This book is the result of a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at the Kunsthistorisches Institut (Max Planck Institute) in Florence, Italy, in collaboration with the MaxNetAging Research School in Rostock, Germany. Adopting an innovative approach, it leads the reader through early modern Tuscan paintings to discover a new vision of intergenerational relationships. By studying both the images of elderly people in the scenes of Jesus’ Childhood and the primary sources dealing with old age, the book reveals how old age was perceived at the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the Renaissance in Tuscany.

The dry, wrinkled skin, crow's feet and rheumy eyes of old women can be seen universally; yet the actual images and their meaning differ widely, and the very absence of these old women in certain settings also reveals both a discomfort with the aged and an ease in their invisibility. This is true in writing about art and often in the art itself. The physical markers of aging, even implications of death or the nearness of death, make many of these images of old women, haunting; in the 16th and 17th centuries, they become emblems of anger and avarice, though portraits of known elderly women are often created with a sense of awe, and in some cases, authority. This book provides a frank examination of old women, from medieval “old wives” to contemporary reimaginations of shamans and witches and empowering self-portraits. Works from medieval Europe to colonial-time Polynesia, present West Africa, Japan, and the Americas, in a multiplicity of media are explored. These studies of varied representations of “old women” offer fresh perspectives and a dialogue about society's values and preconceptions regarding the “golden years” in different times and cultures. Images of old women may be the very opposite of what one considers the ideal, but this discussion makes these often overlooked images seem fresh and highlights their many positive associations.

This timely publication ponders the presence of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, in art, and seeks to evoke the affective rationale underlying Mary's centuries old fascination.

The Advocate is a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) monthly newsmagazine. Established in 1967, it is the oldest continuing LGBT publication in the United States.

Originally published in 1983, Leo Steinberg's classic work has changed the viewing habits of a generation. After centuries of repression and censorship, the sexual component in thousands of revered icons of Christ is restored to visibility. Steinberg's evidence resides in the imagery of the overtly sexed Christ, in Infancy and again after death. Steinberg argues that the artists regarded the deliberate exposure of Christ's genitalia as an affirmation of kinship with the human condition. Christ's lifelong virginity, understood as potency under check, and the first offer of blood in the circumcision, both required acknowledgment of the genital organ. More than exercises in realism, these unabashed images underscore the crucial theological import of the Incarnation. This revised and greatly expanded edition not only adduces new visual evidence, but deepens the theological argument and engages the controversy aroused by the book's first publication.

Bridging the fields of conservation, art history, and museum curating, this volume contains the principal papers from an international symposium titled "Historical Painting Techniques, Materials, and Studio Practice" at the University of Leiden in Amsterdam, Netherlands, from June 26 to 29, 1995. The symposium—designed for art historians, conservators, conservation scientists, and museum curators worldwide—was organized by the Department of Art History at the University of Leiden and the Art History Department of the Central Research Laboratory for Objects of Art and Science in Amsterdam. Twenty-five contributors representing museums and conservation institutions throughout the world provide recent research on historical painting techniques, including wall painting and polychrome sculpture. Topics cover the latest art historical research and scientific analyses of original techniques and materials, as well as historical sources, such as medieval treatises and descriptions of painting techniques in historical literature. Chapters include the painting methods of Rembrandt and Vermeer, Dutch 17th-century landscape painting, wall paintings in English churches, Chinese paintings on paper and canvas, and Tibetan thangkas. Color plates and black-and-white photographs illustrate works from the Middle Ages to the 20th century.