Art
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Unique pets in the Eighteenth-Century
I recently stumbled across this beautiful portrait in the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Once I got past the beautiful fabrics and luxurious pearls (they always pull me in) – there was something else that struck me… The squirrel. I wondered if it was a symbol of something, but it turns out that actually, it wasn’t. read more
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New Podcast | HistoryExtra, “Everything you wanted to know about the Grand Tour”
Giovanni Paolo Panini, Modern Rome, 1757. Met Museum. I am so excited to share that the latest BBC HistoryExtra podcast had me answering lots of different questions about, and sharing highly entertaining stories from, the Grand Tour. It’s a topic I’m fascinated by, so I am so grateful to have been a part of the read more
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The first major British artist outside of London: Joseph Wright of Derby
Self-Portrait, c.1780. Yale Center for British Art. I think we often think that, with the growth of culture and leisure in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, that the be-all and end-all is London (or, perhaps Bath). But, of course, this was not true. For starters, I want to share with you the first major British read more
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Marie-Antoinette’s biggest fan: Empress Eugénie
Fewer women have captured cultural imagination like Marie-Antoinette. Her fascination endures today, and it did so almost immediately after her death in the French revolution. And one of her biggest fans, who sat at the helm of cult-like adoration for who they saw as a martyr queen, was Empress Eugénie. Empress Eugénie was born in read more
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Mini-Post | Charles-Antoine Coypel
I am obsessed with the luxury of the fabrics, bows, ruffles and utter GLOW of this piece in the Met’s collection: to me, it is so romantic, enhanced by the use of pastels. This is a Coypel portrait of Marie Elisabeth de Séré de Rieux and her husband François de Jullienne. Julienne was a collector read more
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What is a Cabinet of Curiosity?
One of my favourite things that I spotted in the second half of the third season of Bridgerton was the presence of cabinets of curiosity in Penelope and Colin’s sitting room. It seems the perfect set addition for our intrepid and intellectually engaged couple (I tried to find a still of the set, but couldn’t!): read more
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Book Review | “Picasso’s Lovers”, by Jeanne Mackin
Happy Friday! I have a wonderful new historical fiction novel to share with you this week – I’m stepping out of my Regency and eighteenth-century world into the twentieth century thanks to Berkley gifting me a copy of Jeanne Mackin’s new novel Picasso’s Lovers. If you love art, political and gender history, this one is read more
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Mini-Post | Flora (1894)
This weekend, I had the absolute joy of seeing this Evelyn de Morgan painting of “Flora”, which you can find at Delaware Art Museum. It was pretty magical as I’ve had a postcard of it above my desk for so long! Combining influences from Botticelli’s “Primavera” and “The Birth of Venus”, de Morgan (whose first read more
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Sir Joshua Reynolds, Celebrity Portrait Painter
If you ever look at British portraits during the eighteenth century, you will be hard-pressed not to come across one by the illustrious Sir Joshua Reynolds. He was one of the artists to be painted by if you were at the level of society that you wanted your portrait taken, and has gone down in read more
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Mini-Post | The Royal Chapel at Versailles
Six years ago today I was with two of my best friends in Paris – one was living there at the time, and we had gone to visit her. It was one of the best trips and perhaps my favourite day was the one in which we went to the Palace at Versailles. It was read more
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Dr. Lizzie Rogers 