Synopses & Reviews
Art, Science, and Witchcraft in Early Modern Holland is the first sustained study to offer an account of the rise of scientific naturalism in Dutch art and the simultaneous interest in fantastic imagery, representations of witches in particular. Claudia Swan uses the work of artist Jacques de Gheyn II (1565-1629) to explore the reciprocity between visual representation and early modern descriptive science, and of the parallel demonological theories of the human imagination and artistic theories of creation. This book is the first to examine De Gheyn's work in the context of cultural history and image theory.
Synopsis
This book explores the rise of scientific naturalism in Dutch art and the simultaneous interest in fantastic imagery.
About the Author
Claudia Swan teaches Northern renaissance and Baroque Art at Northwestern University. She is the author of Clutius Botanical Watercolors: Plants and Flowers of the Renaissance.
Table of Contents
Part I. Jacques de Gheyn II and the Representation of the Natural World: 1. De Gheyn in Leiden: approximating nature; 2. Making nature: the Lugt album; 3. Patterns of experience, pictures of nature; Part II. Unnatural Sights: Witchcraft and Phantasia: 4. The wherewithal of de Gheyn's witches; 5. Seeing witches: thinking about witchcraft in the Netherlands ca. 1600; 6. Trouble in the Ventricles: Phantasia, melancholy, witchcraft.