The Burlington Magazine

The Burlington Magazine http://burlington.org.uk/
Over a century of leading research as the world’s longest running art-h

11/10/2025

For over 100 years, The Burlington Magazine has remained the world’s leading academic journal in Art History. As well as editorials on topical issues, you will find the latest research on art history and authoritative reviews of the most important books and major exhibitions around the world. ⁠
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Students get a 1-year digital subscription for only £30/€35/$40. ⁠
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Subscribe today for 87% off 12 digital issues and instant access to over 120 years of research in our vast archive. ⁠
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Claim your discount: https://shop.burlington.org.uk/student-offer.htm?promo=STUDENT&utm_source=TBM_Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=BTU2025_student

Don’t forget: we're giving away our most-read academic articles for free for a limited time. Follow us on Instagram to be the first to know when articles are released: https://www.instagram.com/theburlingtonmagazine/

An album emerged at auction in 2020 and was acquired by Colchester and Ipswich Museums. It included hitherto unknown and...
09/10/2025

An album emerged at auction in 2020 and was acquired by Colchester and Ipswich Museums. It included hitherto unknown and very early works by John Constable and was compiled by the Mason family, the artist’s relatives in Colchester. These juvenilia are assessed here and placed in the context of Constable’s artistic evolution and his wide social circle.⁠
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Read Emma Roodhouse’s article ‘Scraps of genius, taste and skill: works by John Constable in the Mason album’ in our October issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202510?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Oct+25+issue+promo
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Image: Two drawings and notes from Maria Louisa (‘Minna’) Constable to Inglis, probably Jane Anne Mason (née Inglis), and her mother Anne Mason, 19th April 1850. Graphite on paper, 10.2 by 7.6 and 11.4 by 9.2 cm. (Colchester and Ipswich Museums; Ipswich Borough Council).

Bridget Riley’s deep appreciation of the work of John Constable throughout her career and respect for his achievement is...
07/10/2025

Bridget Riley’s deep appreciation of the work of John Constable throughout her career and respect for his achievement is explored in our current issue in an insightful interview. Conducted by Amy Concannon, Manton Senior Curator, Historic British Art, at Tate, the discussion touches on the artists’ parallel approaches to light, colour and technique.⁠
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Read 'Discussing John Constable: an interview with Bridget Riley' in our October issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202510?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Oct+25+issue+promo
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Images:⁠
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Detail of Bridget Riley and Gabriele Finaldi looking at Messengers in 2019.⁠
(© Bridget Riley; National Gallery, London).⁠
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Detail of 'The white horse', by John Constable. 1818–19. Oil on canvas, 131.4 by 188.3 cm. ( Frick Collection, New York).

We are offering students 87% off a 1-year digital subscription. ⁠⁠Alongside 12 monthly digital issues, you'll also have ...
03/10/2025

We are offering students 87% off a 1-year digital subscription. ⁠
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Alongside 12 monthly digital issues, you'll also have access across all your devices and the ability to search, download and read any issue, article or review from our complete archive dating back to 1903. ⁠
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The Burlington Magazine is the definitive resource for those studying Art History. Subscribe here: https://shop.burlington.org.uk/student-offer.htm?promo=STUDENT&utm_source=TBM_Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=BTU2025_student
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Plus: as a taster, we're giving away our most-read academic articles for free for a limited time. Follow us on Instagram to be the first to know when articles are released: https://www.instagram.com/theburlingtonmagazine/

What must it have been like to have been entranced by the work of Pablo Picasso in the 1920s and enjoy the means to buil...
02/10/2025

What must it have been like to have been entranced by the work of Pablo Picasso in the 1920s and enjoy the means to build a large collection of it? This question is answered by new research published this month on the pioneering taste of the German collectors Gottlieb Friedrich and Erna Reber. They became Picasso’s major patrons in the inter-war period and purchased key works, such as his Three Musicians (Philadelphia Museum of Art).

