Renaissance Utterances

Many high profile reviews of Beyond Caravaggio have criticised it because it only contains six works by the master himself. However as the e...

I'm on the cusp of handing in my dissertation and to both my delight and dismay, I'm still finding potentially relevant interestin...

The Wettin rulers’ journey from margraves to kings was not an easy one. The most serious period of instability occurred in the years prior...

The wire drawing bench in Écouen is the only remaining object of its type. Although many plain wooden goldsmith's benches can be found...

This was an interesting start to Birkbeck Arts Week . Given the MA  Catholic reformation module , I thought it would be a on topic diversi...

Suleiman the Magnificent I hadn't been to one of the Birkbeck EMPHASIS seminars in ages. Every time I go to one, I leave with my he...

Reconstruction of Zeus These notes continue on from the lecture on idols . The boundaries between gods and idols are rather blurred; bot...

It has long been appreciated that an interdisciplinary approach has to be taken when looking at the arts. A book from 1922 said the 'p...

Here, have some kittehs instead This lecture was on relics and the cults of the saints and I was presenting – hence the post on propagan...

True Cross, Santo Toribio de Liébana , Spain. (photo by F. J. Díez Martín). This post has come out of a preparation for a class present...

It seems timely that Monday’s class was about altar pieces. Given that Hasan Niyazi spent so much of his time investigating and writing abou...

This book review is dedicated to the memory of my good friend, Hasan Niyazi . I just wish it had been a book on Raphael, about whom who he k...

Il Gesu The title of this fourth lecture held a lot of promise: 'Space, Function and Decoration in a Catholic Church'. In it we ...

Rome as a religious centre? Pardon? Ok, what exactly did I know about Rome as a place of pilgrimage? I’ve seen Gladiator and I, Claudius (...

This course has piqued my interest in a huge way. After nearly spending the entire weekend – unintentionally – in the Warburg Library read...

No nudes thanks, we're post-Trent Catholics It's that time of year again when we're dusting off the pencil cases and hole re...

It seems that the National Gallery is busily knitting threads between all the different London arts. There is the incredible Metamorphosis...