Sheer serendipity led me to this 13th century Italian sculpture from Bologna, tucked away in a small room in the medieval Cluny Museum of Paris. This solitary figure expresses the quiet, dignified life of the scholar. Scholar at his writing table. Unknown Bologna sculptor. Cluny Museum, Paris It brought me back to a series of tomb sculptures I had seen in Bologna – tomb decorations that mesmerized and delighted me and that were unlike anything I had ever seen before. I had