Holbein on display in Los Angeles and New York

The New York Times website has an article about the current exhibition at the Morgan Library and Museum in that city of works by Hans Holbein. This is the first US exhibition devoted to him. Despite the logistical difficulties caused by covid and by being unable to transport fragile works across the Atlantic this does appear to be an impressive display - and the catalogue something to look out for.

The article is more than just a review in that you learn about Hans Holbein and something of the London in which he worked on his second stay in England in the 1530s and early 1540s. The various examples of his work reproduced indicate his mastery not only of textiles and surfaces but also of faces and fleeting expressions or gesture. The pairing of the drawing of Simon George - lent by the Royal Collection - and the finished portrait - lent from Frankfurt and recently cleaned - shows how Holbein worked from his sketches and brings to life an otherwise minor figure. There is poise and elegance from both painter and subject, and more than a hint of the purposeful courtier watching for his chance to advance. He is supremely elegant in his finery but he is also, one senses, an enterprising young man, with a keen eye for the main chance - in this case a potential betrothal. There is more about this portrait at Portrait of Simon George by HOLBEIN, Hans the Younger

The article can be read at Hans Holbein: Truth in Painting

There is another article about the exhibition and its previous presentation at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles in the Smithsonian Magazine at Hans Holbein's Portraits Defined—and Immortalized—Tudor England's Elite

This also recounts, again with various online links Holbein’s life and something of his artistry, and the vibrant, and potentially violent, world he and his sitters inhabited. That tension between the exquisite fabrics and courtesies of  courtly life, the opulence and bravura on the one hand and the terrifying risks of a fall from favour into disgrace and, potentially, violent death and destruction is, of course, part of the fascinatination of the age of King Henry VIII. We owe a great debt to Holbein for not only depicting so many of the players in those dramas but also for indicating and revealing so subtly their keen and calculating eyes and minds.