"Pisanello: Painter to the Renaissance Court"
2001-10-24 until 2002-01-13
National Gallery
London, , UK United Kingdom

One of the main events of the National Gallery's Renaissance Autumn programme, the exhibition 'Pisanello: Painter to the Renaissance Court', opens this month. This is the first exhibition devoted to the artist and his work in this country. It brings together the four undisputed panel paintings by Pisanello (c.1394-1455) that survive, including two from the Gallery's collection.

The exhibition will focus on these works, examining their subject matter and the preparatory drawings, including a group of remarkable coloured nature studies that Pisanello produced for them.

Many lively and charming details of animals and birds feature in both Pisanello's paintings, and his preparatory sketches. One of the drawings in the exhibition is the study of a running hare. This was probably copied from a pattern book ñ the bound collection of drawings in which artists recorded motifs for future reference for themselves and their studio. These drawings were rarely made from nature, but were usually copied from other works of art. However, Pisanello has taken a standard type and then added naturalistic detail to the fur and face, after studying a dead hare. Some areas of the drawing, such as the hind legs, have been left unpainted to exploit the colour of the paper. The running hare appears in the National Gallery's painting of the 'Vision of Saint Eustace', which is included in the exhibition. However it has been reversed, and now runs from left to right, away from the saint and his pack of hounds.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a comprehensively illustrated catalogue, price £25 paperback and £35 hardback, available from the National Gallery shops.

IMIAGE
Pisanello
Portrait of Margherita Gonzaga, c.1438-40
Paris, Musée du Louvre.

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