The admirable catalogue, in German, explains all about the transaction, in addition to setting forth the latest evidence on Friedrich's painting methods, the context of the painting and Romantic discovery of Berchtesgaden, almost two centuries ago.
In addition to aesthetic analysis of the paintings, Scherer was urged to explore the historical, political and cultural context of each painting.
There the pictures, the text says, "can clearly be seen in the art-historical context of history painting".
In the context of the painting, the lyrics to "The Wheel," her 1993 song, seem eerily appropriate: "And the wheel goes round, round/ And the flame in our souls, it will never burn out".
In the context of El Museo, painting feels less like a vehicle for metaphysical contemplation than like a blank wall on which the smudgy diaristic drawings of Kenny Rivero might advantageously be arranged, or like a screen onto which the colonialist histories of Latin America referred to by other artists — Hector Arce-Espasas, Arce-Espasas, Ramón Miranda Beltrán and Christopher Riveraojected.
There is, to begin with, the historical context of the painting — the French Revolution — which Martinez believes speaks to our own political moment.
"The intended messaging of the original design is slowed down and its relationship to the product advertised is altered, merely by being included in the context of a painting.
According to John Coplans's Roy Lichtenstein, the artist was fascinated by the drawings: "isolating the woman out of the context of the painting seemed to Lichtenstein to be such an oversimplification of a complex issue as to be ironical in itself"; the oversimplification referred to was Loran's representing Cézanne's work with nothing more than black lines.
In the context of the painting, Snyder argues that the scene is the end of the royal couple's sitting for Velázquez and they are preparing to exit, explaining that is "why the menina to the right of the Infanta begins to curtsy".
