The Court Artist; & Rubens: A Double Life

Catherine King reviews two new books on art

Catherine King | Published in 31 Dec 1995
  • The Court Artist
    Translated by D. McLintock and Martin Warnke- Cambridge University Press, 1993 - xx + 299 pp. - £35
  • Rubens: A Double Life
    by Marie Anne Lescourret. Translated by Elfreda Powell - Alison and Busby, 1993 - ix+ 289 pp. - £16.99

In an ideal world, these two studies would dovetail with one another – the one being a general overview of the development of the court artist and its ennoblement of the artist in the West, the other considering the career of a painter who served courts both as a diplomat and a maker of visual representations. Unfortunately the biography of Rubens by Marie Anne Lescourret is not the match of Martin Warnke's survey, in terms of clarity of argument, modernity in approach, or provision of reliable scholarly footnotes and bibliography.

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Art