Georges de La Tour and His World

Patricia Behre Miskimin is a contributing author Lorraine in the Time of Georges de La Tour . Book Description: Georges de La Tour, now considered one of the greatest painters of seventeenth-century France, was virtually unknown until the early twentieth century. His works were attributed to a variety of other artists until some were correctly identified in 1915, and he only came to the attention of a larger public in an exhibition in Paris in 1934. Since the major retrospective exhibition held in Paris in 1972, new paintings have continued to emerge, most recently the exquisite Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness, in 1994. La Tour painted common men and women with sympathetic insight, and his religious paintings are among the most powerful expressions of the Counter Reformation. Whether a subject was from modern life or a religious scene, he treated it with remarkable originality and intensity of vision. This beautiful book is a complete overview of the work and world of La Tour. Drawing on new technical and art historical material, it discusses his life, his paintings, and the context in which he worked. It traces La Tour\u27s development from the early, realistic daylight works to his later nocturnal scenes, in which forms are dramatically illuminated, to his final works, in which figures are reduced to simple, sculptural forms rendered in warm colors. The book also addresses such issues as the contemporary replication and dissemination of La Tour\u27s work; the place of his art in Counter-Reformation Europe; and the parallels that link his work with that of artists in other European cities. The book also presents the latest scientific research into his materials and working methods.https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/history-books/1029/thumbnail.jp