Darker Shades

Difference exists; otherness is constructed. This book asks how important Western artists, from Giotto to Titian and Caravaggio, and from Bosch to Dürer and Rembrandt, shaped the imaging of non-Western individuals in Early Modern art. This nuanced and detailed study examines images of racial ‘otherness’ during a time of new encounters with different cultures and peoples, such as people of colour, Muslims and Jews. The book also reconsiders the Western canon’s most essential facets: perspective, pictorial narrative, composition, bodily proportion, beauty, colour, harmony and lighting. What room was there for the ‘Other’ in such a crystalline, unchanging paradigm? This book is a fascinating investigation for anyone interested in early modern art history, anthropology and post-colonial studies.