Samuel van Hoogstraten's Introduction to the Academy of Painting; or, The Visible World

"This volume presents the first English translation of Samuel van Hoogstraten's Introduction to the Academy of Painting; or, The Visible World (1678). Van Hoogstraten's text was the only comprehensive work on painting written by a Dutch artist in the later seventeenth century and a unique account of painting as it was practiced, taught, and discussed during a period of extraordinary artistic and intellectual ferment in the Netherlands"--
A unique seventeenth-century account of painting as it was practiced, taught, and discussed during a period of extraordinary artistic and intellectual ferment in the Netherlands.
A unique seventeenth-century account of painting as it was practiced, taught, and discussed during a period of extraordinary artistic and intellectual ferment in the Netherlands.The only comprehensive work on painting written by a Dutch artist in the later seventeenth century, Samuel van Hoogstraten&;s Inleyding tot de hooge schoole der schilderkonst, anders de zichtbaere werelt (Introduction to the Academy of Painting; or, The Visible World, 1678) has long served as a source of valuable insights on a range of topics, from firsthand reports of training in Rembrandt&;s studio to contemporary engagements with perspective, optics, experimental philosophy, the economics of art, and more. Van Hoogstraten&;s magnum opus&;here available in an English print edition for the first time&;brings textual sources into dialogue with the author&;s own experience garnered during a multifaceted career. Presenting novel twists on traditional topics, he makes a distinctive case for the status of painting as a universal discipline basic to all the liberal arts. Van Hoogstraten&;s arguments for the authority of what painters know about nature and art speak to contemporary notions of expertise and to the unsettled relations between theory and practice, making this book a valuable document of the intertwined histories of art and knowledge in the seventeenth century.