This week: two exhibitions in London are showing remarkable works made during the Renaissance.
Fra Angelico, The bust of a cleric (around 1447-50), part of the exhibition at London’s King’s Gallery
© Royal Collection Enterprises Limited 2024 | Royal Collection Trust
At the King’s Gallery, the museum that is part of Buckingham Palace, Drawing the Italian Renaissance offers a thematic journey through 160 works on paper made across Italy between 1450 and 1600. Ben Luke talks to Martin Clayton, Head of Prints and Drawings at the Royal Collection Trust, about the show.
Michelangelo Buonarroti, The Virgin and Child with the Infant Saint John (The 'Taddei Tondo') (around 1504-05), which featured in Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael: Florence, c.1504 at the Royal Academy of Arts in London
Photo: Royal Academy of Arts, London, Photographer: Prudence Cuming Associates Limited
At the Royal Academy, meanwhile, the timescale is much tighter: a single year, 1504 to be precise, when Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael were all in Florence. We talk to Julien Domercq, a curator at the Academy, about this remarkable crucible of creativity.
Leonardo da Vinci, A Rearing Horse, (around 1503-05), on view at the Royal Academy show
© Royal Collection Enterprises Limited 2024 | Royal Collection Trust
And this episode’s Work of the Week is a magnum opus of Renaissance textiles: the Battle of Pavia Tapestries, made in Brussels to designs by Bernard van Orley, and currently on view in an exhibition at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. Thomas Campbell, the director of Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, talks to The Art Newspaper’s associate digital editor, Alexander Morrison, about the series.
The Invasion of the French Camp and the Flight of the Ladies and Servant, designed by Bernard van Orley, woven in the workshop of Willem and Jan Dermoyen, Brussels (around 1528–31)
Courtesy Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte
- Drawing the Italian Renaissance, King’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace, London, until 9 March 2025
- Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael: Florence, c.1504, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 9 November-16 February 2025
- Art and War in the Renaissance: The Battle of Pavia Tapestries, de Young Museum, San Francisco, US, until 12 January; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, spring 2025