Professor Alexander Marr, Head of Department, has published a major new study of Hans Holbein the Younger, examining the wit, ambiguity and visual ingenuity at the heart of the Renaissance artist’s work.
Holbein’s Wit: Pictorial Ingenuity in Renaissance Art, published by Brepols in 2026, spans Holbein’s career in Basel and London, bringing together his portraits, devotional paintings, prints and designs for the decorative arts.
Holbein is renowned for the extraordinary realism of his paintings. In this new study, however, Professor Marr reveals a more playful and intellectually inventive artist, exploring the visual jokes, puns, paradoxes and ambiguities that run throughout his work. The book places Holbein within the culture of Renaissance ingenium, or ‘wit’ – a concept encompassing talent, intelligence, creative capacity and individual character.
The study also considers Holbein’s relationships with leading figures of Renaissance humanism, including Desiderius Erasmus and Thomas More, and examines how the artist developed a sophisticated visual language in dialogue with the literary culture of his time. In doing so, Professor Marr argues for a conception of Holbein’s art that goes beyond naturalistic imitation to emphasise the intelligence and ingenuity involved in making pictures.
Find out more here: https://www.brepols.net/products/978-1-915487-52-0
