Renaissance to Rococo: masterpieces from the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art

Abstract

When the Wadsworth Atheneum opened in 1844 as the first public gallery of fine arts in America, the highlights of the collection were works by contemporary American artists. However, gifts soon brought a number of old master paintings to the museum, and today perhaps the most famous aspect of its fine European painting collection is the concentration of Italian Baroque masterpieces. The museum's distinguished director in the 1930s and 1940s, Chick Austin, acquired notable examples by Strozzi, Luca Giordano, and the first authentic Caravaggio in an American museum. Today the collection includes such Renaissance masters as Piero di Cosimo and Sebastiano del Piombo, continuing with the finest examples of Baroque painting, and culminating in a blaze of rococo splendour with Tiepolo, Canaletto, Guardi, Melendez, Greuze and Goya. This catalogue includes a history of the directors who formed the collection, and the owners and dealers from whom they bought paintings. Eric Zafran provides entries on the individual paintings by distinguished scholars.