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Dynamic and theatrical, but also down-to-earth, moralizing, and
sometimes comic. Triumphant, grandiose, and propagandistic, and yet
also intimate and inward. All of these terms are applicable to the
art of the European Baroque, the cultural epoch of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries which produced an unprecedented richness and variety in
creative expression. Complex and conflicting forces across the
political, religious, economic, and social spheres of life account for this
artistic abundance. The Netherlands, a major center of artistic
production during the Baroque period, was home to many of these contrasts and
conflicts within its relatively small geographic boundaries along the northern
coast of Europe.
These diverse cultural forces are evident, in varying ways and
degrees, in a selection of paintings generously lent to Wofford College by the
Bob Jones University Museum & Gallery in Greenville, SC, the Columbia
Museum of Art in Columbia, SC, and the Robicsek Family Collection in Charlotte,
NC.
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