Sacred art illuminated

Witness our Medieval and Renaissance altarpieces after hours in this special Members’ online tour and lecture.

We are used to viewing the magnificent altarpieces from our collection under perfect gallery conditions. We see them well-lit, with every detail on show. But what happens when we see them differently? Is there a way to evoke how people would have encountered altarpieces in their original settings or illuminated by the flickering light of lamps and candles?

Curators Nicholas Flory and Christine Siedel lead this exclusive event. We will visit our altarpieces to consider how light affects how we see them, and how artists responded to light in their work, from grand altarpieces to personal objects of devotion.

Join us to uncover how light – both physical and spiritual – shaped devotion and transformed the way these masterpieces were seen and understood.

Christine Seidel is Associate Curator of Renaissance Painting, supported by The Rothschild Foundation. Prior to joining the National Gallery in January 2024, she held fellowships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museo Nacional del Prado and was assistant curator at the Gemäldegalerie and the Bode Museum in Berlin and Stuttgart.

Nicholas Flory is the David Scrase Project Curator at the National Gallery, working on the upcoming exhibition of Jan van Eyck’s portraits. He was previously the Gallery’s Simon Sainsbury Curatorial Fellow for Paintings before 1600. He received his PhD from the Courtauld Institute of Art in 2022, where he also taught as an Associate Lecturer.

A recording of this event will be made available to all ticket holders in the days following the event.

This recording will be available for one month.

Automatic closed captioning is available for this event.