Narrative painting in nineteenth-century Europe

Nina Lübbren

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2023
• eBook ISBN: 9781526168566
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Art européen

This ground-breaking book presents a critical study of pictorial narrative in nineteenth-century European painting. Covering works from France, Germany, Britain, Italy and elsewhere, it traces the ways in which immensely popular artists like Jean-Léon Gérôme, Karl von Piloty and William Quiller Orchardson used unique visual strategies to tell thrilling and engaging stories. Regardless of genre, content or national context, these paintings share a fundamental modern narrative mode. Unlike traditional art, they do not rely on textual sources; nor do they tell stories through the human body alone. Instead, they experiment with objects, spaces, cause-and-effect relations and open-ended ambiguity, prompting viewers and reviewers to read for clues in order to weave their own elaborate tales.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of plates
• List of figures
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1. The terms of narrative
• 2. Eloquent objects
• 3. Patterns of reception
• 4. Stories in paint
• 5. Epilogue: into the twentieth century
• Select bibliography
• Index