LONDON.- As Dickinson prepares to exhibit at The European Fine Art Fair in Maastricht once again, they are looking forward to welcoming many friends and collectors to their stand. In advance of the opening of the fair, and for those who will be unable to visit, the gallery shared a small selection of the impressive artworks they will be showing this year.
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At the heart of the display is Jan van Bijlert's large-scale painting, The Five Senses, which depicts five allegorical figures gathered around a stone table, with a cupid in attendance. Having returned from Italy to his native Antwerp in 1624, Bijlert developed this masterpiece - which dates from the early 1630s - in a style that combines the traditions of Dutch realism with which the artist was deeply familiar with the Caravaggesque chiaroscuo of the paintings he had seen in Rome only a few years before. The result is a monumental work so life-like and dramatic in its execution that, upon viewing it, our own senses seem to be heightened.
On a smaller scale, they will also be presenting Lucas Cranach the Elder's delicate panel painting, Christ as the Man of Sorrows. Thought to have been commissioned by Johannes Henckel von Donnersmarck, Court Chaplain to King Ludwig II of Hungary, the panel dates from around 1525-30 when Cranach was deeply involved in creating art that supported Protestant themes. Indeed, this work has been painted with such detail and delicacy that Christ's appearance is almost ethereal, serving both as a reminder of His suffering for humanity and as an invitation for faithful contemplation.
Among the Italian Old Masters is a work by Elisabetta Sirani, also of a religious subject. The Madonna and Child with a swallow is an exceptional and rare example of the work that Sirani achieved during her abbreviated career: she died at the age of just 27. Within that brief time, however, she grew to prominence executing commissions for both private and ecclesiastical patrons. She developed a widespread reputation as an accomplished painter, celebrated in her own era and still recognised for her talents today.
Each year, Dickinson aim to show a selection of artworks that cover a variety of artistic genres. It is a rare occasion, however, to be able to exhibit one piece that is both a work of portraiture and a landscape. Ships on a stormy sea, painted over a fragmentary portrait of a young man, attributed to Isaak Luttichuys and Ludolf Backhuysen, is an example of such a work: a wooden panel, already used by one artist, which was subsequently recycled and reused by another artist. Although it was not an uncommon practice to repurpose materials, to see both elements so clearly, rather than one having been entirely overpainted, is remarkable. Indeed, the two components have become one composition, with the blue sky of the seascape silhouetting the face of the sitter beneath, creating a unique painterly palimpest.
The display this year will also include a number of Old Master sculptures, including a marble effigy of Saint Sebastian, attributed to Benedetto da Rovezzano and Donato Benti. This highly-polished, slender work is thought to have been intended for an architectural niche and depicts Saint Sebastian bound by intricate knots to the rough bark of a tree. Dating from the final phase of the Genoese partnership of Da Rovezzano and Benti, around 1503-04, this figure is reminiscent of those that appear on the tomb of the Dukes of Orléans, itself a collaboration between these two artists, which ranks amongst their most impressive creative outputs.
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