15 October at the London National Gallery opens fascinating exhibition devoted to portraits of the Renaissance. The exhibition, called «Renaissance Faces: Van Eyck to Titian before», will be presented to the masterpieces of such famous artists of southern and northern Europe, as Raphael, Titian, Botticelli, Van Eyk, Golbeyn, Dürer and Bellini. Visitors will be able to see more than 70 paintings, drawings, sculptures and even the coin.

Along with the best works from the collection of the National Gallery (which houses one of the world's largest collection of portraits of the Renaissance) in the display are portraits of the museums of Great Britain, Europe and North America. It is thanks to this exhibition for the first time in more than 200 years will be a number of famous self-portrait of Van Eyck (in red turbans) and a portrait of his wife Margaret.

The exhibition will be presented to the work done in the XV - XVI centuries. During this period, given the development of ideas of humanism, and the attention of all of creative people drawn to the man, his personality and creativity. It is therefore of particular importance is the portrait. It not only serves to preserve the appearance of man in childhood, adulthood, old age and after death, but also helps to establish and maintain a variety of relationships - from love to political.

The exhibition will open to visitors many faces of people as they were 500-600 years ago - from princes, envoys and merchants to clergymen, shopkeepers and artists themselves (eg, «Self» Durer from the Kunsthalle Bremen). The National Gallery will also see the official portraits of courtiers, marital, family and children's portraits. Interestingly, the boys high origin often depicted together with their fathers, partly in order to strengthen the link between generations of a dynasty.

In the Renaissance it was considered that the appearance of man reflects his inner essence. Therefore, the external beauty showed high morals and virtues. Of course, every artist has their own idea of the ideals of beauty, and some pictures, presented in the exhibition, such as the «Portrait of a young girl» Palma il Vecchio (Palma il Vecchio), or «Bacchus and Ariadne» Tullio Lombardo (Tullio Lombardo), is clearly this show.

exhibition curator Susan Foster (Susan Foster) reported that one of the main ideas of the exhibition - to consider the purpose of painted portraits. According to her, the motivation of people at that time practically no different from ours today. The portrait was needed in order to capture the image of a loved or loved to call the bride or groom to show others their power and majesty, to keep the memory of himself after the death, or simply to make money.

Exhibition of Renaissance portraits, and vividly demonstrates the cross-cultural exchange that took place in Europe five centuries ago. Such artists as Van Eyk, Titian and Memling were in demand everywhere, and the impact of their work extends far beyond the holdings of their patrons.

exhibition at the National Gallery can be visited from October 15, 2008 to January 18, 2009.

material produced Catherine Onuchin

Sources: artdaily.com , guardian.co.uk , artinvestment.ru