DONATELLO
DAVID
Conceptualization of this bronze & its first casting: Italy, c.1430s-1440s
Realization of this reduction: Europe, c.18th/19th century
Bronze
Collection: FLG on loan to IAD
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
Part 1
THE WORLD OF THE RENAISSANCE PORTRAIT:
A Lecture, 2012
Part 2
RENAISSANCE STUDIES, SERIES ONE (1961-1996)
Section 1 – Northern Renaissance
Section 2 – Italian Renaissance
Leonardo Studies
Giorgione Studies
Part 3
RENAISSANCE STUDIES, SERIES TWO
(2007-2010)
Introduction
The Spirit of the Renaissance
Cultural Studies
Part 4
RENAISSANCE LECTURES
Part 5
RENAISSANCE & BAROQUE EXHIBITIONS
RENAISSANCE ART:
An Introduction
The Renaissance was the first great era of the modern period. “Renaissance” means rebirth in French. Rebirth of what? The short answer is a rebirth of urban life, which in turn gave rise to a rebirth in the social and artistic values of the Ancient World of Greece and Rome. Those values for the most part disappeared with the Fall of Rome in the 5th century CE. For almost a thousand years, Europe did not have urbanized life, that is to say, Europe did not have “Civilization.” Very few could read and write. Even most of the kings and queens were illiterate. Very few ever left the villages in which they were born. There was little regional trade and less international trade.
The feudalism of kings and queens and knighthood established the rules of society. Local lords in their castles, served by local knights, ruled each region. Very poor serfs barely made a living at the bottom of life. For centuries, food was so scarce that parents sometimes had to choose between saving seeds for the next season and feeding their children. Sometimes there was nothing to eat but tree bark. There was no “business,” other than farming and fighting and a few crafts like the blacksmith and the shoemaker. So, there was no middle class.
Slowly, things improved. By the 12th century, a stronger economy was taking shape. The horrific Viking invasions had subsided. The terrifying armies of Islam were being less aggressive. Trade among regions and among nations returned. Prosperity grew. Medieval villages became towns. A middle class of merchants developed. Great Cathedrals were built throughout Europe. Within a few centuries there was a new spirit in the land. This spirit has come to be known as the Renaissance.
What are the dates? That depends on who is answering the question. Literary historians usually start the Renaissance in the 14th century. Art historians usually start the Renaissance in the 15th century. Most agree there was a late phase that ended about the end of the 16th century in most of Europe, around 1600, and a bit later in England.
Was the Renaissance “Modern”? Yes and no. Art historians use the term “Modern” for what started to happen during the second half of the 19th century and continued into the middle of the 20th century. Political, economic, and cultural historians use the term “Modern” for what started to happen during the Renaissance and has continued into contemporary times.
The Early Modern era in Europe saw the extraordinary growth of cities, of commerce, of banking, and an astonishing outburst of creativity in all the arts. This was true in both southern Europe, particularly Italy, and Northern Europe, particularly Flanders. “Modern” art styles and standards of quality were established by Leonardo, Michelangelo, Giorgione, Titian, and all the others.
Music, as we think of it today, with voices and a rich variety of musical instruments, was developed during the Renaissance. Before that was religious group chanting and folk songs.
Time, as we think of it today, started to be perceived this way during the Renaissance. During the Middle Ages, one measured large passages of time by the seasons, and daily time by the position of the sun in the sky. There were no timepieces as such, other than sundials and sand clocks, and village bell towers to mark the hours. By the late Middle Ages, cities started to have large clocks in public places. That was enough for most people. But for merchants, “time is money.” They wanted more efficient ways to measure smaller units of time.
The 15th century saw smaller clocks that used a coiled spring. These were to be found in shops and wealthy homes. By around 1500, the first watches appeared, so that one could “watch” individual moments of time. It was large and heavy but such prized possessions could be carried in a pocket, or worn around the neck as did Queen Elizabeth I. It was during her reign that the first time in books and plays (such as those of Shakespeare) that we hear the question being asked: “What time is it?” And the questioner expected a precise answer. In short, urban people could now carry time with them wherever they went. And punctuality became a social imperative. (The small pocket watch came about in the 19th century, and the wristwatch in the 20th century.)
The printing press enabled whole populations to be able to read. Banks made it possible for small and large businesses to grow. Economic power gradually shifted from the landed gentry to the new merchant class – a class that would eventually also take the political control of national affairs away from the hands of kings and queens.
Martin Luther and the Protestants demanded a new kind of religion and fought bloody wars to win the right to communicate with God without a priest as middleman. Adventurous sailors went all the way around the world. That led to a new global perspective, and very profitable global commerce.
With the spread of commerce and education, a new kind of rationality came into play. Previously unquestioned superstitions and religious dogma came to be questioned. Reason begins to overtake intuition. The Scientific Method emerges as a way to test truth. Copernicus and Galileo use it to open eyes to a new kind of cosmos.
No period of European history has been studied so thoroughly. Why is the Renaissance so fascinating? Because it is the parent-culture of the Modern world. For Europeans, Euro-Americans, and much of the industrialized world, the Renaissance is when WE became US.
In many ways, the most important single development during the Renaissance was the rebirth of Individualism. The growth and institutionalization of Individualism lies at the foundation of all the other economic, religious, and artistic revolutions of the time.
Let’s step back and look at the Big Picture of World History. Societies of the Old Stone Age type and the New Stone Age type are tribal. WE is more important than ME. Societies of the Bronze Age type, such as Egypt, are semi-tribal. Societies of the Iron Age type are post-tribal. In place of Tribalism came Individualism, in which ME is more important than WE. This profound change took place during the Axial Age in Europe (starting about the 8th century BCE), and has characterized European culture ever since.
The ubiquity with which Individualism became institutionalized in the urbanized, post-tribal world (first in places like ancient Greece and Rome and later during the Renaissance), is remarkable. It can be found in the structure of all the major areas of cultural analysis. Art historians recognized it first in the invention of linear perspective during the early 15th century. This way of picturing the world was a brilliant intellectual invention that made a painting or a sculpted relief function like a window through which an INDIVIDUAL perceives daily life. Multi-point perspective in the Middle Ages expressed the collective perspective – the group-vision- of the medieval community. That was somewhat semi-tribal. Single-point perspective is the way an INDIVIDUAL looks at the world.
This way of thinking and seeing was a revolution on consciousness. What I have termed “Institutionalized Individualism” also manifested in music as monody (the rise of the single voice), in economics as capitalism (the rise of the single merchant in commerce and urban government), in politics as nationalism (the rise of the nation-state), and in religion as Protestantism – the rise of an individual’s right to communicate with God directly, individually.
