What do I read if I like Italian art?
February 26, 2023 9:45 AM Subscribe
I’ve read Vasari’s The Lives of Artists, Michael Baxandall’s Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-Century Italy, Ross King’s books on Michelangelo and Leonardo Da Vinci, and Shearman’s Mannerism. What more can I read about the Italian Renaissance period? I am also very interested in pre-Renaissance painting in Italy. I have access to a very well-stocked university library.
I am also on the lookout for art theory that can be applied to Italian art. I don’t know where to start so any pointers in that direction would be welcome, as well!
I am also on the lookout for art theory that can be applied to Italian art. I don’t know where to start so any pointers in that direction would be welcome, as well!
The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860) by Jacob Burkhardt is the classic. Not just about painting.
(I have only read short excerpts, not about painting, that were quoted in other books, but they were good.)
posted by JonJacky at 10:17 AM on February 26, 2023
(I have only read short excerpts, not about painting, that were quoted in other books, but they were good.)
posted by JonJacky at 10:17 AM on February 26, 2023
Best answer: If you're into sources authored during the Renaissance, the (16th-century) Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini is a classic, and full of as much action as art! If you're more interested in the technical side of things, Cennino Cennini's (15th-century) Book of Art is a great resource—but it's pretty much a technical manual, so don't go in expecting a gripping read. Unless, of course, technical manuals are your jam!
posted by the tartare yolk at 10:45 AM on February 26, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by the tartare yolk at 10:45 AM on February 26, 2023 [7 favorites]
Best answer: There are so many possible answers to this question; I'll just throw out a few suggestions.
For historical background, my favorite one-volume history is Lauro Martines, Power and Imagination: City-states in Renaissance Italy (Knopf, 1979). For a more expansive and up-to-date history, you can follow up Martines with Guido Ruggiero, The Renaissance in Italy: A Social and Cultural History of the Rinascimento (Cambridge, 2014). On humanism and its relation to medieval European culture, Charles Nauert, Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe (2nd ed., Cambridge, 2006), is reliable if a bit dry.
Ingrid D. Rowland's work is rewarding on cultural and art history. Her Culture of the High Renaissance: Ancients and Moderns in Sixteenth-century Rome (Cambridge, 1998), is a good place to start. Martin Kemp has written a fine study of Leonardo da Vinci; his Behind the Picture: Art and Evidence in Renaissance Italy (Yale, 1997) is a classic, and his Structural Innovations: Seeing Shapes in Art and Science (U of Virginia, 2016), looks fascinating, though I haven't had a chance to read it yet.
A quirky book you might like is John Varriano, Tastes and Temptations: Food and Art in Renaissance Italy (U of California, 2009).
I wouldn't read Burckhardt until you've inoculated yourself against him by reading someone like Ruggiero or Nauert. His book, building on Jules Michelet, created an enduring myth of the Renaissance, but it's wrong in many important regards.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:24 AM on February 26, 2023 [2 favorites]
For historical background, my favorite one-volume history is Lauro Martines, Power and Imagination: City-states in Renaissance Italy (Knopf, 1979). For a more expansive and up-to-date history, you can follow up Martines with Guido Ruggiero, The Renaissance in Italy: A Social and Cultural History of the Rinascimento (Cambridge, 2014). On humanism and its relation to medieval European culture, Charles Nauert, Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe (2nd ed., Cambridge, 2006), is reliable if a bit dry.
Ingrid D. Rowland's work is rewarding on cultural and art history. Her Culture of the High Renaissance: Ancients and Moderns in Sixteenth-century Rome (Cambridge, 1998), is a good place to start. Martin Kemp has written a fine study of Leonardo da Vinci; his Behind the Picture: Art and Evidence in Renaissance Italy (Yale, 1997) is a classic, and his Structural Innovations: Seeing Shapes in Art and Science (U of Virginia, 2016), looks fascinating, though I haven't had a chance to read it yet.
A quirky book you might like is John Varriano, Tastes and Temptations: Food and Art in Renaissance Italy (U of California, 2009).
I wouldn't read Burckhardt until you've inoculated yourself against him by reading someone like Ruggiero or Nauert. His book, building on Jules Michelet, created an enduring myth of the Renaissance, but it's wrong in many important regards.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:24 AM on February 26, 2023 [2 favorites]
Oh, and to underscore how scholars with different research questions and presumptions can produce very different interpretations of the same place and time, it's instructive to contrast Richard Goldthwaite, The Building of Renaissance Florence: An Economic and Social History (Johns Hopkins, 1980) with Richard Trexler, Public Life in Renaissance Florence (Academic Press, 1980). Neither is wrong, per se, but they give very different impressions of what it was like to be a Renaissance Florentine.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:28 AM on February 26, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by brianogilvie at 11:28 AM on February 26, 2023 [3 favorites]
Best answer: The World of the Early Sienese Painter by Hayden Maginnis.
posted by mani at 11:35 AM on February 26, 2023
posted by mani at 11:35 AM on February 26, 2023
Just to second the recommendation of the Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini, which is just entertainingly bonkers and worth reading for the fun of it.
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 12:02 PM on February 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 12:02 PM on February 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
For non academic, sort of fiction, sort of non fiction, I really enjoyed I Know What I Am: The Life and Times of Artemisia Gentileschi, which is a graphic novel.
posted by damayanti at 12:06 PM on February 26, 2023
posted by damayanti at 12:06 PM on February 26, 2023
Gallileo's Daughter was an eye-opener. His letters to his daughter are lost (they were burned by the Church, damn them!). But her letters to him gave insight into the workings of a nunnery.
posted by SPrintF at 5:05 PM on February 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by SPrintF at 5:05 PM on February 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
Best answer: The Enigma of Piero by Carlo Ginzburg
If you like footnotes, as I do, there's notes on the notes!
It gets deep into the weeds, but that's where I'm comfy
posted by shoesfullofdust at 6:12 PM on February 26, 2023 [2 favorites]
If you like footnotes, as I do, there's notes on the notes!
It gets deep into the weeds, but that's where I'm comfy
posted by shoesfullofdust at 6:12 PM on February 26, 2023 [2 favorites]
Best answer: I very much enjoyed "The Collector of Lives: Giorgio Vasari and the Invention of Art" by Ingrid Rowland for the context it provided to Vasari's long-standard work.
Because of the personalities involved, it gets...not gossipy, but things really were lively back then. :7) Plus, current scholarship corrects and informs the original work, which is always welcome.
I listened to the audiobook, which was on flawed CDs (two of which didn't play at all) -- so reading a book would be preferable, especially if it included pictures of the works in question.
posted by wenestvedt at 9:32 AM on February 27, 2023
Because of the personalities involved, it gets...not gossipy, but things really were lively back then. :7) Plus, current scholarship corrects and informs the original work, which is always welcome.
I listened to the audiobook, which was on flawed CDs (two of which didn't play at all) -- so reading a book would be preferable, especially if it included pictures of the works in question.
posted by wenestvedt at 9:32 AM on February 27, 2023
Response by poster: This is fantastic, thank you so much everyone. @fingersandtoes - I’d love to read the novel you mentioned! I
posted by bigyellowtaxi at 3:21 AM on March 1, 2023
posted by bigyellowtaxi at 3:21 AM on March 1, 2023
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Re history, are you only interested in the lives of the artists themselves or are you looking for wider reading on the period? I like to dive deep on the various popes and cardinals who were the patrons.
posted by fingersandtoes at 9:54 AM on February 26, 2023