The Immortality of Early Modern Art

Random Art Facts
Maybe I am going a little off topic here, but I love early modern art....and I am intent on proving to you why you should love it too.
Early Modern = (1450-1800)

Almost all of these types of paintings have hidden symbols which when you recognize uncovers a different story.

Those paintings also capture a moment in time. Like a camera taking a picture of a child, that child may never be ten again and that time of childhood bliss may never be captured again. This moment by a camera or a painting has become something of fragile immortal purity.

Here's some examples:

This woman on the left was Anne de Pisseleu d'Heilly in 1526. She was to be never in such extravagance again in her life. 

This is a picture of the peak of her wealth. In the 16th century wealth is wearing gold, a valuable metal, and fur. She was the mistress of the King Francois and was using her high status to elevate her family's position at court.

But then the king died, and the new King Henri and his mistress, Diane, came along. She was 'humiliated in ever way' by Diane and dismissed from the graciousness of the king's court. She was to die unknown and forgotten.

• Vermeer's work on the right is a classic example of symbols in early modern art.

This woman is standing on 'earth' and looking at a crystal ball symbolizing heaven. Underneath her is the apple of original sin and near it a snake. A snake is commonly a symbol of Satan. Thus this serpent Satan is struck down by the cornerstone of the church, Christ. Most Catholics in the Netherlands at the time when Vermeer lived had to pray in their home. Or those Catholics had to face the wrath of the then Protestant Netherlands.

Sources:

'Anne de Pisseleu d'Heilly' in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 9, Slice 7

   http://www.gutenberg.org/files/35398/35398-h/35398-h.htm. 

The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

I have looked on the Met Museum website and they have fantastic paintings in the public domain so I have drawn my examples from there.

Check out

Renaissance Art (Beginner's Guides) by 

Tom Nichols 

Click on the the picture and surf the world of renaissance.