Product Description
Pastels are ìluminous and beautiful beyond all other pictures,wrote the English eighteenth century pastelist Francis Cotes, describing the sensual appeal of this special dust rubbed into paper which has enchanted connoisseurs ever since. But the history of pastels is one of compounded mistakes and misattributions: these intimate portraits, whose subjects range from dynasts to servants, have been neglected for the better researched areas of old master drawings and oil painting.
Pastels from the French school account for more than half the Dictionary, representing most of the more important artists such as Vivien, Nattier, La Tour, Perronneau, Labille-Guiard and VigÈe Le Brun. But there were other major pastelists, such as Copley, Russell, Mengs, Carriera and Liotard from the American, English, German, Italian and Swiss schools, as well as a host of minor portraitists, many of whom traveled widely. The extent of the mutual influences between these schools can only be understood with the Dictionaryís integrated global coverage.
