and The Rossettis at Tate Britain has got the blockbuster feel to it, with 150 paintings and drawings. It is, surprisingly, the first ever retrospective of poet and painter Dante Gabriel at the Tate, and the biggest show of his work in two decades. It's also the largest show in 30 years of art by his wife and model Lizzie Siddal and will in addition cover the life of Romantic poet Christina Rossetti and Dante's relationships with his muses Fanny Cornforth and Jane Morris. An immersive experience is promised, including spoken poetry. It's on from April 6 to September 24. There'll be some beautiful art to look at, even if we can't escape the feeling we've trodden similar ground a couple of times recently, here and there .  A very different experience will be on offer over at Tate Modern in the shape of Hilma af Klint & Piet Mondrian: Forms of Life . The Swede af Klint...
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They Sold Him as Vermeer

Jacobus Vrel: the mystery man of Dutch Golden-Age painting. We don't know where he came from, where he lived and worked, or anything of note about him at all. His cryptic interiors and detailed street scenes were attributed by galleries, dealers and art historians, sometimes clearly fraudulently, to other artists -- Pieter de Hooch or the much more famous JV, Johannes Vermeer.  We've been fascinated by Vrel since first coming across his work a decade ago. So we've been looking forward for quite a while to the first ever exhibition devoted to him:  Vrel, Forerunner of Vermeer  at the Mauritshuis in The Hague.  This is the Vrel painting that first piqued our interest when we saw it in a show about women in Dutch interiors at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge back in 2012. Simply because it's such an unusual subject. To a certain extent, Dutch genre paintings repeat themes over and over again; messengers arrive with letters; swooning ladies are treated by doctors; mu...
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Vermeer's Remarkably Small World

Perhaps you've seen the superb Johannes Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum or, more likely, you've been frustrated by failing to get tickets. Whichever it is, you know the pictures, but how much do you know about the painter himself and the world he lived in? You'll learn so much more if you head to the Museum Prinsenhof in his home city for their show Vermeer's Delft . It was a remarkably small world; Delft in the middle of the 17th century was a little town by our standards, with just over 20,000 inhabitants. But despite that, Delft was a hub for art and science in the remarkably sophisticated society of the Dutch Golden Age. This exhibition throws light on the life of Vermeer the man, who spent all his 43 years living either on Delft's main square, or just off it, and demonstrates the influences on Vermeer the painter through the artworks and objects that surrounded him.    There are no Vermeer paintings in this show, but you'll see works by other artists...
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Vermeer -- Unmissable, If You Can Get a Ticket

Of course you'll want to see Vermeer at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam: It's absolutely stunning. But if you haven't been fortunate enough to secure a ticket yet, you may very well be disappointed. Even though it's on till early June and open late three evenings a week, it's absolutely sold out, though the museum is planning to make another announcement on Monday March 6 (set an alert on your phone) on how they'll make more tickets available.  This is truly an exceptional exhibition. Of the 37 paintings now attributed to Johannes Vermeer, the Rijksmuseum has assembled 28 (though there still seems to be an argument about whether a couple of them are truly by him). And although we've seen almost all of these pictures before, many of them on numerous occasions, it's a huge thrill to view them all together in one place. And we thought we'd done well to catch 23 Vermeers together at the Mauritshuis in The Hague in 1996.  So this truly is one of those bloc...
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