William and Henry Walters, the Reticent Collectors


Book Description

Surprisingly, the story of how William Walters and his son Henry created one of the finest privately assembled museums in the United States has not been told."--BOOK JACKET.










Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe


Book Description

"This publication accompanies the exhibition Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe, held at the Walters Art Museum from October 14, 2012, to January 21, 2013, and at the Princeton University Art Museum from February 16 to June 9, 2013."




Henry Walters and Bernard Berenson


Book Description

Collecting Italian Renaissance paintings during America’s Gilded Age was fraught with risk because of the uncertain identities of the artists and the conflicting interests of the dealers. Stanley Mazaroff’s fascinating account of the close relationship between Henry Walters, founder of the legendary Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, and Bernard Berenson, the era’s preeminent connoisseur of Italian paintings, richly illustrates this important chapter of America’s cultural history. When Walters opened his Italianate museum in 1909, it was labeled as America’s “Great Temple of Art.” With more than 500 Italian paintings, including self-portraits purportedly by Raphael and Michelangelo, Walters’s collection was compared favorably with the great collections in London, Paris, and Berlin. In the midst of this fanfare, Berenson contacted Walters and offered to analyze his collection, sell him additional paintings, and write a scholarly catalogue that would trumpet the collection on both sides of the Atlantic. What Berenson offered was what Walters desperately needed—a badge of scholarship that Berenson’s invaluable imprimatur would undoubtedly bring. By 1912, Walters had become Berenson’s most active client, their business alliance wrapped in a warm and personal friendship. But this relationship soon became strained and was finally severed by a confluence of broken promises, inattention, deceit, and ethical conflict. To Walters’s chagrin, Berenson swept away the self-portraits allegedly by Raphael and Michelangelo and publicly scorned paintings that he was supposed to praise. Though painful to Walters, Berenson’s guidance ultimately led to a panoramic collection that beautifully told the great history of Italian Renaissance painting. Based primarily on correspondence and other archival documents recently discovered at the Walters Art Museum and the Villa I Tatti in Florence, the intriguing story of Walters and Berenson offers unusual insight into the pleasures and perils of collecting Italian Renaissance paintings, the ethics in the marketplace, and the founding of American art museums.




The Essence of Line


Book Description

Rarely seen drawings and watercolors by some of the most influential French artists of the nineteenth century are the subject of this richly illustrated publication from The Baltimore Museum of Art and the Walters Art Museum. From revealing preparatory sketches to exquisite finished watercolors, more than 100 works by artists such as Eugene Delacroix, Honore Daumier, Paul Cezanne, and Edgar Degas illuminate the range of French art over the course of a century of innovation. The BMA and the Walters have combined holdings of more than 900 French drawings from the nineteenth century, one of the nation's strongest and richest collections of French art from this period. The publication also includes works from the Peabody Institute Art Collection of the Maryland State Archives. The Essence of Line offers the first comprehensive discussion of the formation of these collections and their significance for the history of French art. The catalogue includes essays by Jay McKean Fisher, William R. Johnston, and Cheryl K. Snay that provide insights into the artistic, commercial, and social functions that drawings served for their creators and collectors, as well as how collecting patterns influenced the development of modernism. Conservator Kimberly Schenck bridges the worlds of the collector and of the artist by examining the production and the use of drawing materials in an epoch of radical changes in technique as well as style. Published on the occasion of an exhibition jointly organized by The Baltimore Museum of Art and the Walters Art Museum, this book presents a panorama of sketches, watercolors, and presentation drawings, many of them little known outside a small circle of experts. It is correlated with an online database of more than 900 nineteenth-century French drawings in the holdings of these Baltimore museums.




Victorian Radicals


Book Description

Drawn from Birmingham Museums Trust's incomparable collection of Victorian art and design, this exhibition will explore how three generations of young, rebellious artists and designers, such as Edward Burne-Jones, John Everett Millais, and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, revolutionized the visual arts in Britain, engaging with and challenging the new industrial world around them.




Courbet and the Modern Landscape


Book Description

With its fittingly dramatic design, Courbet and the Modern Landscape accompanies the first major museum exhibition specifically to address Gustave Courbet's extraordinary achievement in landscape painting. Many of these carefully selected works produced from 1855 to 1876--gathered from Asia, Europe, and North America--will be new to readers. The catalogue--which accompanies an exhibition at the Getty Museum to be held from February 21 to May 14, 2006--highlights the artist's expressive responses to the natural environment. Essays by the curators examine Courbet's distinctly modern practice of landscape painting. Mary Morton's essay situates his landscapes in relation to his work in other genres, his critical reputation, and his role in establishing a new pictorial language for landscape painting. Charlotte Eyerman's essay investigates how later generations of nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists responded to Courbet's example. The catalogue also includes an essay by Dominique de Font-Reaulx, curator of photographs at the Musee d'Orsay, on the relationship between Courbet's work and landscape photography of the 1850s and 1860s. With its fittingly dramatic design, Courbet and the Modern Landscape accompanies the first major museum exhibition specifically to address Gustave Courbet's extraordinary achievement in landscape painting. Many of these carefully selected works produced from 1855 to 1876--gathered from Asia, Europe, and North America--will be new to readers. The catalogue--which accompanies an exhibition at the Getty Museum to be held from February 21 to May 14, 2006--highlights the artist's expressive responses to the natural environment. Essays by the curators examine Courbet's distinctly modern practice of landscape painting. Mary Morton's essay situates his landscapes in relation to his work in other genres, his critical reputation, and his role in establishing a new pictorial language for landscape painting. Charlotte Eyerman's essay investigates how later generations of nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists responded to Courbet's example. The catalogue also includes an essay by Dominique de Font-Reaulx, curator of photographs at the Musee d'Orsay, on the relationship between Courbet's work and landscape photography of the 1850s and 1860s.




Exploring Art of the Ancient Americas


Book Description

This stunning volume presents nearly 150 pre-Columbian works from the collection assembled by John Bourne in the 1950s and 1960s.




Treasures of Heaven


Book Description

Keynote A magnificent study of the beautifully crafted Medieval reliquaries that enshrined holy relics, and their wider historical, cultural, political and religious context Sales points Published in conjunction with Walters Art Museum and the Cleveland Museum of Art to accompany a major touring exhibition, at the British Museum 23 June 9 October 2011 No equivalent book on this fascinating subject An important reference work drawing on the latest scholarship, which will be of value far beyond the exhibition Description Drawing on three major museum holdings as well as featuring iconic pieces from other international public and private collections, this richly illustrated book looks at the phenomenon of holy relics in the Middle Ages. Thematic essays and object entries by leading scholars trace the history and development of the cult of relics, from its beginnings in late Roman funerary practices to its rise in both the Byzantine East and the West. Contributors Derek Krueger, Eric Palazzo, Arnoldt Angenendt, Martina Bagnoli, Holger A. Klein, Barbara Boehm, Guido Cornini, Cynthia Hahn, James Robinson, Alexander Nagel, C. Griffith Mann