Old world masters in new world collections
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"Old World Masters in New World Collections" by Esther Singleton is an illustrated art history survey and catalogue written in the early 20th century. It documents European Old Master paintings that entered American private collections, blending brief school overviews with focused entries on individual works, their provenance, former owners, and aesthetic qualities. The volume foregrounds beauty, downplays martyrdom and violence, and underscores the roles of prominent collectors and dealers—especially Sir Joseph Duveen—in shaping America as a new repository of masterpieces. The opening of this volume presents a preface asserting the book’s novelty and scope, crediting American collectors and Duveen’s influence, listing celebrated works with illustrious provenances, arguing for the superior selectiveness of American collections, and declaring a “Beauty”-driven selection while noting extraordinary valuations. It then outlines the contents by national schools and begins with a clear, contextual primer on Sienese painting as a refined Gothic offshoot with Byzantine and possible Oriental affinities. Early entries describe Sassetta’s St. Francis scenes, Matteo di Giovanni’s brocaded Madonna, and Benvenuto di Giovanni’s lively Adoration, each with vivid formal analysis and ownership history. A broader Florentine survey follows—linking Cimabue, Giotto, guilds, and Medici patronage to the Renaissance—before concise entries on a Giotto Madonna, Masolino’s architectural Annunciation, Fra Angelico’s angel and Virgin diptych and a Cosmas-and-Damianus predella scene, and a Fra Filippo Lippi Madonna, all characterized by precise iconography, technique, and provenance.
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"... Treating of old masters in private collections ... in America."--Preface
