Classical and mediaeval dress was simple, and not tailored much until after 1000 CE. Painters were also constrained by fresco and egg tempera.
Botticelli
Paintings by rising stars including Michelangelo, Giorgione and Raphael. The state of paintings of secular stories from classical and literary sources.
Major works from around 1500 by Giovanni Bellini, Mantegna, Botticelli, Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci, and Fra Bartolomeo.
Commemorating the 500th anniversary of the death of this innovative Florentine painter, a contemporary of Botticelli.
This is when the year should really begin. A celebration of the real New Year from Botticelli to Pissarro, aided by Sisley, Van Gogh and others.
How we got from one of the most senior gods, and a winged young man, to a chubby infant armed with a bow and arrow, let alone an unknown former saint.
From a prototype laid out by Duccio in about 1310, through the vision of Saint Bridget, to modernised versions in a French town or English cattle shed.
To celebrate the life and work of Dante, a small selection of paintings inspired by the Divine Comedy, and his ‘Vita Nuova’.
From Apelles, in around 330 BCE, the personification of Truth has had particular importance to painters, in the faithfulness and accuracy of their work. Here she is.
Huge clam shells were a common feature in paintings of the birth of Venus, and other classical myths. They also feature in many ‘vanitas’ paintings.