Status and Reputation: The Magnificent Age of the Baroque

In this lecture, STATUS AND REPUTATION, we will examine how status was created or maintained. We will explore the culture of portraiture at the courts through such works as Velasquez’s portraits of “Las Medians”, Phillip IV Mariana of Austria, Queen of Spain, and the Infanta Margarita and Nocret’s “Family of Louis XIV”

In this series on the age of Baroque, we explore how Martin Luther published his 95 theses in 1517. This was not only a challenge to the perceived corruption of the Catholic Church, it was an act which prompted the transformation of the religious, socio-political, and artistic landscape of Europe. One of the most dynamic styles to emerge in the wake of the Counter-Reformation, the Baroque, lasted a century and manifested differently in Italy, Spain, and France, where it produced the most extraordinary artists and architects including Caravaggio, Bernini, Velasquez, Poussin, and Borromini.