Zeitgeist

I don't know the source, but it seems like a marriage of art history with current events.

Mayan Lintel at the British Museum

About two weeks ago, I spent several days at the British Museum, where they have several carved stone works from Yaxchilan that I teach in my art history and humanities classes. These include relief carvings and architectural elements that are often described as “canonical” examples of Classic Maya art.

I have to get this out of my system first: they were taken by Britain, and they should be returned. Full stop.
That said—yes, this is hypocritical—seeing them in person, like the Parthenon metopes, is genuinely moving.

What really struck me was the scale. These carvings weren’t decorative wall panels. They functioned as ceilings over very short passageways leading into small yotoot—palace or elite residential spaces. Standing in front of them, you realize how low and narrow these entrances were. You would have passed directly beneath the carving, almost brushing it with your head.

The carving itself surprised me. It isn’t as sharp or crisp as I expected from textbook photos. That’s likely due to a mix of erosion, age, and wear, rather than lack of skill. The details are still impressive, especially the figures and glyphs, but the surface feels softened by time.

What I liked most was how intimate the space must have felt. These carvings are much narrower than I imagined, and that changes how I think about their function. This wasn’t art meant to be seen from across a plaza. It was meant to be encountered up close, in a confined space, probably by a small and very specific audience.

I wish I could read the glyphs. Even without that knowledge, you can feel how much meaning is packed into a tight physical space—political power, ancestry, ritual, and authority, all compressed into a few feet of stone.

If you want a deeper breakdown of the symbols, inscriptions, and historical context, I cover these works in detail in a video in my Udemy course.

https://www.udemy.com/course/art-history-survey-prehistory-to-1300/?referralCode=5830BC2BBFDA076FDC00

The Sidewalks of Spain

 

I'm traveling through Spain lately. I’ve spent time in Gijón, Madrid, and Seville. One of the things I’m having a bit of trouble adjusting to is how to navigate travel on sidewalks and in museums. I’ve been spending a lot of time in art museums, negotiating my way past people in hallways, galleries, and on sidewalks.

Some of this is definitely culture shock. Some of it is my own cultural ignorance. And, if I’m being honest, some of it is my bad habit of slipping into the role of the long-suffering victim of other people’s behavior. I know, rationally, that it’s not possible that everyone I meet is selfish or unaware. Emotionally, though, my shoulders don’t always get the memo.

After one too many tight squeezes and near-collisions, I decided to ask for help. I used the scholar function on ChatGPT and asked whether there were any studies or coping mechanisms that might help me deal with both the physical navigation and my rising irritation.

What it told me was surprisingly comforting. A lot of the stress comes from expecting cooperation in places that actually run on unspoken rules. People aren’t ignoring me on purpose. They’re following patterns they’ve learned work. Once I stop expecting eye contact to mean anything, and once I move earlier and more clearly, things get easier. Even more helpful was the reminder that my anger isn’t a moral failure. It’s just a nervous system reacting to repeated small frustrations.

So now I’m trying a few small changes. I move a little sooner. I breathe out longer than I breathe in. I remind myself that my job is to get through the space, not to teach a lesson in courtesy. I still get annoyed sometimes. I’m human. But I’m also enjoying the art more, the streets more, and the trip as a whole a bit more gently.

It turns out that adjusting how I walk is easier than adjusting how I think, but both are worth practicing when you’re a guest in someone else’s rhythm.

A Trip to see Italica, Spain

Last week Valerie and I took a bike ride from Seville to Italica. We were a bit sad because the ruins of the city were closed because it’s been raining an unusual amount, but we got to see a Roman theater.

The ride itself was great—flat, easy, and surprisingly green once you get out of Seville. When we reached Italica, we found out the main archaeological site was shut down to protect it from damage. Honestly, that made sense. Heavy rain and ancient stone don’t mix well.

Still, we weren’t totally out of luck. From behind barriers, we could clearly see the Roman theater, and it was impressive even from a distance. It’s built into a hillside, just like Roman theaters were meant to be, using the slope to support the seating. Even partially closed off, you can still get a real sense of how large it was and how it worked as a public space.