It would be difficult to overemphasize the importance of this point. Let’s review. The psycho-social rebirth of Individualism during the European Renaissance is:
- why there was a desire for single-point perspective in art, since this is the way individuals perceive the world;
- why a growing number of people no longer accepted religious dogma as an authority not subject to question, and instead regarded personal experience as authoritative;
- why the Protestants protested, for the right to worship in their own individual way;
- why nation-states were solidifying their individuality;
- why each country wanted the Bible in its own individual language. (Luther rendered the whole Bible into German in 1534. The King James version of the Bible in English came out in 1611);
- why people wanted to read for themselves, not just listen to others read. They wanted to make up their own minds. This is what made the invention of the printing press important;
- why ancient literature was so attractive to the Humanist scholars of the Renaissance. The world of Greece and Rome was the last time Individualism was at the heart of life. Humanism guided Renaissance Europeans back into the value-system of ancient Europeans when the highest goal of life was learning to be fully human. The Renaissance version of this goal came to be known as vertu meaning virtue and/or wisdom – a wisdom that involved linkage with the Transcendent;
- why the Catholic Church, at the in 1513 at the Lateran Council, added to the doctrine of the Resurrection of the body, the profound new doctrine of the immortality of the soul;
- why capitalism (and the middle class of merchants who created capitalism) developed during the Renaissance, and why the middle-class ideal of democracy eventually replaced aristocratic feudalism in the government of the modern world – a world which is a world of republics.
The Individualism of the Renaissance catalyzed many positive contributions to the world: political and economic democracy, nations that are republics rather than kingdoms, religious freedom and with it a respect for diversity, a growing aversion to the institution of slavery, an increasingly precise rationalism during the 15th & 16th centuries that in the 17th century would result in the Scientific Method, and an extraordinary richness of art, literature, music, theater, and dance.
However, this modern Individualism also has negative aspects. In its extreme form, Individualism can be a self-centeredness that has little interest in others. Some modern moralists justify a good deal of such behavior as “Enlightened Self Interest.” There is little that is “enlightened” about a society that tends to almost worship the ego and tends to excuse the greed of many as “natural and normal,” even when a society permits a few people to be millionaires while millions of others live in abject poverty, even when individual and corporate greed of gigantic proportions leads to world-wide economic collapse, as it did in 2008.
The Humanists of the Renaissance were constantly searching for a balance between ancient wisdom and contemporary life. They found what they were looking for in the world’s first civilizations – in the world of Egypt (home of Hermes the Wise), a world that seemed to be as old as time, and in the newer worlds of Greece and Rome that matured under the inspiration of the art and philosophy of Egypt.
We too need to be searching for a balance between ME and WE. It would be useful for us to take a clue from the Humanists of the Renaissance and look to our ancient ancestors in Europe for ancient wisdom, and to look to the ancestral wisdom of Asia for lessons that modern Individualism has forgotten.
Large portions of Asia today have remained semi-tribal, in the largest sense of the word, even in urbanized regions. These people continue to have a relationship between individual values and collective values that is quite different from the people in the West. Asians have welcomed many of the technical innovations that developed out of the industrious Individualism of the Renaissance, without abandoning their traditional respect for each other, and the values of their ancestors, and without being entirely seduced by the rampant materialism and scientism of the post-Renaissance world where traditional spirituality has grown thin.
The primary value of learning about history lies in the lessons history has to teach us who are living now. The Humanists of the Renaissance as they poured over the ancient manuscripts of their ancestors smelled something very special. They smelled a pathway to psycho-cosmic balance. They smelled the scent of Light.
DONATELLO
DAVID
Conceptualization of this bronze & its first casting: Italy, c.1430s-1440s
Realization of this reduction: Europe, c.18th/19th century
Bronze
Collection: FLG on loan to IAD
NOTE: Donatello (c.1386-1466) was the most important European sculptor of the Early Renaissance. If the challenge were to select a single art of art to represent the birth of the Humanist spirit in the early 15th century, many would choose Donatello’s “David.” Until this moment in the history of painting and sculpture, figures (whether saints or wealthy patrons) were rendered as secondary realities within a larger context. They might be tiny figures in a painting of the Crucifixion, or small figures on a wall-sized story from the Bible, but they never stood alone. Over the centuries, these human images grew larger, as ideas of self importance grew. “David” exploded in sculptural space at the climax of this Humanistic tendency, a tendency that did not replace Christianity but rather gave to the life of human beings on earth a new respect. Medieval people tended to regard life on earth as little more than passing time in “God’s waiting room.” Their focus was on Heaven. Their visual art focused on the golden, infinitely luminous Other World. Renaissance people tended to regard life on earth as a place to experience the fullness of their humanity under the inspiration of both Christian values and Ancient values. Their visual art focused on This World. During the first half of the 15th century, this new desire for naturalism came to be structured inside a visual field called linear perspective. This way of picturing This World was a brilliant intellectual invention that made a painting or a sculpted relief function like a window through which individuals perceived This Life. Multi-point perspective expresses the group-vision of a medieval community. Single-point perspective is an individual’s way of looking at the world. This way of thinking and seeing was a revolution on consciousness. What I have termed “Institutionalized Individualism” also manifested in music as monody, in economics as capitalism, in politics as nationalism, and in religion as Protestantism. Standing over the head of Goliath, “David” is the first statue since the time of Greece and Rome to stand on its own (away from any wall, apart from any context) as a strong, proud, independent individual. No work of the period gives more vivid expression to the Individualism at the heart of the Renaissance spirit. Countless reductions of this famous statue have been made over the last 500 years, but few have been as close to the original as this remarkable bronze.
BOTTICELLI [?]
PORTRAIT OF A GOLDSMITH
Italian, later 15th century (c1480s?)
Attributed to Botticelli by Berenson. Attributed by some to Filippino Lippi
NOTE: The most important single development in the psychology of the Renaissance was the birth of Individualism. It was a cultural phenomenon that developed gradually, and was fully developed by the middle of the 15th century. The art form that symbolizes this revolution in society is the birth of the portrait as a realistic image of a person’s face and spirit.
There were very few portraits in the Middle Ages. The values being celebrated in the art of that era were collective rather than individual. When we do see the rendering of an individual, late in the Middle Ages and early in the 15th century, it usually is the rather standardized face of a donor seen to the side – properly subservient to the sacred subject being portrayed at the center of a painted or sculpted composition. Only men and women of high status were rendered. What we do not see are vibrant images of real people alive with distinctive personalities.
The first individualized portraits of the Renaissance took place in the North, in the hands of van Eyck and van de Weyden during the first half of the 15th century. The personalized portrait idea reached Italy by the middle of the 15th century. The first examples had only a side-view, based on the Humanistic adoration of the side-view in portraits on ancient coinage. The 3/4 view, which also began in the North, was common in Italy by the end of the 15th century. This view allows for a much richer depiction of a person.
