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As we all adapt to working and living under these new and unusual circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we\u2019ve asked curators from the Getty Museum and Getty Research Institute to share short reflections on works of art they\u2019re thinking about right now. These brief recordings feature stories related to our daily lives\u2014from laundry on the line to a dog at a scholar\u2019s feet. Over the next few weeks, look for new recordings every Tuesday.\n\n\n\nThis week features manuscripts curator Beth Morrison discussing Simon Bening\u2019s portrait of the author of the Livre des faits de Jacques de Lalaing, made about 1530.\n\n\n\nTo learn more about this artwork, visit:  https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/287388/\n\n\n\n\n\nTranscript:\n\n\n\nJAMES CUNO: Hi, I\u2019m Jim Cuno, president of the J. Paul Getty\nTrust. As we all adapt to working and living under these new and unusual\ncircumstances, we\u2019ve asked curators from the Getty Museum and Getty Research\nInstitute to share short reflections on works of art they\u2019re thinking about\nright now. We\u2019ll be releasing new recordings on Tuesdays over the next few\nweeks. I hope you\u2019ll find these stories about our daily lives\u2014from laundry on\nthe line to a dog at a scholar\u2019s feet\u2014thought provoking, illuminating, and\nentertaining.\n\n\n\nBETH MORRISON: Hi, my name is Beth Morrison and I\u2019m head of manuscripts at the Getty Museum. As for everyone else, it\u2019s been a little bit of a transition to working at home and my life seems dominated by endless zoom meetings. But one of the things I really look forward to is the unexpected appearance of people\u2019s pets. They sort of nose in from the side, or jump up on people\u2019s laps, and it reminds me very much of an illumination that I\u2019m working on right now. \n\n\n\nI\u2019m writing an article about a manuscript that is devoted to the life of a medieval knight names Jacques de Lalaing. And the frontispiece is by an artist named Simon Bening, who was one of the greatest artists of the sixteenth century. And he chooses an author portrait at the beginning of the manuscript which is a picture of the author hard at work at his text, and he\u2019s got a desk, he\u2019s got light at his back so he can see more clearly, he\u2019s writing with his quill pen and he\u2019s got books nearby him in case he needs to check something. And one of the great, charming details is that his pet dog has wandered in to curl up in the sun and take a nap. It\u2019s a fluffy brown and white dog, quite distinctive, and very cute. \n\n\n\nAnd it reminds me so much of my own working methodology nowadays. I put my desk at a good place in my house so the sun is at my back so I can see clearly. And my dog comes in, plops down, and decides to take a nap whenever she can because she thinks shelter at home is the greatest thing ever invented; she gets to spend all day with me. \n\n\n\nSo as I\u2019ve been studying this illumination more and more,\nI\u2019ve been comparing it to other works by Simon Bening. And I realized that this\ndog appears multiple times in his works. At the beginning of the 1530s, it\u2019s a\nlittle puppy. And then by the end of the decade it\u2019s a full-grown dog. And it\nkind of made me realize I bet this is Simon Benning\u2019s own dog. And he used the\ndog as a model whenever he needed to add a sort of everyday touch to his\nilluminations. \n\n\n\nIt seems to me that pets are such an important part of our\nlives, especially now in times of crisis. They provide comfort, they provide\ninspiration, and just like this artist and this author in the middle ages, I\nlike to have my dog near me. It makes me realize that people in the middle ages\nare pretty much just like ourselves in terms of how they approach their lives. \n\n\n\nCUNO: To view this author portrait by Simon Bening made\naround 1530, click the link in this episode\u2019s description or look for it on\ngetty.edu/art/collection/.