Associated with Dionysus/Bacchus and his followers, it’s basically a staff decorated with plant matter. Seen here in different variants from Pompeii onwards.
painting
If David’s neoclassicism emphasised form or ‘disegno’, Delacroix was a colourist. Shown here in details of his paintings.
How Uther Pendragon, King of England, came to father Arthur, how Merlin arranged for hi
Paintings by Chassériau, Franz von Stuck, Lovis Corinth, and Félix Vallotton telling this story.
Paintings by Rubens, Rembrandt, Jordaens, Coypel and an unusual watercolour on ivory by Goya, telling this story.
Paintings from 1400, including Tintoretto’s masterpiece, Veronese, and three by Artemisia Gentileschi, telling this story.
The Grand Tour traditionally took young gentry through the Alps, where they could buy paintings of its sublime peaks.
The sign of (human) death. Lots of skulls means mass death or apocalypse. Held by Hamlet, featured in vanitas paintings, and with Mary Magdalene.
Initially constrained by the orthodoxy of the Imperial Academy, the arrival of art schools and public collections around 1900 led to rapid development. A tentative history.
Once popular in wall paintings and miniatures across Europe, these legends were revived in the nineteenth century and adopted by the Pre-Raphaelites.