Probably no artist of the middle of the 15th century in Italy is more widely admired (then or now) than Botticelli. Even Leonardo admired him. While he is best known for “The Birth of Venus,” he also established standards of quality for highly individualized portraits of saints, portraits of the nobility, as well as portraits of modest craftsmen. He established his own studio in the 1470s.
This “Portrait of a Goldsmith,” when I was in school, was attributed to Botticelli himself by the most respected of all Italian experts, Bernard Berenson. More recently, it has been attributed to Filippino Lippi, who was a close associate of Botticelli. Botticelli had studied under Filippino’s father. Filippino studied under Botticelli and then became his partner.
When you read about attribution debates, keep in mind that connoisseurship is not an exact science. It is a humanistic study. Moreover, Renaissance portraits are notoriously difficult to attribute. Very few are signed. Most are in very poor condition. Most of you will be surprised to know that probably less that 10% of the original work on most surviving paintings of this period remains as it was. The rest has been added during later restorations.
Therefore, attributions vary widely from art historian to art historian, and go back and forth from one name or another generation after generation. For example, when I discussed this particular portrait in 1975 with L. D. Ettlinger (America’s leading authority on Botticelli), he thought it looked very much like a genuine Botticelli – with much in common with Botticelli’s famous portraits of young men.
As Professor Ettlinger and I evaluated the attribution, here are some of the factors that I asked him to consider:
- The background is one solid color (black). Most of the accepted male portraits by B have extremely simple backgrounds, often one color. Others have very simple widow frames or door frames. Very rare is any kind of landscape in one of his portraits. B seems to have enjoyed the stark rectangular framework against which to place the sensuous curves of his figure-forms.
- The modest blouse and red cap are quite like those in most of B’s better known portraits of young men. The ¾ pose is like many of B’s portraits. The figure is taut, the face calm.
- The rendering of the face, while quite naturalistic for the time, also has subtle graceful, delicately delineated, rhythmic undulations that are essentially abstract – a stylistic feature distinctive to B – so too the curling hair. This lyrical, visual “musicality” of line is, arguably, the most distinctive feature of B’s style.
- The face has the smoothly modeled texture of B’s typical skin – a thin, quietly luminous membrane. It is almost as if light were coming up from underneath the material world to fill the head as air fills a balloon.
- The eyes have heavy eyelids that seem almost carved – characteristic of B.
- The eyes have the firmly ovoid shape that is typical of B – shapes that usually are given an extra dark outline that make them stand out from the rest of the face. These eyes have two different sizes, as is common with Botticelli, and proper to the nature of perspective. (Sometimes in a manner curiously opposite to normal perspective, B reverses the two eye sizes, for some kind of expressive purpose. But that does not happen here).
- The psychology of the personality is one of deep introspection – typical of B.
- We both agreed it was theoretically possible for it to have been done by Filippini, who after all was closer to B that any other artists of the time. And B surely had apprentices who would have helped with his big murals in Rome. Moreover, no painter in Florence was more imitated at the time than B. However, the quality of this work and intensity of the expression are superior to what we know of Filippini, or anyone else in Florence, and this Goldsmith matches very well the accepted male portraits of B’s great decade between about 1475 and about 1485.
Even so, there was no room for yet another portrait to be reproduced in the small monograph that Professor Ettlinger and his wife Helen were completing for the World of Art series, a manuscript they completed shortly after our meeting in Berkeley. This Goldsmith would have to wait for a new catalogue raisonné. In short, to the best of my knowledge, this Goldsmith has not been published since the booklet on this painting published in London by Agnew’s in 1974.
How important is the question of authorship after all? It terms of market value, it matters a great deal. An accepted Botticelli could sell for tens of millions of dollars. Something by a pupil might sell for a few thousand dollars. Authorship also is worth trying to determine in order to establish a comprehensive picture of a culture as a whole.
Nevertheless, naming the artist, in the end, is an intellectual exercise. What matters to most students and museum visitors is not names but the quality of the visual experience. This portrait holds up well beside the more certain ones by Botticelli. (In fact, I would buy this painting if I could.)
I have always admired this portrait for the simple honesty of the concept and the setting (the simplicity of the composition and the extreme clarity of every precise detail) as well as straightforward directness of his gaze. This is the kind of sober, honest, tightly focused, self-activating artisan who fabricated the jewelery, picture frames, stage sets, and palaces of Renaissance. (By the way, many of the greatest painters of the period trained as goldsmiths – including Botticelli.)
FIORENTINO
PORTRAIT OF GIOVANNI ANTONIO GUIDO,
COUNT OF URBECCHE AND
MODIGLIANA
Conceptualization of this medal & its first casting: Florence, c.1490
Realization of this casting: Italy, c.16th century
Bronze
Collection: IAD 2012
Ex. Collection: Neil A. Goodman, Chicago
NOTE: Niccolo Fiorentino (1430-1514) was one of the most gifted medalists of the 15th century. He lived and died in Florence where he was a friend of Leonardo da Vinci. He also worked for the highly sophisticated Dukes of Burgundy. He worked in a style invented by Pisanello at mid-century, a style that his contemporaries compared with the sculptural qualities of such Greek masters as Phidias and Praxiteles. Fiorentino’s work was in such high demand that 148 medals are now attributed to him. This particular medal is one of his finest works. The modern idea of the portrait as the rendering of the likeness of a person (together with some indication of that person’s nature) began in the middle of the 15th century with the rapid growth of Individualism. The earliest portrait paintings and sculptures were profiles, because the Humanistic artists and their patrons during the Early Renaissance were following the profile custom of Roman coins. For many centuries the classical art of Greece and Rome was of little interest in medieval Europe. If such a statue were found in a farmer’s field, it most likely would have been crushed into powder for fertilizer. It was not until the 14th century & early 15th century that ancient coins and statuary suddenly became “beautiful.” Among these early modern individuals the classical art of Greece and Rome was stimulating a newly developed feeling for their own humanity. Classical art, literature, and philosophy fueled the explosive creativity of the European Renaissance. Those ancient values were mirrors in which Humanistic Europeans saw themselves reflected. Later in the 15th century, the ¾ view of the Flemish portrait painters was adopted by the Italian portraitists, along with the Flemish inventions of oil paint and atmospheric perspective. It was not until the High Renaissance (c.1490s-1520s) that the front-view portrait was developed in the hands of such artists as Leonardo, Raphael, and Titian. For most people today, these unsurpassed masters of form and penetrators of psychology created the standards of quality by which portraits are still judged.
