Raking Light (from the Left) - I

Geldorp Gortzius
Susanna and the Elders
ca. 1600-1604
oil on panel
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Ottavio Leoni
Susanna and the Elders
ca. 1620
oil on copper
Detroit Institute of Arts

Massimo Stanzione
Susanna and the Elders
ca. 1631-37
oil on canvas
Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha

attributed to Adriaen van der Werff
Susanna and the Elders
ca. 1700
oil on panel
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Johann Carl Loth
St Sebastian
ca. 1670
oil on canvas
Národní Galerie, Prague

Liberale da Verona
St Sebastian
(in a Venetian setting)
ca. 1490
oil on panel
Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan

Anonymous Italian Artist
St Sebastian tended by St Irene
ca. 1600-1620
oil on canvas
Alte Pinakothek, Munich

Artemisia Gentileschi
Judith and Maid with the Head of Holofernes
ca. 1623-24
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Bartolomeo Manfredi
Judith and Maid with the Head of Holofernes
ca. 1620
oil on canvas
(extended on three sides by a later hand)
Alte Pinakothek, Munich

Simon Vouet
Incredulity of St Thomas
ca. 1636-37
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon

Adriaen van der Werff
Incredulity of St Thomas
1710
oil on panel
Milwaukee Art Museum

Bartolomeo Manfredi
Christ crowned with Thorns
ca. 1610-20
oil on canvas
Staatsgalerie im Neuen Schloss Schleissheim

Giuseppe Marullo
Christ and the Woman of Samaria 
ca. 1650
oil on canvas
Sinebrychoff Art Museum, Helsinki

Francesco Solimena
Christ and the Woman of Samaria
ca. 1710
oil on canvas
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Jusepe de Ribera
Bound Christ
ca. 1616-18
oil on canvas
Galleria Sabauda, Turin

Bartolomeo Schedoni
The Last Supper
ca. 1610
oil on canvas
Galleria Nazionale di Parma

Herewith the amorous spirit that was so kinde
To Teras haire, and combd it downe with winde,
Still as it Comet-like brake from her braine,
Would needes have Teras gone, and did refraine
To blow it downe: which staring up, dismaid
The timorous feast, and she no longer staid:

But bowing to the Bridegrome and the Bride,

Did like a shooting exhalation glide

Out of their sights: the turning of her back
Made them all shrieke, it lookt so ghastly black.
O haples Hero, that most haples clowde,
Thy soone-succeeding Tragedie foreshowde.

Thus all the Nuptiall crew to joyes depart,
But much-wronged Hero stood Hels blackest dart:
Whose wound because I grieve so to display,
I use digression thus t'encrease the day.

– Christopher Marlowe, from Hero and Leander (published 1598)

Painted Copper

Gonzales Coques
Portrait of a Man
ca. 1670
oil on copper
National Gallery, London

Karel van Mander the Elder
The World before the Flood
1600
oil on copper
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Jan Brueghel the Elder
Wooded Landscape with Figures
ca. 1605-1610
oil on copper
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Jan Willemsz Lapp
Italianate Landscape
ca. 1660
oil on copper
Mauritshuis, The Hague

Jan Willemsz Lapp
Italianate Landscape with Buildings
ca. 1660
oil on copper
Mauritshuis, The Hague

Monogrammist R.F.
Miniature Portrait of a Young Man
1606
oil on copper
Mauritshuis, The Hague

Adam Elsheimer
The Deluge
ca. 1600-1601
oil on copper
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Joachim Wtewael
The Wedding of Peleus and Thetis
1612
oil on copper
Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts

attributed to Jacopo Zucchi
Holy Family
ca. 1576
oil on copper
Musée des Augustins de Toulouse

Jacques Stella
Holy Family
ca. 1650
oil on copper
Musée des Augustins de Toulouse

attributed to Willem van Nieulandt the Younger
Temple of Minerva Medica in Rome
ca. 1610-15
oil on copper
Musée des Augustins de Toulouse

Caspar van Wittel
Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute, Venice
1706
oil on copper
Neue Pinakothek, Munich

Anonymous Flemish Artist
The Road to Emmaus
ca. 1600
oil on copper
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Paul Bril
Mountainous Landscape with St Jerome
1592
oil on copper
Mauritshuis, The Hague

workshop of Paul Bril
Landscape
ca. 1625
oil on copper
Musée des Augustins de Toulouse

Frans van Mieris
Portrait of botanist Florentius Schuyl
1666
oil on copper
Mauritshuis, The Hague

from A Word in Edgeways

Tell me about yourself they

say and you begin to

tell them about yourself and

that is just the way I

am is their reply: they play

it all back to you in another

key, their key, and then in mid-

narrative they pay you a 

compliment as if to say what a good

listener you are I am

a good listener my stay

here has developed my faculty I will

say that for me I will not

say that every literate male in 

America is a soliloquist, a

ventriloquist, a strategic 

egotist, an inveterate

campaigner-explainer over and

back again on the terrain of him-

self – what I will

say is they are not un-

interesting: they are simply

unreciprocal . . . 

