"The exhibition is organized by the Centraal Museum Utrecht; the National Gallery of Art, Washington; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation."--Title page verso.

The Dutch history painter Joachim Wtewael is widely admired for his astonishing small paintings on copper. The Getty Museum's Mars and Venus Surprised by Vulcan is one of his finest works in this unusually demanding medium. Though only eight inches high, this Mannerist painting contains eleven figures in three different spaces, captured in a dramatically charged moment from the famous story told by Ovid in his Metamorphoses. The author's detailed analysis of Wtewael's painting also serves as a fine introduction to Dutch art of the Golden Age. Illustrated with seventy reproductions of paintings, drawings, etchings, and decorative objects, Anne W. Lowenthal's study ranges over the broad historical and cultural context in which Mars and Venus was created.

A novel and female empowering interpretive approach to these artistic archetypes in her analysis of Imaging Women of Consequence in the Dutch Golden Age.

Despite the tremendous number of studies produced annually in the field of Dutch art over the last 30 years or so, and the strong contemporary market for works by Dutch masters of the period as well as the public's ongoing fascination with some of its most beloved painters, until now there has been no comprehensive study assessing the state of research in the field. As the first study of its kind, this book is a useful resource for scholars and advanced students of seventeenth-century Dutch art, and also serves as a springboard for further research. Its 19 chapters, divided into three sections and written by a team of internationally renowned art historians, address a wide variety of topics, ranging from those that might be considered "traditional" to others that have only drawn scholarly attention comparatively recently.

The purpose of these essays is to mine the complexity and expressive richness of still life, traditionally considered one of the lesser genres. Though theorists have commented on its appeal since antiquity, the status of still life has risen significantly only recently, as the priorities of art history and criticism have been reordered to validate areas outside the canon of traditional inquiry. Here six distinguished scholars interpret a wide range of still lifes, using diverse current methods, including paleoethnobotanical research (which makes it possible to reconstruct diets), social history, technical examinations, and material culture studies. The introduction provides a historiography of still life with an emphasis on the twentieth century. Reindert Falkenburg's essay is "Matters of Taste: Pieter Aertsen's Market Scenes, Eating Habits, and Pictorial Rhetoric in the Sixteenth Century," Anne Lowenthal's, "Contemplating Kalf," Julia Ballerini's "Recasting Ancestry: Statuettes as Imaged by Three Inventors of Photography," and Doreen Bolger's "The Early Rack Paintings of John F. Peto: Beneath the Nose of the Whole World.'" Petra ten-Doesschate Chu writes on Vincent van Gogh's still lifes and the nineteenth-century vignette tradition; and Nan Freeman, on Tom Wesselmann and still-life painting and American culture, circa 1962. In view of the current interest in still life, the publication of this book is ideally timed. Cumulatively, the six essays alert the reader to the myriad meanings carried by still lifes and the diverse ways in which those meanings can be studied.

Experience the uplifting power of art on this breathtaking visual tour of 2,500 paintings and sculptures created by more than 700 artists from Michelangelo to Damien Hirst. This beautiful book brings you the very best of world art from cave paintings to Neoexpressionism. Enjoy iconic must-see works, such as Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper and Monet's Waterlilies and discover less familiar artists and genres from all parts of the globe. Art That Changed the World covers the full sweep of world art, including the Ming era in China, and Japanese, Hindu, and Indigenous Australian art. It analyses recurring themes such as love and religion, explaining key genres from Romanesque to Conceptual art. Art That Changed the World explores each artist's key works and vision, showing details of their technique, such as Leonardo's use of light and shade. It tells the story of avant-garde works like Manet's Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe (Lunch on the Grass), which scandalized society, and traces how one genre informed another - showing how the Impressionists were inspired by Gustave Courbet, for example, and how Van Gogh was influenced by Japanese prints. Lavishly illustrated throughout, look no further for your essential guide to the pantheon of world art.