MANTUAN SCHOOL
Rendered in the manner of Antico (c.1460-1528)
PORTRAIT OF GIULIA ASTALLIA
Conceptualization & first casting: Mantua, c.1480-85
Realization of this casting: Italy, c.16th/17th century
bronze
Collection: IAD 2012
Ex. Collection: Neil A. Goodman, Chicago
NOTE: On the obverse is her lovely portrait and her name preceded by the term Diva. On the reverse is an emblematic Phoenix on a flaming pyre looking at the sun, and the inscription: “Example of Chastity and Courage.” There is reason to think this is not a portrait of an actual young lady but rather a fictional character from a novel by Matteo Bandello. This Giulia was violated by a servant of the Bishop of Mantua and drowns herself.
Collecting antique statuary was a fashion that swept the royal and noble courts of Europe in the late 15h & early 16th centuries, especially in Italy. An actual statute thought to be by Praxiteles or some other ancient was the most desirable of sculptural acquisitions, of course. However, that was very rare. Most collectors purchased or commissioned replicas. The Mantuan sculptor & goldsmith Antico earned this name because of his remarkable ability to make fine bronze miniatures of antique statuary. His best-known piece is the “Apollo Belvedere” (c.1490). However, Antico also felt the spirit of his own time. This lovely rendering of a young lady is as close to Botticelli as was ever rendered in bronze.
Bronze statues and medals such as “Giulia” were not made in large numbers during the 15th century. Unique bronze masterpieces were made in the early 15th century by Ghiberti and Donatello as Florence became the capital of bronze-casting. However, it was not until the later 16th century, when Giambologna developed a virtual bronze industry in Florence, that the now famous “Renaissance bronze” became very popular for both upper class and middle class collectors. More often than not, the themes are these statuettes are Greek and Roman. They remain highly desirable to modern collectors of Renaissance art. (Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin; brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. Bronze makes possible a very sensuous surface, suggestive of human flesh.)
TITIAN (after)
PORTRAIT OF “LA BELLA”
Conceptualization & execution by Titian: c.1534-36
Realization of this miniature replica: c.17th/18th century
watercolor
Collection: FLG
NOTE: Titian (c.1488-1577) is widely regarded as the greatest portrait painter of the 16th century. “La Bella” is one of his most famous portraits. During the Renaissance, many artists made replicas of paintings they admired either for their patrons or for themselves. Few were copied more often than Titian. This tradition of making large and small copies the Old Master paintings as souvenirs of the experience of masterpieces continued for centuries, until the birth of photography in the middle of the 19th century reduced the market for hand-painted copies. Miniature paintings of this type have become a special category for collectors, largely because the skill of some of the copyists can be exceptional. This superb miniature seems to have painted in the 18th or early 19th century.
RUBENS (after)
SELF PORTRAIT
Conceptualization & realization by Rubens: 1604
Realization of this miniature replica: c17th/18th century
watercolor
Collection: FLG
Click here or on self-portrait (above) for more detailed image
NOTE: The date of the original is inscribed on the back of this miniature: 1604. This is a period in which Rubens was copying Renaissance paintings in Italy and cultivating an image of himself as the successor of Titian.
Rubens (1577-1640) was a Flemish master who became the most widely celebrated painter of the Baroque era in Northern Europe. He was raised Catholic and had a Humanist education, then worked as a younger painter in Italy where he was deeply influenced by the Venetians especially Titian, as well as by the expressive forms of Hellenistic sculpture particularly the famous “Laocoon and his Sons.” His mature work is a dynamic fusion of intensely energetic forms, rivers of vibrant color, and rich sensuality. Few artists had a greater influence during the 18th & 19th centuries, up to the time of Delacroix and van Gogh. Rubens also was a diplomat, a scholar, and a collector of note. He employed a large workshop to execute major commissions from numerous royal and noble individuals. He also directed a studio full of engravers to promote his work. His most famous student was van Dyck. Rubens received knighthoods from the King of Spain and the King of England. The history of artists being regarded as “artists” rather than mere artisans began with Leonardo, Raphael, and Leonardo during the High Renaissance. However, it was not until the early 17th century that painters such as Rubens and Valasquez were honored with knighthoods. This miniature replica of a self portrait is dated on the back 1604. In it we see the young Rubens during his apprenticeship in Italy where he decided to model himself on Titian. It was meaningful to Rubens that he was born shortly after Titian died. This handsome miniature seems to date from the late 17th or early 18th century.
RUBENS Studio (Cornelius Galle)
ST. IGNATIUS LOYOLA IN PRAYER
1609. Engraving
Collection: FLG
Ex. Collection: Mrs. ADR Lanier
NOTE: Within the extremely diverse work of Rubens one finds the wide range of artistic quality characteristic of prominent studios during the Renaissance and Baroque eras when many artists used any number of assistants. Consider his portraits of Saints. Rubens, who was a devout Catholic, took a special interest in St. Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556), a Spanish knight from a Basque family who founded the Jesuit Order. His painted portrait by Rubens is now in the Norton Simon Museum. In 1609, the year Loyola was beatified, Rubens produced a sumptuous book called Vita Beati. P. Ignatii Loiolalie [Life of the Blessed Father Ignatius Loyola, Founder of the Society of Jesus]. It was illustrated with 81 plates designed by Rubens and engraved under his direction by artists in his workshop. In a way, the whole book is a “portrait” of Loyola, with the plates portraying moments in his life. This particular plate was engraved by Cornelius Galle. It pictures Loyola with a luminous full-body aura in an altered state of prayerful meditation uniting with the Transcendent. This engraving is typical of the kind of portrait that became quite popular in books of the 17th century. It is a competent illustration. However, it does not do more than convey the idea of a reality. It does not evoke inside the viewer an empathetic experience of that reality, unless there is a sympathetic response to the idea itself rather than its visual expression. In short, the plate is flat – both visually and emotionally. Such a plate is typical of the workshop of a major artist. However, a plate done by Rubens himself can evoke a rich empathetic experience because it is a synthesis of a meaningful idea with a strong visual expression of the spirit of that idea. For example, consider “St. Catherine of Alexandria” (the following image), etched by Rubens himself.
RUBENS
ST. CATHERINE OF ALEXANDRIA
c.1620. Etching & engraving
Collection: FLG
NOTE: Rubens had a large workshop of engravers making prints after his designs. He can be credited with the general composition of many of the plates but not for any of the execution. This “St. Catherine” is the only etching Rubens is known to have made himself. Following Christian tradition, she is standing over the spiked wheel on which a pagan Roman emperor attempted to torture her to death in the 4th century. Following her prayer, the wheel broke, and the emperor had to settle for having her beheaded. Rubens has given us not only a story but a story wrapped in an vivid expression of the meaning of the story. This is an explosive figure of a Transcendent spirit who has triumphed over torture, a spirit who has moved beyond ordinary humanity to an illuminated state of Grace. This Transcendent condition of the soul is what the halo symbolizes in the sacred art of the West and the sacred art of the East. It is typical of Baroque art to be activated by swirling masses, as if being blown by the wind. This convention is dramatic and thus emotionally engaging which is what the Catholic Church during the Counter Reformation wanted its art to be. The dramatic “wind” blowing form into place also was thought of as the Divine Spirit moving earthly matter into purposeful positions.