What struck me is how important a theater like this would have been. This wasn’t just for entertainment. It was where people gathered, heard the Latin language spoken, absorbed Roman values, and participated in civic life. Seeing it there, outside of Rome, really drives home how deeply Roman culture reached into what is now Spain.

You can only view it from behind barriers, which at first feels frustrating, but it’s clearly about preservation. Parts of the theater are delicate, some areas are still being studied, and parts of the ancient city are tangled up with the modern town nearby. The barriers are less about keeping people out and more about making sure the site survives.

Even with the closures, the trip felt worth it. Standing there, looking at a Roman theater in the Andalusian countryside, it’s easy to imagine the city when it was alive—crowds arriving, voices echoing, and performances happening nearly two thousand years ago. Not a bad payoff for a rainy bike ride.

The Benefits of No Photography at the Prado

I spent the day at the Prado today, and saw around thirty paintings in the art historian's "canon" of great works.

Photography is not allowed.

It was a relief!

Most of my visits to art museums I juggle taking photographs of the things I'm seeing to use when I teach.  Sometimes getting those hard to find details, or more faithful color, or the painting in its frame, or with people around to show its size.

I spent my time standing in front of each work asking myself what I saw in terms of color, texture, composition, shading, realism, and anatomy.

Then I looked at the subject of the painting, the symbols used, the interrelationships of the symbols and what it might mean.  

I also tried to remember what I knew about each painting's history, the geography, it's context, and patronage.  

Sometimes I shared what I knew with my partner or just asked her what she saw and thought.

If I didn't know enough or had questions, I looked it up on my phone.

All without wasting time taking the perfect shot.  I had to actually look at each work in real time and decide with each painting what I wanted out of the experience.  It also gave me the extra bandwidth to compare the paintings near it to it.

The lack of photography also lessened the interference from other viewers and my interference with them.

I had a good time.  I think I'll remember what I saw and, if I don't, I can always look for a picture on the web.

Seville (The Art Museum) Paintings with Skulls)

While visiting the art museum in Seville, pretty fantastic collection, I started noticing all the different ways that skulls show up in paintings.  Many of them were upended or turned at a weird angle.  You see them from the bottom, where the spinal column and at an angle that is not the most recognizable view of the skull.

I wondered, why is that?  So I used Ebscohost and read some stuff.

Art historians generally say that the unusual way skulls are depicted—tilted, inverted, or seen from awkward angles—is intentional, especially in Spanish Baroque painting.

 (I'm actually not sure since none of them seemed to refer to an actual text where an artist who painted them said this, but, it does seem reasonable. )

In works like San Jerónimo penitente en su estudio by Sebastián de Llanos Valdés, Tentaciones de San Jerónimo by Juan de Valdés Leal, and San Francisco confortado por un ángel by Domingo Martínez, the skulls are rarely shown straight on. Instead, they are often viewed from below or turned in ways that make them harder to recognize.

They might be shown this way because artists wanted them to function as more than simple symbols of death. By rotating or foreshortening the skull, painters turned it into more of an idea rather than something we literally could put a face on.

I bet it's because they may have gotten bored with straightforward ways of painting a skull and wanted to experiment or show off.

One historian, in fancy jargon, calls this a "conceptual device that slows down the viewer and demands careful observation." (paraphrased) and that this visual difficulty makes us think more about moral and philosophical ideas about mortality, knowledge, and the limits of human life, which were central concerns during the Renaissance and Baroque periods (Juan, 2012).

To reiterate, he's guessing or theorizing.  To go with this, historians theorize that, in religious paintings, especially those associated with saints like San Jerónimo, skulls serve as vanitas or memento mori symbols—reminders that worldly achievements, learning, and power are temporary. When the skull is shown from an unusual angle, it becomes less decorative and more unsettling.

 The viewer has to “discover” the skull rather than immediately recognize it, which mirrors the moral lesson: people often ignore death until they are forced to confront it directly (Sofer, 1998; Goscilo, 2010).

I found one guy who kind of agrees with my guess or theory that artists were bored or showing off.  To paraphrase,

These angles may reflect the period’s artist's experiments with foreshortening, perspective, and anatomical accuracy. (Think Mantegna's Dead Christ.

