Grootenboer, Hanneke: Treasuring the Gaze
Intimate Vision in Late Eighteenth-Century Eye Miniatures
The end of the eighteenth century saw the start of a new craze in Europe: tiny portraits of single eyes that were exchanged by lovers or family members. Unearthing these portraits, the author proposes that the rage for eye miniatures - and their abrupt disappearance - reveals a knot in the unfolding of the history of vision.