Search results for ""author claudia wagner""

Exhibiting the mastery of the gem-engraver from prehistory to the present, Masterpieces in Miniature offers a survey of the finest products of the gems craft over millennia. The creation of miniature intaglios - or incised carvings - which could be impressed on clay or wax was one of the earliest crafts of civilisation. To this the Greeks added relief cameos, while comparable skills were lavished on the decoration of metal finger rings. These artefacts record subjects of significance for their period and place but are also the direct expression of an artist's skills and imagination. Engraved gems were collected first by the ancient Romans and then throughout the Renaissance were a source for knowledge of `classical' subjects and styles, when they were copied - from Michelangelo to Rubens - by the foremost artists of the day. There was a strong revival of the craft in the Neo-classical period of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when European collectors - many undertaking their Grand Tour of the continent - made new collections, several of which form the basis for those held in major museums today. The gemstones explored and illustrated here are from a distinguished collection made in the earlier twentieth century by a notable connoisseur of ancient art. Many originate from named older European collections and were previously unknown to scholars and collectors. The authors offer a balanced selection of earlier eastern and Greek stones, alongside others from the Neo-classical era, that will delight all lovers of antiquity and art.

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The Beverley Gem Collection at Alnwick Castle is one of the most distinguished in Great Britain still in private hands. Alnwick Castle, ancestral seat of the Earls of Northumberland - and the House of Percy - was built as a border fortress against the Scots in the twelfth century, if not earlier. Substantially enlarged in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and remaining in Percy family hands to this day, it stands now as a prime example of robust stone defensive architecture. Much visited and admired for its impressive exterior, this dramatic stronghold and stately home is the setting for this collection. The Beverley Collection reflects the longstanding interest of the English nobility in both accumulating and commissioning gemstones. The Collection was begun by the First Duchess of Northumberland in the early eighteenth century; but the greater part of it was made later in the century by Algernon Percy, First Earl of Beverley, during a tour of Europe while in the company of his mentor, Louis Dutens. Their success in France and Italy was such that it incited the jealousy of the Empress Catherine of Russia, herself a passionate collector. The range of objects - cameos, intaglios and finger rings of the highest quality - is considerable: Greek, Roman and Etruscan, as well as a notable assemblage of neoclassical signed gems by British artists. One jewel clearly provided inspiration for Michelangelo's painting of Adam on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. The Collection has been little known, except by connoisseurs, but this volume brings to the attention of a broader audience many of the finest products of one of the oldest arts of the western world.

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