Loading Events

Cranach: Artist and Innovator

Sat 14 March 2020, 10.30amThu 5 November 2020, 5.00pm

Cranach: Artist and Innovator

‘****A temptation that should not be resisted…’
The Telegraph

‘Compton Verney’s terrific exhibition … puts Cranach’s modernity strongly in focus for us once more’
The Observer

‘Stunning’
The New European

The archetypal Renaissance man, Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472 – 1553) was one of the most successful German artists of all time.

Cranach’s paintings of German nobility and the leaders of the Protestant Reformation made him a highly sought after portraitist in his own time, while today he is best known for his seductive paintings of the female nude, which beautifully express temptation and its consequences. Cranach was also a talented entrepreneur, founding a successful publishing business and producing powerful woodcut illustrations for Luther’s translation of the bible.

Featuring some of Cranach’s most beguiling paintings and illustrations, on loan from the National Gallery, the Royal Collection, the British Museum and Waddesdon Manor, the exhibition will also showcase Cranach’s enduring appeal to a range of modern and contemporary artists, including: John Currin, Isabelle Hayman, Michael Landy, Wolfe von Lenkiewicz, Andrew McIntosh, Ishbel Myerscough, Claire Partington, Pablo Picasso and Raqib Shaw.

[cv-button]Discover the exhibition digitally[/cv-button]

In association with the National Gallery

Header image: Lucas Cranach the Elder – Venus and Cupid © Compton Verney
Second image: Exhibition view of Michael Landy, Saint Apollonia, 2013 © Michael Landy. Courtesy the artist, Thomas Dane Gallery and Antiguo Colegio de San Ildefonso. Photo Francisco Kochen. Photo by Jamie Woodley