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Way of Beauty
Living the Dream
BY GINA LOEHR “The angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream” (Matthew 2:13) — for the second time! This striking depiction of The Dream of Joseph by Anton Raphael Mengs (1728–1779) imagines Joseph receiving the divine commission to…
A family at prayer
by Gina Loehr Paris, 1867. The World’s Fair, a gathering so full of character and culture that it attracted more than 9 million visitors during the course of the nine-month exposition. Among the exhibits at the fair was the work of the…
Vermeer’s hidden Catholic faith
by Fr. Anthony Giambrone, OP Dutch genre and landscape painting is a wonderful, placid gift to the world. The humble serenity that perfumes these images of simple people and daily chores, of pleasant homes and peaceful homelands, breathes a…
Unescapable death
by Elizabeth Lev In the late 12th century, Ubaldo Lanfranchi, archbishop of Pisa, returned from the Holy Land to his native city. As papal legate to the Third Crusade, he traveled with 52 ships, which he had filled with dirt from Mount…
The ‘vast cosmic drama’
by Fr. Anthony Giambrone, OP Hieronymus Bosch (circa 1450–1516) is certainly one of the most singular visionaries in the history of Western religious art. While the essential theology and moral message of his images accords perfectly with…
Tanner’s Realistic Annunciation
BY ELIZABETH LEV If the Virgin Mary is the most visually represented woman in history, then the Annunciation is the most favored scene from her life. Centuries of artists have fashioned images of this scene according to the spirituality of…
The Vatican’s masterpiece loan: Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘St. Jerome’ at the Met
To commemorate the 500th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s passing, the Vatican Museums have loaned one of the artist’s greatest paintings to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Saint Jerome Praying in the Wilderness is on view in…
Is Rembrandt’s ‘Return of the Prodigal Son’ the greatest painting of all time?
“Your brother was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.” Luke 15:32 Rembrandt van Rijn was the greatest painter of the Dutch Golden Age — and to some, of any age. Known as both the “painter of light,” and an…
Carthusian devotional art inspires exhibition at The Frick Collection in New York
The glories of God have always inspired artists, and art is a powerful way of spreading his word. In earlier centuries, when many faithful couldn’t read and few understood Latin, paintings, sculptures, and stained glass windows brought the…