Courses

Renaissance Italians wrote prolifically about the visual arts: contracts detailing commissions, treatises codifying good practice, manuals describing techniques, biographies of artists, descriptions of real and imagined painters, letters reporting on things seen, poems attacking new public works, dialogues debating different aesthetic perspectives, religious tracts on the proper use of religious imagery, guidebooks to cities. This seminar will survey the Renaissance texts that are sometimes grouped under the heading “art theory,” looking at the major genres and themes and examining the approaches that key scholars have taken in writing about them.

Regular course meetings will take place online, but conditions permitting, the group will convene in person for three visits to the Metropolitan Museum over the course of the semester. Students will be asked to do a lead at least one class discussion, and to write a research paper, on a topic developed in consultation with the instructor.