Devotion by Design: Italian Altarpieces before 1500

by Scott Nethersole

Museum visitors today usually see pre-16th-century Italian painted altarpieces exhibited alone, as single paintings. Yet this beautiful catalogue shows that these works were once part of decorative, integrated schemes, and the original experience for viewers of the paintings was significantly different from our own. Focusing on Italian altarpieces from the second half of the 13th century to the very end of the 15th, the book investigates the original functions and locations of altarpieces as well as the circumstances of their dislocations, dismantlings, and reconstructions. Regional variations are also analyzed, and the author examines altarpieces' formal and typological development, taking into account the wealth of related scholarship undertaken in the past thirty years.

Published by National Gallery Company / Distributed by Yale University Press

Exhibition The National Gallery, London
(07/6/11-10/02/11)

Genres: Art

128 pages, Hardcover

First published July 26, 2011

About the author

Scott Nethersole is senior lecturer in Italian Renaissance art, 1400–1500, at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London.

Reviews

[GBL · Rating 5 out of 5]

Devotion by Design examines Italian altarpieces from the period 1300-1500.

The book links to works in the National Gallery but refers to other examples of the art. The book explores the development of the altarpiece - in the form of polyptych and ‘pala’ and discusses the many aspects related to the production of an altarpiece. The book also explores how many of these artworks came to be broken up and dispersed to art galleries.

The book is beautifully illustrated with a high standard of reproduction and the text is informative and illuminating.

[Mills College Library]

726.5296 N27753 2011