Two weeks ago, the debut of Titian's "God of Flowers" in Chinese mainland has made Dongyi Art Museum a popular "check-in point" for countless art lovers. On April 11th, Dongyi Art Museum ushered in the fourth international exhibition of the "Ten Exhibitions in Five Years" cooperation project with the Uffizi Museum in Italy, "The Last Aristocrat: 18th-Century European Master Paintings from the Uffizi Collection".
Unlike the exhibition "Titian, the God of Flowers: Masterpieces from the Uffizi Gallery of the Venetian School", which focuses on the masterpieces of the 16th-century Venetian School, the exhibition "The Last Aristocrat: Paintings of 18th-Century European Masters from the Uffizi Collection" presents a panoramic view of the splendid development of art in the 18th century.
Xie Dingwei, executive director of Dongyi Art Museum, said that the 18th century was a critical period in Western history. "The 18th century was a turning point, when political changes and industrial revolutions triggered social upheavals, and the enlightenment of the human mind inevitably gave birth to countless of the most precious and symbolic works in the history of European art. ”
The Uffizi Gallery's collection of 18th-century art reflects this. The exhibition features a selection of 80 works from the Uffizi Gallery's collection, bringing together works by more than 50 art giants, including Goya, Tiepolo, Canaletto, Boucher, Chardin, Guardi, and Lyotard. "Compared with the previous three exhibitions with the Uffizi Gallery, the works on display do not refer to a single artist, because in the 18th century, European art was in full swing, and artists from France, the Netherlands, Italy and other countries were in the exhibition, and the influence of the Renaissance was evident at that time. Xie Dingwei particularly emphasized.
In order to present the evolution of painting styles in the 18th century, the exhibition is divided into five chapters: "Portraits of the Court and New Society", "Landscapes, Still Lifes and Genre Paintings", "Myths, History and Legends", "The Birth of Tourism", and "Local Characteristics and the Charm of Distant Places". "The special feature of this exhibition is to tell the audience that art changes with the times. ”
In the 18th century, the number of tourists visiting Italy purely for personal leisure was booming, and the tourism industry flourished, and all kinds of souvenirs, especially landscape paintings, came into being.
"The landscapes in this exhibition are also divided into two types: one is a landscape painting that reflects the actual scene, such as Canaletto's "Landscape of the Grand Canal", "Landscape of the Doge's Palace of Venice" and other landscape and urban landscape paintings, showing the interplay of Venice, Florence, Rome and Naples, and the other is the artist's re-creation of the landscape through his own thoughts and thoughts, interpreting the theme of travel from another perspective. Xie Dingwei explained.
Caravaggio once said that to depict "a still life of flowers, like a human figure", it takes equal virtuosity. In the exhibition hall, the Dutch painter Rachel Reis's "Still Life" is a very typical Dutch style floral still life. Against a dark background, an extremely dense bouquet of flowers fills the entire frame, with dozens of different flowers, as well as a dozen different insects, worms, and butterflies. With a unique style of floral still life, Rachel Lesjean became a leader of his time.
Xie Dingwei said that the simultaneous exhibition of "Titian, God of Flowers: Masterpieces from the Venetian School of Painting from the Uffizi Museum" and "The Last Aristocrat: Paintings of 18th-Century European Masters from the Uffizi Collection" has formed a response to the development of European art history that lasted for two centuries, and the audience may feel that the artistic fashion of the 18th century was gradually developed under the influence of the Venetian school 200 years ago.
The exhibition will be on view until August 25.