flemish masters. landing page of exhibition. - Anna Zavatska

In the 1600s, artists started flexing with something called a painting within a painting — entire galleries painted inside a single canvas. These “gallery paintings” became especially popular in Antwerp, where wealthy collectors and connoisseurs wanted to show off their taste. Some artists, like David Teniers the Younger, even made books cataloguing these collections — the first illustrated art catalogues in history. This work, Cognoscenti in a Room hung with Pictures (c.1620), shows eleven men