 From the sixteenth century onward, painters were deeply invested in demonstrating their technical skill. Showing a skull from the base, including the opening where the spine connects, allowed artists to display their mastery of foreshortening and their knowledge of human anatomy. In Seville’s paintings, this technical ambition reflects the influence of Italian Renaissance theory combined with a distinctly Spanish realism that emphasizes physical and spiritual intensity (Kajinishi et al., 2023).

They did like to play with optics.  There's a famous painting by Holbein that I saw at the British National Gallery that puts some "flesh" on the theory. 

Distorted skulls may connect to the idea of anamorphosis, where an image only appears correct from a specific viewpoint. 

While the Seville works I saw are not fully anamorphic like Holbein’s The Ambassadors, their angled skulls still suggest that truth—and death—is always present but not always immediately visible. The viewer must change how they look in order to understand what is being shown (Massey, 1997).

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References (forgive the crappy formatting. I'm on a phone.)

Juan, R. M. S. (2012). The turn of the skull: Andreas Vesalius and the early modern memento mori. Art History, 35(5), 958–977.

Kajinishi, Y., Kodera, R., & Kodera, H. (2023). Anatomical intention in a seventeenth-century Dutch vanitas skull. Anatomical Science International.

Massey, L. (1997). Anamorphosis through Descartes, or perspective gone awry. Renaissance Quarterly, 50(4), 1142–1169.

Sofer, A. (1998). The skull on the Renaissance stage: Imagination and the life of props. English Literary Renaissance, 28(1), 3–31.

Goscilo, H. (2010). Vision, vanitas, and veritas: The mirror in art. Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature, 34(2).

Çelik, Z. (2016). About antiquities: Politics of archaeology in the Ottoman Empire. University of California Press.

De Pascale, E. (2009). Death and resurrection in art. Getty Publications.

The British Museum of Art, The Elgin Marbles (Again)

I received some angry comments when I made a post on Facebook describing the Parthenon Marbles at the British Museum as "stolen."  (Most of the angry comments came from British Nationals.)

I did some research, and found scholarly sources proving I am right.

Most historians agree that Lord Elgin stretched or exceeded his authority in removing large parts of the Parthenon sculptures and that later conservation practices at the British Museum caused irreversible damage.

In the early 1800s, Lord Elgin removed large sections of the Parthenon sculptures from Greece, even though the Ottoman permit he relied on only allowed limited access and the taking of a few loose stones, not whole carvings. His workers cut sculptures directly from the building, causing damage during removal. Years later, the British Museum further harmed the marbles by aggressively cleaning them with metal tools and wire brushes to make them look whiter, scraping away original surfaces and details that can never be restored.

Excuse my formatting, I'm doing this on my phone.  Here are some selected scholarly sources (for reference):

Boardman, J. (2000). The Elgin Marbles: Matters of fact and opinion. International Journal of Cultural Property.

St Clair, W. (1999). The Elgin Marbles: Questions of stewardship and accountability. IJCP.

Neils, J. (2003). Cleaning and Controversy: The Parthenon Sculptures 1811–1939. JSTOR.

Titi, C. (2023). The Parthenon Marbles and International Law. Springer.

Reppas, M. J. (1998). The deflowering of the Parthenon. Fordham IPLJ.

Çelik, Z. (2016). About Antiquities: Politics of Archaeology in the Ottoman Empire.

Stamatoudi, I. (2022). The Parthenon Marbles Case. Cardozo Arts & Ent. LJ.

Betts, P. (2000). Cleaning of the Parthenon Marbles. Museum Management and Curatorship.

How to fix things.

 The ACLU is winning between 70 and 80% of all of its cases.  I've researched what we can do.  The most important thing is to use democratic procedures to slow, temper, and dampen infractions.  The second thing is to not amplify panic by resharing stuff that amplifies and repeats bad news and evil events.  Believe it or not, the constant repetition of outrageous behaviors actually normalizes these behaviors and reduces optimism.   It has the effect of advertising and normalizing.  Contributing money to organizations that fight things procedurally works the best. (I've found actual studies.)  Also, deleting Amazon accounts, Uber, and other major oligarchic organizations stops some of their economic power.  (There are historical precedents and economic projections/studies that prove this.)  The most effective route to change is to slow the hype and use boring methodical legal and procedural methods.

