Readers Reading

Henry Raeburn
Portrait of the artist's nephew Patrick Moir
ca. 1785
oil on canvas
(made in Rome)
Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh

Jacob van Loo
Youth Reading
ca. 1650
oil on panel
Leiden Collection, New York

Gabriël Metsu
Woman Reading a Book
ca. 1653-54
oil on canvas
Leiden Collection, New York

Jan Lievens
Old Woman Reading
ca. 1625-26
oil on panel
Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden

Jean-Augustin Franquelin
Reading to the Convalescent
ca. 1827
oil on canvas
Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts

Albert Edelfelt
Annie Edelfelt with Fredrika Snygg
1888
oil on panel
Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki

Magnus Enckell
Reading Room
1899
oil on canvas
Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki

Sven Henriksen
Social-Demokraten
ca. 1930-34
lithograph (poster)
High Museum of Art, Atlanta

Karl Klimsch
Engelhorn's Allgemeine Roman-Bibliothek
ca. 1885-95
lithograph (poster)
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence

Sebastiano Conca
Sibyl of Lemnos
ca. 1725
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Sebastiano Conca
Phrygian Sibyl
ca. 1725
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Bartolomeo Passarotti after Michelangelo
Persian Sibyl
(figure from the Sistine Ceiling)
ca. 1550
drawing
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Orazio Borgianni
Cardinal pondering the Words of Isaiah
ca. 1605-1608
oil on canvas
Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena

Pietro Faccini
Saint with Book
ca. 1595
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

workshop of Antonio Carneo
St Jerome
ca. 1670
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Franz Sturtzkopf
The Hermit
ca. 1876
oil on canvas
Auckland Art Gallery, New Zealand

The Balloon of the Mind

Hands, do what you're bid:
Bring the balloon of the mind
That bellies and drags in the wind
Into its narrow shed.

 – W.B. Yeats (1919)