VAN DYCK
SELF PORTRAIT c.1630
Etching
Collection: FLG
NOTE: There were many good artists working under or with Rubens, but the Flemish genius who stood out over all the others was Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641). In the 1630s (probably at the suggestion of Nicholas Lanier) he became the court painter of King Charles I of England, the leading art collector of his age. Van Dyck painted some of the most graceful portraits ever made. The output of his studio was enormous. Assistants did much of the work, but the faces usually were by the master himself. He received a knighthood and was the dominant influence of British painting for the next two centuries. Like his master, van Dyck lived in Italy as a young man and was deeply influence by Titian. Perhaps van Dyck’s best known portrait is his spectacular rendering of Charles I standing in front of his horse in the Louvre, but many major museums proudly display a van Dyck. He also was a printmaker. During the 1630s, in a series called Iconography, he took the art of the printed portrait to a new level. The series was devoted to half-portraits of distinguished contemporaries – artists, scholars, solders, and statesmen. Many think there has never been a finer series of printed portraits. Each was begun by van Dyck as a drawing or an oil sketch, and sometimes as an etching, and then was completed by a collaborator as an engraving. Of the plates that survive in the form of an original etching, the most famous is this self portrait. The plates for the series, which first appeared in an edition of 80 and eventually numbered over 200, were collected by the Louvre. They have been reprinted from time to time. Van Dyck and Rembrandt were the most brilliant etchers of the 17th century, and perhaps of all time. Only the etchings of Whistler and Picasso usually are discussed in the same conversation.
ANTHONY VAN DYCK
PORTRAIT of NICHOLAS LANIER
oil on canvas. c.1628
Collection: Kunsthistorisches, Vienna
Ex. Collection: King Charles I, & then Nicholas Lanier
click here or on portrait (above) for more detailed image
NOTE: Nicholas Lanier (1588-1666) was a prominent member of the court of King Charles the First (1600-1649) where a late phase of the Renaissance flourished in England. As a composer and musician, he was Master of the King’s Music. He collaborated with Ben Jonson and Inigo Jones on masques (as a composer, musician, singer, and set designer), and is credited with composing the first English opera. His singing voice was celebrated in a poem by Robert Herrick in the following lines:
Then if thy voice commingle with the string,
I hear in thee rare Lanier to sing.
He is also credited with composing the first English opera. He also was a painter, poet, and art collector. He is considered one of the first, and possibly the very first Englishman to collect Old Master drawings, especially those of 16th-century Italians. When buying paintings for the king, he bought drawings for his own collection. He engraved and published a number of these drawings himself. As the king’s curator, he is best remembered for selecting and arranging for the acquisition of the legendary “Mantuan Purchase.” This extraordinary collection of Renaissance Italian masterpieces is widely considered the most important purchase of paintings made in the Western world until the 20th century.
This portrait is the reason Van Dyck was invited to move to England. When King Charles saw this elegant portrait (of a man who resembled the king), King Charles asked Van Dyck to be his court painter. An unusually large number of Nicholas Lanier portraits survive, including ones attributed to Isaac Oliver, Guido Reni, Jan Lievans (Rembrandt’s friend), and Rembrandt himself. There also is a self-portrait at Oxford University. My 1966 biographical study of this ancestor was the standard reference for many years. A much more complete biography was published by Michael I. Wilson in 1994. The largest archive of the American and European branches of the Lanier Family is at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
VOSTERMAN (after LIEVENS)
PORTRAIT of NICHOLAS LANIER
engraving. 1630s
Collection: FLG
NOTE: Lucas Vosterman the Elder (1595-1675) was one of the most gifted engravers in the workshops of Rubens and then van Dyck. He later collaborated with Nicholas Lanier in England on a book of engravings after Italian drawings from Lanier’s collection. Jan Lievens (1607-1674) and Rembrandt shared a studio in their younger years when it was difficult to tell their work apart. The Lievens portrait of Lanier has been lost.
REMBRANDT
SELF PORTRAIT LEANING ON A SILL
etching. 1639 (signed)
Collection: FLG
Ex. Collection: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
NOTE: Today, the best-known artist of the 17th century is the Dutch master Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669). He is arguably the greatest portrait painter of all time. His name, and only a handful of other artist names, have become household words. As a painter of portraits, and as an “illustrator” of Bible stories, his use of light to articulate aspects of psychology and the depth of his humanity have never been exceeded. He also was a printmaker. No prints have been more avidly collected by a greater number of enthusiasts. If van Dyck was an etcher of consistent compositional structures and remarkable simplicity, Rembrandt was an etcher of enormous variety and often haunting complexity. This particular print is often considered the greatest of his early self portraits. He continued to explore this thing called “self” in a very long series of paintings and prints for the rest of his life. That series is arguably the most complete “self portrait” ever made by an artist. The fact that the Met had a collection of Rembrandt etchings made from his original plates in modern times was first told to me by A. Hyatt Mayor, curator of that print collection, when he was my professor at the Institute of Fine Art, New York University in 1966. They were later put up for sale. I purchased this impression at the Met in 1980. A Rembrandt portrait that many think is of Nicholas Lanier is in the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C.
REMBRANDT
THE ALCHEMIST (aka FAUST). c.1650
Etching
Collection: FLG
NOTE: Rembrandt eventually had an international reputation as an etcher. The meaning of most of his portraits and narratives is clear. But this famous print is mysterious. Scholars have debated its meaning for centuries. An old man in a dark room looks up from his writing desk, pen in hand, and sees a luminous disc inside of which are words. The meaning of those words is a mystery. Most of the room is imprecise – the table, the books, the globe; but the words are quite precise. The whole scene is a mystery, and that may well have been just what Rembrandt wanted it to be. The title published in the 17th century was “The Practicing Alchemist.” Only in the 18th century did it start being known as “Faust.” To the uninitiated, Alchemy was little more than efforts by greedy people to turn lead into gold. There were such people during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. However, true Alchemy was a meditative tradition within Christianty that had parallels with Asian yoga. During the 16th & 17th centuries, true Alchemy was a special interest of leading figures of the time including Sir Isaac Newton. By means of spiritual practices, one attempts to transcend lead-like selfishness and attain the Transcendent state of Golden Consciousness. {For further details, click here for “The Mystic Ladder: Parallel Stages of Consciousness in Alchemy & Tantra.”]
