Art  

One of the first female artists to achieve recognition in her own time, Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653) became instantly popular in the 1970s when feminist art historians "discovered" her and argued vehemently for a place for her in the canon of Italian baroque painters. Featured alongside her father, Orazio Gentileschi, in a recent exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Artemisia has continued to stir interest though her position in the canon remains precarious, in part because her sensationalized life history has overshadowed her art.

This publication focuses on the collection of Japanese secular painting in the Museum of East Asian Art in Cologne, a large part of which was acquired by the museum’s founders Adolf and Frieda Fischer before 1913. Six internationally renowned specialists of Japanese art present new insights and approaches to pre-modern Japanese visual culture in this exquisitely illustrated catalogue.

The publication is divided into two parts: the first section discusses the reception of Japanese art and the dawn of East Asian art history in Germany, as well as shedding new light on the role of the monk painter as mediator between Chinese and Japanese concepts of secular art.

The main body of the publication is the catalogue section. Here, 94 works (divided into seven subject categories) are presented: hand scrolls, fans, hanging scrolls and folding screens. All works are reproduced in full colour, many scrolls being shown in their entirety. Each chapter is preceded by an introduction, elucidating the historiographical, aesthetic and methodological questions that are central to current research in the visual culture of pre-modern Japan. The illuminating entries are followed by a comprehensive appendices section, including photographs of the paintings’ signatures, seals and transcriptions of the inscriptions in the paintings.

Sans équivalent parmi les artistes de son époque, Antoine Watteau (1684-1721) a vraiment bouleversé en une décennie l'histoire de la peinture européenne. Nourri des exemples du passé, fort d'une culture musicale et théâtrale parfaitement assimilée et sensible à la nature, Watteau a créé un monde à lui, à la frontière du rêve et de la réalité, une peinture que rien ne laissait présager dans l'évolution des arts en France. Peintre du sentiment amoureux, il a créé un type de sujet radicalement nouveau et appelé à connaître un succès immense, la fête galante.