Annabel Rowntree, a first year doctoral student at LMH, has been announced as the runner up of this year’s Juan Facundo Riaño Essay medal. The competition is run by ARTES, the Iberian and Latin American Visual Culture Group, and looks for the best essay on the art, architecture or visual culture of the Hispanic world. Annabel, who works on the Spanish Golden Age, submitted an essay entitled "Habsburg Hyperbole: Luca Giordano and La gloria de la monarquía hispánica" where she analyzed a fresco in Madrid's Escorial palace for its symbolic political value. She will attend a ceremony at the Spanish Embassy in London to collect her prize later in the year.