In 1804 Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres painted a well-known self-portrait (Musee Conde, Chantilly) when he was a young man. Much later in life he re-worked it and the complex and intriguing history of this process of revision and the ways it relates both to his private life and the public status of his work is clarified in a fresh analysis of the painting and related versions of it.

John Constable was born in 1776 and so his 250th anniversary will be celebrated next year. Anticipating this, we publish a penetrating discussion with the distinguished artist Bridget Riley on her appreciation of Constable’s achievement. Early drawings by the artist, recently acquired by the Colchester Museums, which provide insights into his wide family circle in Suffolk, are also studied.

The wide range of reviews this month includes books on Indian art after Independence, Jewish country houses, the architect Halsey Ricardo, Manet and Eva Gonzales, female printmakers and printsellers of the eighteenth century and Giorgione. Meanwhile, exhibitions devoted to Marlene Dumas, Simone Cantarini and Jean-François Millet, as well as to artists engaging with themes from the Old Testament Book of Esther, are also the subject of expert analysis.

Discover the full list of content: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202510?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Oct+25+issue+promo
October's Editorial: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/editorial/the-story-of-art-at-75?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Oct+25+issue+promo+editorial
This month's free review: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/exhibition-review/mestre-didi-spiritual-form?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Oct+25+issue+promo+free+rev

A drawing in the Istituto Centrale per la Grafica, Rome, dating from 1667, is a unique depiction of part of the Fonseca ...
28/09/2025

A drawing in the Istituto Centrale per la Grafica, Rome, dating from 1667, is a unique depiction of part of the Fonseca Chapel in S. Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome. It provides evidence, hitherto unavailable, of the evolution of Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s work on this important commission and allows comparisons to be drawn with other works of his maturity. ⁠
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Read Marco Coppolaro’s article ‘An unpublished drawing of the Fonseca Chapel: a “destroyed” idea by Gian Lorenzo Bernini’ in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo
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Image: Drawing of the front wall of the Fonseca Chapel in S. Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome. 1667. Pen, ink and watercolour on paper, 23.1 by 17.2 cm. (Italian Ministry of Culture, Istituto Centrale per la Grafica, Rome).

‘Hiroshige: Artist of the Open Road’ at the British Museum, London, is the first major exhibition of the work of Utagawa...
26/09/2025

‘Hiroshige: Artist of the Open Road’ at the British Museum, London, is the first major exhibition of the work of Utagawa Hiroshige (1797–1858) in London in over twenty-five years. It marks the gift of thirty-five prints by Hiroshige to the American Friends of the British Museum from a private collector, who has also lent eighty-two other high-quality works. In all, there are 120 exhibits, which include prints, drawings, illustrated books and paintings. Many are being displayed publicly for the first time, and several prints are believed to be unique examples. ⁠
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Read Monika Hinkel’s review of the show, exhibited until the 7th of September 2025, in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo
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Image: ‘Seba’ from the series ‘Sixty-nine stations of the Kiso highway’, by Utagawa Hiroshige. Late 1830s. Colourwoodblock print on paper, 24.3 by 36.8 cm. (British Museum, London).

Gold (‘oro’) has long shimmered at the heart of Venice’s visual vocabulary and cultural lexicon. From S. Marco’s Pala d’...
24/09/2025

Gold (‘oro’) has long shimmered at the heart of Venice’s visual vocabulary and cultural lexicon. From S. Marco’s Pala d’Oro to the Ca’ d’Oro and ‘oro di Cipro’ (Cypriot gold), it embodies both aesthetic splendour and symbolic depth in the imagination of residents and visitors alike. As a foundational element of Byzantine art, an idiom to which Venetians turned in the eleventh century to shape their own visual language, gold carried connotations of divine light, eternity and sanctity. Byzantine icons, in particular, portable in format and with deep historical and devotional resonance, functioned as agents of spiritual transmission and artistic influence, linking sacred and artistic centres across the Mediterranean.