My NSFW Book

 Quick update and good news:  For a while, my NSFW Paintings of Naked Men catalogs were getting delayed or canceled. The issue wasn’t the book—it was a mix of printer backlogs and some U.S. print partners refusing to print nude male artwork.
https://www.kenneymencher.com

That’s now fixed.

Gelato applied an internal solution and routed the books to print partners who will consistently produce them. Orders are back on, printing reliably, and shipping worldwide again—including Europe.

If you wanted the catalog before and couldn’t get it: it’s live, it works, and it ships.

44 pages. Matte hardcover. Nude men. Definitely not safe for work.

15th Century Art, Brunelleschi

 

In the early 15th century, there was a competition to design the bronze doors for the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence. The two main competitors were Filippo Brunelleschi and Lorenzo Ghiberti. Their panels both depicted the biblical story of Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son, Isaac. The panel by Brunelleschi has a more rigid composition with figures that appear less three-dimensional. It emphasizes the narrative of the scene, making it easy to follow, but it does not incorporate the depth and perspective that would later become central to Renaissance art.

Ghiberti’s panel is more intricate, with greater attention to perspective and the arrangement of figures in space. His use of foreshortening, a technique that makes objects appear to recede into the background, gives his panel a more lifelike quality. Some of the details in his work, however, make the scene more difficult to interpret at first glance.

Art historians generally agree that Ghiberti won the competition. However, some sources suggest that the judges originally declared a tie and asked both artists to collaborate. According to some accounts, Brunelleschi refused to work together and withdrew, leaving Ghiberti to complete the commission.

Brunelleschi later shifted his focus to architecture. He played a major role in the completion of Santa Maria del Fiore, commonly known as Florence Cathedral. The cathedral had been under construction since the late 13th century, with several architects contributing to its design. The campanile (bell tower) was designed by Giotto di Bondone in the 14th century.

 

One of the main challenges in finishing the cathedral was constructing the dome. The space left for the dome was large, and there was no clear solution at the time for how to build it without the use of traditional wooden centering, which would have been difficult given the scale. Brunelleschi, working between 1420 and 1436, developed an innovative method that allowed the dome to be built using a herringbone brick pattern and a system of interlocking ribs for support. His approach allowed the dome to be constructed without external scaffolding, making it one of the most significant engineering achievements of the period.

During the Renaissance, new wealth led to increased interest in construction projects, but many patrons wanted to see results within their lifetimes. Instead of commissioning entire cathedrals, they often funded smaller chapels or decorative elements that could be completed more quickly. An example of this is Giotto’s work in the Scrovegni Chapel.

The Medici family, however, took a different approach. They supported the completion of Florence Cathedral and ensured that a dome would be built. The overall design of the cathedral follows a Romanesque layout, but the structural details vary. The vaulting inside is Gothic, featuring ribbed groin vaults. The dome itself belongs to the Renaissance period. The building’s exterior was completed later, and the facade was redone in the 19th century. The design of the facade has elements that resemble Byzantine architecture.

The front of the cathedral has decorative patterns that resemble the exterior of the Baptistery of Pisa. The design creates a layered effect, possibly an intentional reference to architectural styles from the 13th century and earlier Byzantine periods. Inside, the pointed arches and rib vaults define the space. The cathedral has two side aisles with pointed arches, which are also used at the far end of the building. The structural details and materials reflect different architectural influences, with the interior being primarily Gothic.

The area where the transept meets the nave creates a large open space at the crossing of Florence Cathedral. Brunelleschi was tasked with solving the structural challenge of completing the dome. The cathedral follows a Latin cross plan, and the original design intended for the dome to be a perfect circle, similar to the Pantheon in Rome. Instead, Brunelleschi created an octagonal design, dividing it into segments to improve stability. The shape made the structure stronger and allowed it to be built without traditional wooden centering, which was difficult for a dome of this scale. 

Brunelleschi had traveled to Rome, where he studied ancient architecture, including the Pantheon. He made sketches and analyzed classical structures, but the final design of the cathedral’s dome does not replicate the Pantheon’s form. When presenting his idea to Florence’s leadership, including members of the Medici family, he was asked for a model or working plans. Instead, he demonstrated his concept by standing an egg upright, supposedly cracking the shell to show how a vertical structure could support itself.

