Scripture for the Eyes

If you've been missing our Herman Janz. Mullers and you didn't make it up to New York to see the exhibition "Scripture for the Eyes: Bible Illustration in Netherlandish Prints of the 16th Century" when it was on display at the Museum of Biblical Art, it's now come to the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University in Atlanta, significantly closer for most of you. The exhibition, which features two of Janz. Muller's prints from the permanent collection of GMOA, is on view at the Carlos through January 24, 2010. Tonight (Thursday, Nov. 5) at 7 p.m. in the Carlos's reception hall is a lecture entitled "Reading the Bible through Images in the Sixteenth-Century Low Countries" to be delivered by Dr. Walter Melion, co-curator of the exhibition and Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Art History at Emory University. Melion will decode several prints from the exhibition. For example, in "Balaam and the Angel in a Panoramic Landscape," Maarten van Heemskerck uses a new pictorial format and a relatively new subject—the biblical landscape—to explore the theme of prophecy in the complex scriptural text Numbers 22-24. Other works to be discussed include Jan Swart van Groningen’s "Christ Preaching from the Ship" and several emblems from Benito Arias Montano’s "Monuments of Human Salvation." If you happen to be in the area tonight, it sounds like a very interesting program, and we encourage you to go see the exhibition.