The legend of Faust probably was based on the life of J. G. Faust (c1480-1540) who was an alchemist and magician in Wurttemberg. In Goethe’s play/poem Faust (which occupied much of his life), the central character makes a “deal with the Devil.” For a number of years, Faust gets what he wants and then must surrender his soul to the Devil. If the subject actually is Faust, the scene probably is when a good angel warns Faust not to sign up with the Devil. What is the Devil actually? In a number of spiritual traditions, the Devil is understood to be one’s ego – selfishness personified.
(Go to top of page)
The Female Nude in Early Flemish Painting 1964 (Columbia)
“Virgin & Child” by Dirk Bouts – A Masterpiece of the Flemish Renaissance, 1971
De Young Museum wall label for the new acquisition.
“Virgin & Child” by Dirk Bouts in
MOTHER & CHILD: 100 WORKS OF ART
WITH COMMENTARIES BY 106 DISTINGUSHED PEOPLE
Edited by Mary Lawrence, 1975
Among the other Renaissance commentaries in this book were essays by Kenneth Clark and Sir John Pope-Hennessy. With both of them FLG discussed Renaissance paintings and sculpture from time to time.
Catalog Notes in
THE SPIRIT OF THE RENAISSANCE:
A RECREATION OF THE URBINO STUDIOLO AROUND 1500, 2007
Exhibition catalog & study guide for FLG’s class RENAISSANCE & BAROQUE ART at CSUEB
World Art Press for the University Art Gallery, CSUEB
Pucelle HOURS OF JEANNE d’EVREUX c1325 MMA edition, NYC
[FLG COLLECTION]
Limbourg TRES RICHES HEURES c1416 Facsimile edition
[FLG COLLECTION]
Bouts VIRGIN & CHILD c1460 FAMSF edition, SF
Photos: van Eyck & van de Weyden
Durer, et. al NUREMBERG CHRONICLE 1493 Facsimile Edition
Durer EPIPHANY woodcut c1486-89 First Edition PAGE
[FLG COLLECTION]
Durer MELANCHOLIA I engraving 1514 Ex. Coll.: MMA, NYC
[FLG COLLECTION]
Prints of the Northern Renaissance, 2012
[FLG COLLECTION]
(Go to top of page)
Section 2 – Italian Renaissance
Prints of the Italian Renaissance come to San Francisco 1973
NOTE: This exhibition came from the National Gallery in Washington, DC. FLG published the San Francisco edition of the catalog with a frontispiece of “Apollo & Diana” by Jacopo de Barbari.
(Go to top of page)
Leonardo Studies:
Leonardo’s Book Illustrations, 1961
Leonardo’s “Vitruvian Man” & the Philosophy of the Golden Proportion, 1962
Leonardo’s Neo-Platonic Philosophy, 1963
Circles of Light: Leonardo’s Halo Symbolism, 1964
The Angel of the Rocks: A Study of the Iconography, 1964
The Beam-of-Light in Leonardo’s “Last Supper,” 1964
The Image of Evil in Leonardo’s “Last Supper,” 1964
The Death of Christ & of Socrates in Leonardo’s Drawings, 1964
Shamanic Symbolism in Leonardo’s Drawings, 1965
The Face of a Goddess: Leonardo’s Drawings for “Leda,” 1965
Leonardo’s Art in Early 17th century England: a Short History, 1966
Leonardo’s “St. John the Baptist” & King Charles I of England, 1966
Leonardo’s “Christ among the Doctors:” a Bibliography, 1973
Leonardo’s “Mona Lisa:” a Bibliography by Roy McMullen, 1975 [edited]
Where is Leonardo’s “Blessing Hand of Christ?” – a Bibliography, 1979
Leonardo & the Androgyne: a Study in Nonduality, 1980
The Wrists of Christ: An Analysis of the X-Rays of Leonardo’s “Christ among the Doctors (Harrington)” and the Symbolism of the Punctured Wrist, 1994
The Reunion of the Vitruvian Man (Leonardo) and the Venetian Genius (Giorgione): An Analysis of the Pigment Studies by Walter C. McCrone, 1994 [edited]
The Face of Christ: A Study of the Attribution & Chronology of Leonardo’s “Christ among the Doctors (Harrington),” 1994
Introduction to
LEONARDO’S LIGHT IN “THE LAST SUPPER”
and “CHRIST AMONG THE DOCTORS” –
The Story of an Unrecorded Canvas with an Analysis
of its Style, Physical Properties, and Metaphysical Symbolism,
Edited with an Essay by FLG
World Art Press for the Fine Arts Museum of the South, Mobile, 1995
The Art & Philosophy of Leonardo da Vinci:
A Comprehensive Bibliography of Books
in LEONARDO’S LIGHT, 1995
Co-author of
“Christ among the Doctors” – A New Leonardo Painting?
in MICROSCOPE #44
edited by Walter C. McCrone, 1996
[a version of LEONARDO’S LIGHT]
Leonardo & the Golden Rectangle, 1996
An Analysis of the Attribution to Leonardo
Of “Christ among the Doctors (Harrington),” 1997
Co-author of
“Christ among the Doctors” – A New Leonardo Painting?
in FAKEBUSTERS:
SCIENTIFIC DETECTION OF FAKERY IN ART
Edited by Walter C. McCrone & Richard J. Weiss, 1999
[a version of LEONARDO’S LIGHT as previously edited for MICROSCOPE (1996) ]
ADDENDA
DIVINA PROPORTIONE by Fra Pacioli and Leonardo de Vinci, 1509:
A Bibliographic Checklist of Facsimile Editions
Compiled in collaboration with Elena Lombardi, 2008
“Christ Reasoning with the Pharaises” after da Vinci (Luini), 2010
Engraving by Shenton 1840. Published by George Vertue
[FLG Collection]
Leonardo’s Platonic Polyhedrons
in LOOKING AT LEONARDO, 2011
(@WAP: Lecture/RENAISSANCE), or
(Click here for brochure in PDF format)
LOOKING AT LEONARDO: a Museum Studies Exhibition
with Books, Scale Models, Facsimile Drawings, and Websites
World Art Press for the Library of CSUEB, 2011
(@WAP: Lecture/RENAISSANCE), or
(Click here for brochure in PDF format)
Giorgione Studies:
The Paintings of Giorgione: a Catalogue (1st draft), 1964
The Paintings of Giorgione: a Catalogue (2nd draft), 1969
The Paintings of Giorgione: a Catalogue (3rd draft), 2011
Portrait of a Man attributed to Giorgione: a Study of the Attribution, 1970.
Report for the Kress Foundation
The Biography of Giorgione: a Bibliography, 1973
The Bibliography of Giorgione: a Historical Survey, 1973
The Hands of Giorgione: a Note on Consistent Features, 1987
Portrait of a Woman attributed to Giorgione: a Study of the Attribution, 1988.