 

The dome is not a perfect hemisphere but has an ovoid shape, giving it a slightly elongated form. It is divided into eight segments and includes a unique system of double walls. Between the inner and outer walls, Brunelleschi designed an interlocking brick pattern that helped distribute weight evenly. To further support the structure, he incorporated exterior buttressing, including small domes surrounding the base of the main dome. A lantern was later added on top, completing the design.

Study with me on Udemy. (Videos and more.) 

 

If you look at the cutaway of the dome, you can see that it has a double-dome construction. A similar idea was used in the cathedral at Pisa, where a rounded dome was combined with a more pointed one, giving the structure a shape that some have compared to a bottle. In this case, Brunelleschi designed a system of ribs that functioned almost like layers in a laminate countertop. By overlapping wooden beams and using their tensile strength to oppose forces, he created a structure where the ribs pushed outward from the center. This outward force gave the dome a degree of flexibility, which was important in a region like Italy, where earthquakes and shifting ground could pose a problem for large buildings.

Along with these structural ribs, Brunelleschi built an outer dome that enclosed another, slightly more vertical dome inside. He also used a herringbone pattern for the masonry, laying the bricks in an interlocking arrangement that spiraled upward. Laying the bricks this way was difficult, and working at that height added to the challenge. Workers stood on wooden planks attached to temporary platforms, and at times, even Brunelleschi was unsure if the method would succeed.

 

 Instead of using the traditional scaffolding method found in Gothic cathedrals, where bricks were placed on top of a temporary wooden structure, he had to develop a new way to support the bricks as they were laid. Unlike the Pantheon, which may have been filled with sand and had scaffolding built around it, Brunelleschi left the interior space open as the dome was constructed.

Because the double-dome construction created forces that pushed outward, Brunelleschi needed a way to counterbalance them. To do this, he designed a lantern at the top, a structure that looks similar to a miniature Gothic spire. The weight of the lantern pushed down on the oculus at the center of the dome, helping to keep everything stable.

 

To support the lantern placed on top of the dome, Brunelleschi added a series of smaller domes around the base. These structures acted like bookends, pressing against the main dome to provide additional stability. The entire system was designed to work together, and visitors toFlorence can walk between the two domes to see how the structure connects. The design balances tensile strength and flexibility, allowing for movement while maintaining structural integrity.

Some accounts describe additional features that Brunelleschi included, such as small holes drilled in certain areas to allow for expansion and contraction. A book called Brunelleschi’s Dome details some of these techniques, showing how he accounted for forces acting on the structure. His approach combined practical construction knowledge with an understanding of how materials interact over time.

Brunelleschi’s background extended beyond architecture. He was originally trained as a sculptor and had a broad education, including knowledge of biblical texts. His ability to connect different disciplines reflects the Renaissance ideal of a well-rounded individual. Baldassare Castiglione’s book The Book of the Courtier describes the qualities expected of a courtier, including skill in rhetoric, mathematics, art, history, and even physical activities like tennis and weaponry. Brunelleschi shared some of these qualities, as he combined artistic skill with practical engineering.

Study with me on Udemy. (Videos and more.)  

He also applied what would later be called scientific observation. At the time, the idea of systematic experimentation and testing was not as formally established, and the scientific method had not yet been defined. However, Brunelleschi observed architectural principles from ancient buildings, such as the Pantheon, and adapted them for new projects. His approach involved studying past structures, analyzing their construction methods, and applying those ideas to contemporary architecture.

The Story of Griselda a the British National Gallery

 The series of three paintings at the National Gallery in Britain reminded me of the loggia that is diagonally across fom the Palazzo Rucellai in Florence.  (Read the creepy "Decameron" story by Bocaccio that was on the museum plaques. It's insane!)

I did a bit of research, and it turns out many loggias were built to commemorate political marriages.  The loggia is a semi public space that was built as an outdoor covered space, that was probably used to have the wedding. Then used as a kind of civic/semi private ceremonial space.  They also commemorateor document, misogyny during  the Italian Renaissance. 

Today, the loggia across from the Palazzo Rucellai was enclosed and contains a high end shoe store.

If you take my class, I have a longer video about the two palaces in Florence, the Medici Ricardi and the Rucellai. 
https://www.kenneymencher.com/courses