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Postponed from Saturday 21 August Discuss art, life, culture and creativity from the comfort of your own home at the QAGOMA Members Virtual Book Club or join us on -site for a socially distanced discussion at the Gallery. The titles on the reading list from June until November will connect to, contextualise and discuss the ideas presented in ‘European Masterpieces from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York’, organised by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in collaboration with the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art and Art Exhibitions Australia. The Birth of Venus (2003), by Sarah Dunant Session 1: Wed 18 Aug 3.00pm | Virtual Session 2: Thu 26 Aug 2.30pm | On-site Session 3: Sat 28 Aug, 2.30pm | On-site Alessandra Cecchi is not quite 15 when her prosperous merchant father brings a young painter back from northern Europe to adorn the chapel walls in the family’s Florentine palazzo. A child of the Renaissance, with a precocious mind and a talent for drawing, Alessandra is intoxicated by the painter’s abilities. Soon, her love of art and her lively independence lure her into closer involvement with all sorts of taboo elements of life. Alessandra must make crucial decisions about the shape of her adult life, as Florence itself must choose between the old ways of the luxury-loving Medicis and the asceticism of the city’s new fundamentalist priest, Savanorola. The Birth of Venus brings alive the history of Florence at its most dramatic period, telling a compulsively absorbing story of love, art, religion and power SOLD OUT Email members@qagoma.qld.gov.au to add your to the waitlist Virtual Book Club: Free for Members / $5 Members' Guests On-site Book Club: $12 Members / $17 Members' Guests (includes refreshments) Members receive 20% off current and past Book Club titles from the QAGOMA Store. 'European Masterpieces' Reading List -The Goldfinch (2013) by Donna Tartt -The Vanishing Man: In Pursuit of Velázquez (2016) by Laura Cumming -The Birth of Venus (2003) by Sarah Dunant -Metropolitan Stories: A Novel (2021) by Christine Coulson -Sudden Death (2013) by Álvaro Enrigue, translated by Natasha Wimmer -Girl in Hyacinth Blue (1999) by Susan Vreeland