Report for the Norton Simon Foundation
Portrait of a Man attributed to Giorgione and/or Titian: a Study of the Attribution, 1988. Report for the Norton Simon Foundation
“Three Ages of Man” attributed to Giorgione: a Study of the Attribution, 1993.
Report for Oglethorpe University
The Signature of Giorgione: a Review of the Theories
in GIORGIONE & THE EXPERTS: A Documentary Exhibition of
THE THREE AGES OF MAN (MARCUS AURELIUS BETWEEN PHILOSOPHERS)
and The Process of Identification
edited by FLG
World Art Press for the Oglethorpe University Museum, Atlanta,
1st ed. 1993; 2nd ed. 1994
Introduction to
GIORGIONE’S “THREE AGES OF MAN:” A CRITICAL STUDY
edited by FLG
World Art Press report for Oglethorpe University, 1994
ADDENDA
Giorgione Paintings collected by Nicholas Lanier, 2011
Catalog Notes in
THE SPIRIT OF THE RENAISSANCE:
A RECREATION OF THE URBINO STUDIOLO AROUND 1500, 2007
Exhibition catalog & study guide for FLG’s class RENAISSANCE & BAROQUE ART at CSUEB
World Art Press for the University Art Gallery, CSUEB
1 Duccio MADONNA & CHILD c1310 MMA edition, NYC
Photo: Giotto’s Madonna & Child
2 Angelico ANGEL, colored plaster c1450 Museum Store edition
Photos: Annunciation & Transfiguration
3 Piero DUKE & DUCHESS OF URBINO c1472 digital photos
Photo: Brera Altar & Ideal City
4 Giorgio URBINO STUDIOLO PANELS c1476-83 MMA edition, NYC
Photo: Duke in his Studiolo by Berruguete
5 Mantegna THE RISEN CHRIST engraving c1490 Ex Coll.: J. Stowe
Photo: Camera degli Sposi
6 Botticelli DIVINA COMMEDIA (c1480-95 / 1928) First Edition BOOK
Photo: Birth of Venus
[FLG COLLECTION]
7 Donatello DAVID c1435-40 1/4 size Bronze Edition
Photo: Mary Magdalene
[FLG COLLECTION]
8 Barbari PACIOLI PORTRAIT 1495 digital canvas
Photos: Golden Ratios in Art & Nature
9 Leonardo VITRUVIAN MAN c1490-95 digital photo
Photos: Diagram, Last Supper & Mona Lisa
10 Leonardo 5 PLATONIC POLYHEDRA 1490s
in Pacioli’s DIVINA PROPORTIONE, 1509 photos of illustrations
11 Unknown 5 PLATONIC POLYHEDRA modern 5 brass objects
12 Raphael SCHOOL OF ATHENS c1510-11
Photo & Atalay diagram
13 Bellini NUDE WOMAN WITH A MIRROR 1515 digital canvas
Photos:
Giorgione’s Venus &
Titian’s Venus of Urbino
14 Barbari APOLLO & DIANA engraving digital photo
Photos:
Leonardo’s Mona Lisa
Leonardo’s St. John the Baptist;
Francis I as Mercury
(Go to top of page)
Part 3
RENAISSANCE STUDIES, SERIES TWO
(2007-2010)
THE SPIRIT OF THE RENAISSANCE,
University Art Gallery CSUEB, 2007
Design by FLG as a full-scale model for a “period room”
in the World History Learning Center
The Spirit of the Renaissance
Introduction
When most art historians use the word “modern” their reference is to a period between the middle of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th century. However, when social historians and cultural historians use the word “modern” they have a much larger frame of reference. They usually mean from the Renaissance to the 20th century, in other words, from the time when the ideals of the Middle Ages were replaced by those that most of modern people still live by artistically, socially, economically, and spiritually. When did the Renaissance begin? Literary historians usually say in the 14th century. Art historians usually say in the 15th century.
Italy is the 15th century was a patchwork of independent city-states. Among the most highly developed cultural centers in northern Italy were Florence, Sienna, Venice, Milan, Mantua, and Urbino. Urbino is the city that remains most like it was five centuries ago. The rulers of these centers had to deal with many problems: economic. military, etc. But most of them also were humanists. Inspired by the Greeks and Romans, they wanted the artists they patronized to harmonize Christian ideals with the ideals of the ancients. When the Dukes & Duchesses of these little nations wanted to get away from it all and read quietly or meditate on Platonic harmonies, they often did so in a small chamber called a studiolo. Here were housed their libraries and the finest of their paintings, sculptures, and other objects of vertu – objects of exceptional character, which stimulated them to be persons of exceptional character.
Frederico da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino (1422-82), was an exceptional character. In between fighting the wars that kept his people safe, his legendary patronage extended to some of the greatest painters, architects, and philosophers of the age, figures such as Piero, Alberti, and Pacioli. Thanks to a book by Castiglione about life there, the court of Urbino was known throughout Europe as a place that understood the true meaning of artistic, social, and spiritual vertu. From this world came the profoundly beautiful art and architecture of Raphael and Bramante. We know more about the Urbino studiolo than we do about any other. That special space is our point-of-departure for this exhibition in which we suspend disbelief and pretend we are visiting the Duke’s little treasure chest of art, ideas, and values. This gallery is about the same size as the Urbino studiolo.
This exhibition is the first in a new series of small teaching exhibitions designed as interactive adjuncts to courses. The Satellite Gallery this time is a “display case” inside of which our students can see not slides but original objects and facsimiles of objects created in Italy and northern Europe between the 14th & early 16th centuries. Most of these works were owned or could have been owned by the Duke and his son.
Future exhibitions will be devoted to such themes as Shamanic Objects, Asian Sculpture, the Civil Rights Movement, and Postmodernism.
We are grateful to the Institute for Aesthetic Development in Brentwood, California, for the loan of these objects from its Teaching Collection of World Art, and for providing to our students with this illustrated study guide which reproduces the entire exhibition.
Cultural Studies
A. The Spirit of the Renaissance: Student Evaluations of the Class
THE STUDIOLO IN THE EARLY ITALIAN RENAISSANCE
B.1 The Studiolo in Early Renaissance Italy: a Study Guide
B.2 The Studioli & Library of the first Duke of Urbino
B.3 The first Duke of Urbino’s Taste in Painters
B.4 The Studiolo of Isabella d’Este in Mantua
B.5 The Studiolo of Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara
B.6 Furniture & Interior Design in Renaissance Italy
THE NEW PERSPECTIVE
C. The New Perspective: Brunelleschi, Masaccio, Donatello, & Piero
BOTTICELLI
D.1 Botticelli’s Pagan Iconography: a Bibliography .
