Renaissance doctors, philosophers, theologians, poets, and musicians understood that all sensible experiences of time and space were linked, to a certain extent, to the cosmic order by a universal harmony, an astral-magic rhythm that influenced everything from the rotation of the planets down to the musicality of the pulse.... Read more about Thursday Seminar “Titian and the Skies of Tomorrow”

Boccaccio’s tale of Calandrino and the heliotrope is justly celebrated as a masterful reflection on art and illusion. In this seminar, Justin Steinberg will explore the political dimension of this reflection.... Read more about Thursday Seminar "The Artist and the Police: Decameron 8.3"

Bramante is widely credited for having pioneered a new and assertively antique architectural style in Rome at almost the very start of the sixteenth century, as is supposedly demonstrated by his Tempietto which is almost universally agreed to date from around 1502.... Read more about Thursday Seminar “Bramante and the untidy unfolding of the ‘High Renaissance’”

The origin of the madrigal is a recurring topic in musicology. Did it evolve out of the frottola (Einstein 1949), the chanson and motet (Fenlon and Haar 1988) or the carnival song (A. Cummings 2004)?... Read more about Thursday Seminar “Revisiting the origins of the madrigal”

In this talk, Nicola Suthor will discuss the long-standing literary tradition of a controversial artistic performance first demonstrated in ancient Greece and consisting of drawing a form or figure by means of a single continuous line.... Read more about Thursday Seminar “Exuberant lines: On so-called ‘calligraphic’ drawings in 17th-century Italy”

From the moment of his marriage to his new consort Maria de’ Medici in 1600, Henri IV began to sanction imagery that promoted her value to the French monarchy.... Read more about Thursday Seminar: “The Paradoxical Queen in the Garden: Maria de’ Medici at Fontainebleau”

Among the most complex and engaging artefacts of early modern Italian culture, Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando furioso was first published in 1516... Read more about Ariosto and the Arabs: Contexts of the Orlando Furioso. An International Conference