Beyond the Naked Eye: Details from the National Gallery

by Jill Dunkerton, Rachel Billinge, National Gallery London

What admirer of a great Renaissance painting has not wished for the chance to approach it closely and examine each tiny detail? This unique book permits just such a close-up view of some of the most beautiful masterpieces in the National Gallery, London. Using photography taken through a microscope, this book shows details from paintings that would not normally be a gem sparkling on a ringed finger, a minute insect, intricate brushwork, the texture of a painted surface.Each of the macrophotographs in the book documents around a half-inch section of a Renaissance panel painting, revealing the smallest details in works by Lucas Cranach, Jan van Eyck, Fra Angelico, Raphael, and many others. The complete paintings are shown at the back of the book. Beautifully designed and illustrated, this jewel of a book is an irresistible treasure for every art lover.

Genres: Art

80 pages, Hardcover

First published January 25, 2006

Reviews

[AC]

This small-formatted book was put together by one of the conservationist at the National Gallery in London
(Jill Dunkerton is responsible for the very interesting Giotto to Dürer: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/80...)

The book contains a set of 50-60 highly magnified details drawn from various Italian and Netherlandish paintings of the 15th cen., accompanied by small prints of entire pictures (in their entirey) from which these details were drawn.

In the full picture, there are tiny white numbered circles showing where the details are from. But these white circles completely blot out what the detail looked like in their context, in the full picture, which greatly detracts from the value of looking at the details in isolation. There's nothing to compare them to.

Furthermore, there is very little text (though what text there is, is of real interest) -- far too little to make the significance of these details, suggestive though they are, clear to the layman's eyes.

It's a fabulous idea, bringing us into the artist's workshop in this way -- but its execution was not carried through by the authors.

There is another "in the workshop" book by Anthea Callen on the Impressionists, which I have and have been meaning to read -- which is much fuller and looks to be somewhat more successful:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/66...

[Babajaga]

Great book. Provides unique look at painting techniques of great old masters.
I just wish the layout had been different. The paintings and the microscopic photographs should have been arranged somehow differently, so that one wouldn't have to flip back and forth trying to match up the shots with the paintings.