D.2 Botticelli’s “Venus:” Who? What? When? Where? Why? [lecture notes]
D.3 Botticelli’s “Mars & Venus:” An Alchemical Union? [lecture notes]
D.4 Botticelli’s “Divine Comedy:” An Annotated Bibliography
D.5 Botticelli’s “Portrait of a Goldsmith?” Reflections on an Attribution
D.6 Botticelli & the Studiolo of Urbino: An Annotated Bibliography
LEONARDO
E.1 Leonardo & his Paintings: Reflections on Attributions
E.2 Leonardo & Pacioli: A Partnership of Divine Proportions
E.3 Pacioli’s Divina Proportione: A Bibliography of Editions
E.4 Leonardo’s “Vitruvian Man:” Reflections on Symbolism
E.5 Leonardo & Bramante: An Architectural Friendship?
E.6 Leonardo’s Architectural Plans & the Golden Ratio
E.7 Leonardo’s Allegory of the Wolf & the Eagle
E.8 Leonardo & The Da Vinci Code: Facts & Fictions
E.9 Leonardo & Alchemy: an Annotated Bibliography
E.10 LEONARDO & ANDROGYNY:
SEXUALITY & ENLIGHTENMENT IN THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE
[book manuscript, in progress]
THE GOLDEN RATIO
F.1 The Golden Ratio: A Concise Study Guide [A.2 Appendix]
– (Click here for this Guide in PDF format)
F.2 The Golden Ratio in the Renaissance: a Visual Survey
F.3 The Golden Ratio: A Bibliography
RETURN OF EROS: BELLINI, GIORGIONE, TITIAN, & ARETINO
G.1 Investigating Bellini’s “Feast of the Gods”
G.2 Bellini’s “Nude Woman with a Mirror” & the Return of Eros
G.3 The Nudes of Giorgione and Titian & the Growth of Eros
G.4 Aretino, Guilio Romano, & the Eruption of Lust
BOUTS & THE NORTHERN RENAISSANCE
H.1 Northern Renaissance Madonnas: The Iconography of Interaction
H.2 The San Francisco “Madonna” of Dirk Bouts: Attribution History
DURER
I.1 Durer’s “Epiphany” in The Nuremberg Chronicle: an Attribution
I.2 Durer’s “Soluna” in The Nuremberg Chronicle: an Attribution
I.3 Renaissance North & South: Pacioli, Barbari, Durer, & Raphael
I.4 Durer’s Visits to Venice
I.5 Durer’s “Christ among the Doctors” Revised
ALBERTI & BRAMANTE
J.1 Alberti & the Ancients: The Rebirth of Musical Proportions
J.3 Bramante in Urbino, Milan, & Rome
VERTU
K. “Virtu” — the Life of an Idea, during & after the Renaissance
POETRY & PROSE OF THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE
L.1 Poetry of the Italian Renaissance
L.2 Prose of the Italian Renaissance
COLLECTING ITALIAN RENAISSANCE ART
M.1 Nicholas Lanier & Early Stuart England
M.2 Artemesia Gentileschi
M.3 American Museum Collections
WUNDERKAMMERS
N. Wunderkammers/Cabinets of Wonders
BIBLIOGRAPHY
O. The Italian Renaissance: a General Bibliography
1. Introductory Surveys
2. Thematic Surveys
3. Urbino Surveys
4. The Renaissance of Mythological Painting
5. Archeology & Collecting Antiquities
6. Luca Pacioli:
6a. Luca Pacioli: A General Bibliography
6b. The Barbari Portrait of Pacioli
7. Humanism
8. Neo-Platonism
9. Biographical Sketches of Eminent Individuals
APPENDIX: AUTHENTICITY NOTES
Click here for notes in PDF format
Part 4
RENAISSANCE LECTURES at CSUEB, 2007
Of the 10 weekly lectures in his usual courses, most were spontaneous. Sometimes he wrote short essays to read in class in order to make concentrated points in a short time, and then distributed copies to those of his students who wanted them (which usually was a majority). What follows are those he composed for his Renaissance & Baroque course in 2007:
Pagan Metaphysics lecture #1: The Geneology of Botticelli’s “Venus” 2007
Pagan Metaphysics lecture #2: The Philosophical Venus 2007
Pagan Metaphysics lecture #3: Venus, Mars, & Wisdom 2007
Pagan Metaphysics lecture #4: The Mystic Union of Mars & Venus 2007
Christian Metaphysics lecture #1: The Crucifixion of Christ 2007
Christian Metaphysics lecture #2: Sophia – Holy Spirit 2007
Christian Metaphysics lecture #3: The Kingdom of God 2007
Christian Metaphysics lecture #4: Divine Light 2007
(All eight lectures available @WAP: Lectures/RENAISSANCE/cultural) – (Click here)
Part 5
RENAISSANCE & BAROQUE EXHIBITIONS
BOTTICELLI’S ILLUSTRATIONS FOR DANTE 1963,
Phillips Collection Library, Washington, DC
THE FACE OF NICHOLAS LANIER: AN EXHIBITION OF PORTRAITS 1964,
Columbia University, NYC
FLEMISH PAINTING, 15th through 17th CENTURIES, 1971,
de Young Museum, SF
THE FRENCH RENAISSANCE:
A New Gallery at the CPLH, 1974
THE FRENCH BAROQUE:
A New Gallery at the CPLH, 1974
FRENCH PAINTINGS, 17TH & 18TH CENTURIES FROM THE SIMON COLLECTION, 1973,
CPLH
“The Three Marys” by Rubens,
de Young, 1973
“Portrait of Titus” by Rembrandt,
de Young, 1973
“Still Life” by Zurburan,
de Young, 1973
FRENCH PAINTINGS, 19TH & 20TH CENTURIES FROM THE SIMON COLLECTION, 1975,
CPLH
GIORGIONE & THE EXPERTS,
Oglethorpe University Museum, 1993
LEONARDO’S LIGHT,
Museum of Fine Arts, Mobile, 1995
THE SPIRIT OF THE RENAISSANCE, 2007
CSUEB Art Gallery, Hayward
LOOKING AT LEONARDO: a Museum Studies Exhibition, 2010
CSUEB Library, Hayward
Click here to view entire “Looking at Leonardo” brochure in PDF format
Click here to view entire “Looking at Leonardo” brochure in PDF format
LOOKING AT LEONARDO:
A Museum Studies Exhibition in the Emeriti Gallery of the Main Library of California State University, East Bay, featuring Books, Facsimile Manuscripts, Scale Models, & Websites, including Loans from the Teaching Collection of IAD World Art Press for the Museum Studies Program, CSUEB, 2011