– Charles Tomlinson (1969)

Rendering 17th-century Textiles / Garments

El Greco
Portrait of a Young Nobleman
ca. 1600-1605
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Anonymous Artist after Isaac Oliver
Portrait of Henry, Prince of Wales
ca. 1612
oil on canvas
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

Sisto Badalocchio
Christ and the Samaritan Woman at the Well
ca. 1609-1610
oil on canvas
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Frans Hals
Merrymakers at Shrovetide
ca. 1616-17
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Hendrick ter Brugghen
Martyrdom of St Catherine of Alexandria
ca. 1618-20
oil on panel
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

attributed to Salomon Mesdach
Portrait of Jacob Pergens
1619
oil on panel
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Hendrick ter Brugghen
Lute Player
1624
oil on canvas
National Gallery, London

Thomas de Keyser
Portrait of a Gentleman
1627
oil on copper
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Anthony van Dyck
Portrait of Henrietta Maria, Queen of England
ca. 1635
oil on canvas
Gemäldegalerie, Dresden

attributed to Michel Dorigny
Virgin holding an Oak Branch
ca. 1640
oil on canvas
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

Frans Hals
Portrait of a Man
ca. 1646-48
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Govert Flinck
Portrait of a Man
1648
oil on canvas
Milwaukee Art Museum

Govert Flinck
Portrait of a Woman
1648
oil on canvas
Milwaukee Art Museum

Anonymous Spanish Artist
Portrait of a Young Man
ca. 1650
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Gerard Soest
Portrait of Lady Borlase
ca. 1672-75
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Nicolas de Largillière
The Artist in his Studio
ca. 1686
oil on canvas
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

     "Clement was forced to pay an enormous war indemnity and it was necessary to melt precious pieces from the treasury. According to Cellini, "The pope and one of his servants, Cavalierino, brought me jeweled tiaras from the Apostolic Chamber. The pope commanded me to remove the jewels from their mountings, which I did. Each stone was wrapped in a piece of paper and sewn into the lining of the pope's clothing and Cavalierino's. The remaining gold, about 200 pounds, was left me with the order to melt it down." This was how the pope managed to pay the fantastic sum of 70,000 gold ducats required by the treaty of surrender of June 5. It was necessary to coin still more pieces of gold and silver to pay the colossal tribute required to get the troops to leave. The summer of 1527 saw the most unbelievable conditions – the city totally stripped, virtually without food, the inhabitants held by force and used as servants, the threat of plague hanging over them because the fountains had been destroyed – while the pope and high dignitaries desperately tried to borrow still more money in Naples or elsewhere, or to coin more.  . . .  The sack of Rome virtually wiped out the Church's treasure of gold and silver, which is why we know so little about the craft in central Italy."

– André Chastel, The Sack of Rome, 1527, translated by Beth Archer, 1983 (expanded from the A.W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts, 1977, and published by Princeton University Press and the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.)

Seventeenth-Century Heads

Stefano della Bella
Head of a Young Man
ca. 1650
etching
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Pietro da Cortona
Study for Head of St Michael
1633
drawing
Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio

Peter Paul Rubens
Head of an Old Man
ca. 1600-1608
drawing
(made in Rome)
Morgan Library, New York

Anthony van Dyck
Study Head of an Old Man
ca. 1618-20
oil on paper, mounted on panel
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Anthony van Dyck
Study Head of a Young Man
ca. 1617-18
oil on paper, mounted on panel
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Abraham Bloemaert
Study Head of an Old Man
ca. 1610
oil on panel
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Gérard de Lairesse
Head of Minerva
ca. 1670
etching
Philadelphia Museum of Art

Caspar Gras
Head of Archduke Ferdinand Charles
ca. 1625-50
bronze
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Bartolomeo Gennari
Head of a Bearded Man
ca. 1640
drawing
Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart

Inigo Jones
Head of a Boy
ca. 1625
drawing
Yale Center for British Art

Jacob Matham
Head of Hippocrates
1607
drawing
Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh

Guido Reni
Head of a Man
(possibly Nicholas Lanier)
ca. 1625-30
drawing
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Anonymous French Artist
Head of a Girl
17th century
drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Anonymous Dutch Artist
Head of a Young Man
ca. 1650
drawing
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Prince Rupert, Count Palatine
Head of the Executioner of St John the Baptist
1658
mezzotint
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Pieter Claesz Soutman
Head of a Man
ca. 1630
drawing
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

The Realists

Hope that you may understand.
What can books of men that wive
In a dragon-guarded land,
Paintings of the dolphin-drawn
Sea-nymphs in their pearly wagons 
Do, but wake the hope to live
That had gone
With the dragons?

– William Butler Yeats (1912)