‘Painted Gold: El Greco and Art between Crete and Venice’ at the Palazzo Ducale, Venice, curated by Chiara Squarcina, Katerina Dellaporta and Andrea Bellieni, traces the rich history of Cretan icons and icon painting from the early fifteenth to the eighteenth century, unravelling the complex entanglement of faith, artistic exchange and Mediterranean connectivity.

Read Georgios E. Markou’s review of this show, exhibiting until the 29th of September 2025, in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo

Image: ‘St Demetrius with scenes of the saint’s life and the donor’s portrait’, by Emmanuel Tzanes. 1646. Tempera and oil on panel, 76.5 by 107cm. (Byzantine and Christian Museum, Athens; exh. Palazzo Ducale, Venice).

The use by Canaletto of measured drawings by Antonio Visentini and his assistants is fully considered in our current iss...
21/09/2025

The use by Canaletto of measured drawings by Antonio Visentini and his assistants is fully considered in our current issue for the first time. He ingeniously utilised them at different points in his career to provide images of buildings in both his ‘vedute’ and ‘capricci’. This creative borrowing was possible because both painters formed part of the same successful network of artists, scientists and patrons.⁠
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Read Gregorio Astengo and Philip Steadman’s article ‘Canaletto’s use of drawings of Venetian buildings by Antonio Visentini’ in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo
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Image: ‘The Grand Canal, looking north-west from Ca’ Corner to Ca’ Contarini degli Scrigni, with the campanile of S. Maria della Carità’, by Canaletto. 1730s. Oil on canvas, 47 by 78.2 cm. (Private collection).

‘Art Brut: Dans l’intimité d’une collection’ at Grand Palais, Paris, contains 402 works by 156 artists, which are groupe...
19/09/2025

‘Art Brut: Dans l’intimité d’une collection’ at Grand Palais, Paris, contains 402 works by 156 artists, which are grouped into thematic sections that are a mixture of presumed creative impulses – ‘Repair the World’, ‘Order in God’s Name’, ‘Dance with the Spirits’, ‘Heavenly Epics’ – and practical categorisations – ‘Art Brut Around the World’ and ‘Ateliers Brut’. In the press release, the curators suggest rather gnomically that these are organised around ‘questions, obsessions, doubts, and even torments’. The divisions between these are porous – something acknowledged in the excellent exhibition design, which features gaps in many of the dividing walls, encouraging visitors to look through and across spaces.

Read Colin Rhodes’s review of the show, exhibiting until the 21st of September 2025, in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo

Image: ‘Blauer Montag (Blue Monday)’, by George Widener. 2006. Ink, felt-tip pen, gouache and stamp on paper, 37.3 by 49.7 cm. (© George Widener; Centre Pompidou, Paris; courtesy Henry Boxer Gallery, Richmond; exh. Grand Palais, Paris).

A century after Paolo Veronese’s death, the Venetian critic Marco Boschini enthusiastically called him ‘the treasurer of...
17/09/2025

A century after Paolo Veronese’s death, the Venetian critic Marco Boschini enthusiastically called him ‘the treasurer of painting’, explaining that his brush had the power to place all the jewels of the world before the viewer’s eyes. Now, in ‘Paolo Veronese (1528–1588)’ at Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, the chromatic brilliance of Veronese’s painterly jewels is once again on display. Yet as the catalogue is quick to point out, beneath this dazzling vision of Venice’s golden age runs a darker current of religious turbulence and the first signs of economic and political decline in the Venetian Republic. In every sense of the word, Veronese was painting the ‘myth of Venice’.

🔗 Read Beverly Louise Brown’s review of this show, exhibiting until the 21st of September 2025, in our September issue: https://www.burlington.org.uk/archive/back-issues/202509?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=September+25+issue+promo

Image: ‘Mars and Venus with Cupid’, by Paolo Veronese. c.1565–70. Oil on canvas, 48 by 39.5 cm. (Galleria Sabauda, Turin; exh. Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid).

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