Barbara Basting

Barbara Basting

Barbara Basting worked as a cultural editor and currently heads the visual arts division in the City of Zurich’s Culture Department.

When King Cotton ruled the world

Barbara Basting 01.10.2024 Cotton was the most important commodity of the 19th century. Yet very few artists took an interest in it. One who did was Edgar Degas. His painting of a cotton office in New Orleans is a truly spectacular work.
An eye for economic themes: painter Edgar Degas photographed in 1895.

A teeming painting between art and science

Barbara Basting 14.05.2024 Children love pictures teeming with animals, even in the 21st century. Roelant Savery was an expert in painting wildlife, and he used his skills to impress the Habsburg emperor over 400 years ago as well as inspiring many of his contemporaries, including Swiss artists.
The Paradise by Roelant Savery (detail). The painting was given by the City of Utrecht to Princess Amalie von Solms as a wedding gift on 21 December 1626.

A goddess with wrinkles

Barbara Basting 29.02.2024 Who paints older women? A look at art history shows that painters have always struggled with the subject matter and that they usually needed a pretext to even depict them at all.
‘The Parca Lachesis’ painted by Pietro Bellotti, circa 1684.

A scene of racy bathing pleasure as a social critique

Barbara Basting 28.12.2023 The Reformation brought stricter social mores to many places in Europe, and artists had to adapt if they didn’t want to lose commissions. But these social mores were not popular with everyone – as revealed by this painting by Hans Bock in Basel’s Kunstmuseum.
At time of painting, a picture for somewhere private: Hans Bock the Elder, ‘The Baths at Leuk’, 1597.

How the linen trade brought wealth to Europe

Barbara Basting 09.10.2023 Linen production and trading was once the livelihood of many people in Europe, especially in eastern Switzerland. A famous landscape painting from the Netherlands in Kunsthaus Zürich tells a tale of global trade routes and mutual dependence.
View of Haarlem with Bleaching Fields, by Jacob van Ruisdael, c. 1670/1675.

Inventing the battlefield

Barbara Basting 06.06.2023 Paintings of battles often tell us more about the political backdrop than about military successes or acts of war. What they actually reveal are changing understandings of history.
A bold bird’s eye view: the Battle of Alexanderat Issus, painted by Albrecht Altdorfer, 1529.

Calame’s awe-inspiring Alpine views

Barbara Basting 09.03.2023 Alexandre Calame is considered one of the fathers of Alpine landscape painting. And it all started, figuratively speaking, with a storm.
Calame’s feel for Alpine nature influenced many 19th century artists. This painting of the region surrounding Lake Lucerne dates back to 1852.

Victims of Labour – a memorial that broke the mould

Barbara Basting 24.01.2023 Artists were among the many to draw inspiration from the opening of the Gotthard railway tunnel 140 years ago. Prominent Ticino sculptor Vincenzo Vela created a contemporaneous memorial to those lost during its construction, entitled Victims of Labour. This key work was not particularly well received at the time, however.
Vincenzo Vela's Victims of Labour memorial in Airolo.