EXCLUSIVE TOUR OF ‘THE UGLY DUCHESS: BEAUTY AND SATIRE IN THE RENAISSANCE’ AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY WITH CURATOR EMMA CAPRON

Join us for an exclusive tour of ‘The Ugly Duchess: Beauty and Satire in the Renaissance’ at The National Gallery with curator Emma Capron.

The exhibition looks again at one of the best-known faces in the National Gallery: Quinten Massys’s 16th-century depiction of an old woman, a painting known as ‘The Ugly Duchess’. For the first time, this work is displayed with a related drawing after Leonardo da Vinci, showing their shared interest in fantastical, ‘grotesque’ heads and the vibrant artistic exchange between Italy and Northern Europe in the Renaissance.

‘The Ugly Duchess: Beauty and Satire in the Renaissance’ also includes artworks that look at how women, old age and facial differences were satirised and demonised in the Renaissance, shaping attitudes that still exist today.

Image: Quinten Massys, ‘An Old Woman (‘The Ugly Duchess’)’, about 1513 (detail). Courtesy of The National Gallery