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Journal of the History of Collections Advance Access originally published online on March 16, 2007
Journal of the History of Collections 2007 19(1):75-87; doi:10.1093/jhc/fhm005
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© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.

Desiring Holbein

Presence and absence in the National Gallery

Helen Rees Leahy


  Abstract

The central question of this paper is why are there only three works by Hans Holbein in the National Gallery, London? Through an account of the slow and difficult process of acquiring Holbeins for the national collection, the histories of these three paintings are linked in an exploration of the dialectics of presence and absence in the National Gallery. Each work bought for the Gallery was purchased from the seat of an English land-owning dynasty, and scrutiny of the processes of their acquisition illuminates the cultural politics of transfer from aristocratic to public ownership. Overall, this study of the Gallery's desire for Holbein reveals the invisible threads that bind the paintings on the gallery wall to each other's histories, as well as to the extrinsic fields of finance, the law and politics.

Address for correspondence Dr Helen Rees Leahy, Centre for Museology, Humanities Bridgeford Street, University of Manchester, Manchester m1 5bg, UK helen.rees.leahy{at}btinternet.com


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