Coronavirus or Black Death: what impact do major epidemics have on the arts?

While the current coronavirus epidemic bears no resemblance in scale to the Black Death of 1348, it awakens the same fears and prompts the same, often existential, questions. An opportunity to recall that, centuries apart, human beings react in the same way. Art thus becomes the echo of epidemics, reflecting fears, joys and relationships with life. In the 14th century, we find representations of the social distance we experience today because others, before us, have already gone through it...