Bridgeman Art Library

The sheer scale and range of the Bridgeman Art Library is extraordinary as you can see from a look at their website. However each month I visit Westbourne Grove in order to search through the in house image database, which for some reason seems to work better for my precise needs. A web search might produce the same result, but when I’m right there I can ask for experienced assistance to find unscanned material (John Freeman’s Fotomas Index for a start, still in its original boxes) and material from other collections Bridgeman represent  - if you can’t find what you’re looking for on the website, ring up and they’ll be more than happy to help. The January article on European costume during the Renaissance, was a particularly rich subject here, as many museums and galleries throughout the world are represented, so many of the illustrations for ‘Power Dressing’, including all those on the cover, come from the Bridgeman Art Library.

This is a subject I’ve researched before - the regional variations in style are fascinating, as are the sources of fashions such as slashing (Swiss soldiers in torn clothes after battle), but Ulinka Rublack goes further with points about personal identity and it was enormous fun to seek out pictures which absolutely fitted. The two Italian portraits shown here illustrate the use of fine luxurious fabrics and fur, decoration such as embroidery, slashing and quilting, also accessories (hats and gloves) and the new fashionable yellow dye.

Images:

- Portrait of a Lady in a Green Dress by Bartolomeo Veneto, 1530 (The Putnam Foundation, Timken Museum of Art, San Diego)

- Portrait of a Young Man by Alessandro Moretto c.1542 (National Gallery, London)