Exhibition: Dare to Know: Prints and Drawings in the Age of Enlightenment, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts, September 16, 2022 – January 15, 2023. Pictures produce knowledge. The premise is uncontroversial, but the role that visual representation has played in intellectual transformations throughout history is often difficult to pinpoint. Diagrams…
Rosalind Savill, Everyday Rococo: Madame De Pompadour and Sèvres Porcelain. 2 vols. Norwich: Unicorn Press, 2021. 1211 pp. $275. ISBN 978-1916495715 Dame Rosalind Savill’s Everyday Rococo: Madame de Pompadour & Sèvres Porcelain is a magnificently produced two-volume study of the early development of the Sèvres Porcelain Factory, from its origins in…
Dani Ezor In 1739, the seventeen-year-old Henriette Julie Gabrielle de Lorraine, daughter of Louis de Lorraine, prince de Lambesc, was sent to Portugal to marry the 55-year-old Jaime de Melo, duc de Cadaval. While the two families were tied by a previous marriage, this union was of paramount importance. The…
Christina K. Lindeman In 1744, Antoine Pesne, court painter to King Frederick II called the Great (r. 1740-1786), painted portraits of Frederick’s sisters Luise Ulrike and Anna Amalie in masquerade costume (Figs. 1 and 2). The paintings marked the occasion of ceremonies held after Luise Ulrike’s wedding to the Swedish…
Susan Eberhard “The list of the King’s presents is complete;if you are not satisfied, that is your problem.”[1]—Abbé de Choisy, Ayutthaya, November 11, 1685 Introduction: A Silver Chocolatière with a Bamboo Spout Studies in early modern diplomatic history have focused on the role of gifts in navigating cultural difference and…
James Middleton The Denver Art Museum recently acquired an eighteenth-century Mexican portrait miniature painted on silver (Fig. 1). Datable to about 1770 by the sitter’s accessories and hairstyle, it represents a young woman wearing her era’s most formal garment, a court gown.[1] Why was she painted on such a luxurious…
José Andrés De Leo Martínez Entre 1718 y mediados del mismo siglo, en los talleres de Puebla de los Ángeles de la Nueva España, se realizaron una serie de cálices de plata con formas y elementos decorativos comunes que la bibliografía ha marcado como exponentes característicos de la platería angelopolitana…
Christina Clarke As a gold- and silversmith, the material knowledge I’ve gained through practice makes metal artifacts as legible as documents: the technical processes used to fabricate them can be read in their forms and textures and the marks over their surfaces. Examining the fabrication of decorative arts gives us…
Blue Lewoz, Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, Paris, France, June 10 – July 23, 2022. Visitors to Raphaël Barontini’s show Blue Lewoz at Mariane Ibrahim’s Paris gallery this past summer were greeted by the imposing figure of Creole Dancer (Fig. 1). The 9 feet by 6 feet collage of an archival photo…
Editor’s Note: Published in three installments, this intervention by L’nu interdisciplinary artist, poet, and scholar Michelle Sylliboy offers an Indigenous perspective on the colonial archive. In Part I: Reclaiming Komqwejwi’kasikl, Sylliboy presented the poetic gift she received from her ancestors that launched her creative journey reclaiming the komqwejwi’kasikl writing system…