I got this book for my birthday about 20 years ago from a cousin who was clearly scratching around looking for a present for someone he knew very little about except that she was studying art history at university.
But I have found the book invaluable as a student and as an art curator. I’ve used it so many times for getting the lowdown on bizarre Biblical and mythological stories, numerous strange, obscure saints and their attributes (there’s more than one female saint with a beard, for instance), and the weird and wonderful symbolism that artists have liked to confuse us with over the centuries.
It does focus mainly on the Italian Renaissance but you can look up an object in a painting to find out its symbolic meaning or look up a subject, place or name and read the story behind it.
Like all the best reference books, you can open Hall’s Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art at any page and find something fascinating or strange and feel like you may have learned something useful.
This is especially good if, for instance, you ever need to interpret a picture of an ancient Greek goddess called Amphitrite who is being escorted in the sea by horses with fishes’ bodies and explain what the heck that’s all about.
But even if you don’t have to do such a thing, I would recommend the book. Take it to an art gallery and impress your friends or just open it at random and marvel at the bizarreness of the art world.
Clare Hunt is the curatorial manager at Southend Museums Service
But I have found the book invaluable as a student and as an art curator. I’ve used it so many times for getting the lowdown on bizarre Biblical and mythological stories, numerous strange, obscure saints and their attributes (there’s more than one female saint with a beard, for instance), and the weird and wonderful symbolism that artists have liked to confuse us with over the centuries.
It does focus mainly on the Italian Renaissance but you can look up an object in a painting to find out its symbolic meaning or look up a subject, place or name and read the story behind it.
Like all the best reference books, you can open Hall’s Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art at any page and find something fascinating or strange and feel like you may have learned something useful.
This is especially good if, for instance, you ever need to interpret a picture of an ancient Greek goddess called Amphitrite who is being escorted in the sea by horses with fishes’ bodies and explain what the heck that’s all about.
But even if you don’t have to do such a thing, I would recommend the book. Take it to an art gallery and impress your friends or just open it at random and marvel at the bizarreness of the art world.
Clare Hunt is the curatorial manager at Southend Museums Service
