This book is not only a fascinating biography of one of the greatest painters of the seventeenth century but also a social history of the colorful extended family to which he belonged and of the town life of the period. It explores a series of distinct worlds: Delft's Small-Cattle Market, where Vermeer's paternal family settled early in the century; the milieu of shady businessmen in Amsterdam that recruited Vermeer's grandfather to counterfeit coins; the artists, military contractors, and Protestant burghers who frequented the inn of Vermeer's father in Delft's Great Market Square; and the quiet, distinguished "Papists Corner" in which Vermeer, after marrying into a high-born Catholic family, retired to practice his art, while retaining ties with wealthy Protestant patrons. The relationship of Vermeer to his principal patron is one of many original discoveries in the book.

The invention of the printing press led to an explosion of cheap printed materials in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Ballads were no longer confined to the soapbox. Mass communication was now possible. The broadsides pasted on walls and disseminated among the masses, together with the written ballads hawked at street corners, represented the zeitgeist of popular culture in early modern Europe. Frequently designed in 'blackletter' gothic type and accompanied with distinctive woodcut illustrations, this dynamic, lively form encompassed the obsessions and characteristic humour of the times. This beautifully designed book with a foreword by Reece Shearsmith highlights some of the most striking and amusing examples from the British Library's collections and provides brief commentary on the political and social background of the times. Frequent topics of illustration include monsters, witches, criminals, drinking, war and politics.

2019, 450 years after the Old Master's death, will be celebrated as the Year of Bruegel, culminating in the exhibition 'The Age of Bruegel' at The Royal Museum of Fine Arts (KMSKA), Antwerp. In the run up to the numerous exhibitions and festivities that are planned for next year, Lannoo Publishers releases this glossy guidebook. It contains images of the Old Master's paintings with astonishing detail. It contains expert commentary by Till-Holger Borchert, director of all Bruges-based museums. Also available in the series: Masterpiece: Peter Paul Rubens (ISBN: 9789401441612) and Masterpiece: Jan Van Eyck (ISBN: 9789401441629).

Venice at the start of the sixteenth century was Europe's undisputed capital of culture: home to some of the finest artists of the Italian Renaissance, whose importance stretched far beyond the region. The first great painter to emerge was also the most mysterious: little is known about Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco, known as Giorgione (1478-1510), and few works have been attributed to him with any certainty, yet he painted what is considered to be the first landscape in Western art history, and his influence was profoundly felt by contemporaries including Lorenzo Lotto and Titian. This sumptuous volume brings together many of the works attributed to Giorgione, along with other masterpieces of the Venetian School, demonstrating the extraordinary richness of colour and mood for which these artists were famed. This book brings to life an extraordinary moment in the history of European art.

Few paintings inspire the kind of intense study and speculation as Garden of Earthly Delights, the world famous triptych by Netherlandish master Hieronymus Bosch. The painting has been interpreted as a heretical masterpiece, an opulent illustration of the Creation and a premonition of the end of the world. In this book, renowned art historian Hans Belting offers a radical reinterpretation of the work, which he sees not as apocalyptic, but utopian, portraying how the world would exist had the Fall not happened. Taking readers through each panel, Belting discusses various schools of thought and explores Bosch's life and times. This fascinating study is an important contribution to the literature and theory surrounding one of the world's most enigmatic artists.