In 1837 a family group that flew in the face of convention was committed to canvas, presumably by portraitist Jacques Guillame Lucien Amans. It showed four children. Three were white, dressed in their Sunday best and gazing placidly at the viewer. The fourth, standing behind them in a Brooks Brothers livery coat, was a Black teenager. This is Bélizaire, and at some point around the turn of the twentieth century—for reasons unknown—his portrait was covered up. 

Last week we took a close look at Bélizaire the person, and his tortured life-path through antebellum Louisiana society. This week we examine the painting that is the reason anyone knows Bélizaire’s name, and follow the twists and turns by which it traveled from the studio of Jacques Amans in 1837 to the collection of Jeremy Simien, where it is today.

This is Pt. 2 of our three-part series on the painting "Bélizaire and the Frey Children." Feat. Simien and Wendy Castenell, as well as Taylor Thistlethwaite of Thistlethwaite Americana. Hosted by Benjamin Miller.

Curious Objects

Curious Objects: Belizaire

The Story of Bélizaire, Pt. 2: Provenance

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the ideas brought together under Justinian I, Byzantine emperor in the 6th century AD, which were rediscovered in Western Europe in the Middle Ages and became very influential in the development of laws in many European nations and elsewhere.

With

Caroline Humfress
Professor of Medieval History at the University of St Andrews

Simon Corcoran
Lecturer in Ancient History at Newcastle University

and 

Paul du Plessis
Senior Lecturer in Civil law and European legal history at the School of Law, University of Edinburgh

Producer: Simon Tillotson. Nov 17, 2016

Justinian's Legal Code

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Seneca the Younger, who was one of the first great writers to live his entire life in the world of the new Roman empire, after the fall of the Republic. He was a Stoic philosopher, he wrote blood-soaked tragedies, he was an orator, and he navigated his way through the reigns of Caligula, Claudius and Nero, sometimes exercising power at the highest level and at others spending years in exile. Agrippina the Younger was the one who called for him to tutor Nero, and it is thought Seneca helped curb some of Nero's excesses. He was later revered within the Christian church, partly for what he did and partly for what he was said to have done in forged letters to St Paul. His tragedies, with their ghosts and high body count, influenced Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus and Hamlet, and Kyd's Spanish Tragedy. The image above is the so-called bust of Seneca, a detail from Four Philosophers by Peter Paul Rubens.

With

Mary Beard
Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge

Catharine Edwards
Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London

and

Alessandro Schiesaro
Professor of Classics at the University of Manchester

Producer: Simon Tillotson. Feb 23, 2017

Seneca the Younger

In this episode of Curious Objects & the stories behind them, part one of a special two-part series, Benjamin Miller speaks with nine dealers who exhibited this past January at the antiques world’s marquee event: the Winter Antiques Show.

Curious Objects & the stories behind them

Curious Objects: Treasures of the Winter Antiques Show, Part 1

Treasures of the Winter Antiques Show, Part 1

Benjamin Miller talks with Paul Becker, the fifth-generation owner and director of Chicago-based Carl Becker and Son, a 150-year-old luthier business.

Curious Objects & The Stories Behind Them

Curious Objects & The Stories Behind Them: Paul Becker

Making Music: A Conversation with Luthier Paul Becker

This month we focus on a quartet of curious objects at Freeman’s auction house: a marble-top pier table long believed to have belonged to General Washington’s aide-de-camp Tench Tilghman, a quirky painting of Noah’s Ark by foppish Lancaster polymath John Landis, and two stoneware wine bottles in the shape of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.

Curious Objects: The Soldier, the Dandy, and the Queen

The Soldier, the Dandy, and the Queen

Through interviews with leading figures in the world of fine and decorative arts, Curious Objects—a podcast from The Magazine Antiques—explores the hidden histories, the little-known facts, the intricacies, and the idiosyncrasies that breathe life and energy into historical works of craft and art.

The Story of Bélizaire, Pt. 2: Provenance

Curious Objects

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