Anton Raphael Mengs, son of Ismael Israel Mengs (1688–1764), a Dresden court painter who had converted to Protestantism, was a pioneer of the neoclassical style. In his time, he was celebrated as the greatest living painter. Among Mengs’s most notable works are the ceiling fresco Parnassus with Apollo and the Muses (1759) in the Villa Albani in Rome and the frescoes he painted for Charles III at the Palacio Real in Madrid (1762–1769 and 1774–1775). Mengs published a number of volumes on art, including the influential handbook for painters Thoughts on Beauty and Taste in Painting (1762).
Isabel María Parreño Arce y Valdés (1759–1822), the Marquesa de Llano, had her portrait painted by Anton Raphael Mengs, in Parma, Italy, where her husband was the ambassador from Spain. At the time…
We return now to the narrative of our Lord’s doings.
After he had put the pure turban on his head, he made love to his Ashkenazi wife. She conceived; she bore him a son. On…
This Haggadah from Prague, printed by Gershom and Grunim Katz with illustrations that are thought to be by Ḥayyim ben David Shaḥor, is one of the earliest Haggadahs ever printed. It was the first…