20711237 - ITINERARIES, THEMES, PROTAGONISTS OF ART CRITICISM - LM

The aim of the course is to provide students with an advanced knowledge of the issues related to the discipline and to exercise their ability to contextualise critical sources by deepening their methodological and genre-related aspects.
Students will be directly involved in seminar-type comparisons aimed at applying the acquired knowledge in the analysis of specific themes, critical vocabulary, periods and figures of Italian, European and non-European criticism, refining the various methods of investigation of the discipline and the ability to read stylistic and cultural contexts.
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Programme

Focusing on the Roman historiographical context, the course aims to provide the tools necessary to approach the issue regarding the relationship between art and the Counter-Reformation in twentieth-century and early 2000s literature. The lessons are structured according to a seminar criterion: that is, the students will be involved with an active role by experimenting with specific papers agreed with the teacher.

Core Documentation

H. Voss, Die Malerei der Spätrenaissance in Rom und Florenz, Leipzig 1920, ed. italiana, La pittura del tardo Rinascimento a Roma e a Firenze, Roma 1994, pp. 219-277;

F. Zeri, Pittura e controriforma. L’arte senza tempo di Scipione Pulzone da Gaeta, Torino 1957 (o edizioni successive);

C. Ginzburg, Prefazione, in Il formaggio e i vermi. Il cosmo di un mugnaio nel ’500, Torino 1976 (o edizioni successive), pp. XI-XXV;

G. Spezzaferro, Il recupero del Rinascimento, in Storia dell'arte Italiana, VI. Dal Cinquecento all'Ottocento, 1, Cinquecento e Seicento, Torino 1981, pp. 183-274;

C. Robertson, Il Gran Cardinale. Alessandro Farnese Patron of the Arts, Yale-New Haven 1992, pp. 149-207;

A. Pinelli, La bella maniera, Torino 1993, pp. 166-200;

S. Ostrow, L’Arte dei papi. La politica delle immagini nella Roma della Controriforma, Roma 2002;

G. Fragnito, Istituzioni ecclesiastiche tra Riforma e Controriforma, in Cinquecento italiano. Religione, cultura e potere dal Rinascimento alla Controriforma, Bologna 2011, pp. 17-66;

P. Prodi, Ricerche sulla teorica delle arti figurative nella riforma cattolica, in Arte e pietà nella Chiesa tridentina, Bologna 2014, pp. 53-158;

M. Firpo, F. Biferali, Immagini ed eresie nell’Italia del Cinquecento, Bari-Roma 2016, pp. 3-108, 156-230;

M.V. Fontana, Nella Roma aldobrandiniana. Melius docet pictura, in Itinera tridentina. Giovanni Balducci, Alfonso Gesualdo e la riforma delle arti a Napoli, Roma 2019, pp. 103-145.

About the historical and political context, is moreover recommended the reading of:

A. Prosperi, Il Concilio di Trento. Una introduzione storica, Torino 2001

E. Bonora, La Controriforma, Bari-Roma 2001

FOR NON ATTENDING STUDENTS:
In addition to studying all the bibliographic materials used in the course, non-attending students must demonstrate a thorough critical knowledge of at least one of the following texts:

J. Freiberg, The Lateran in 1600: Christian concord in Counter-Reformation Rome, Cambridge 1995.

Baronio e le sue fonti, atti del convegno (Sora 2007), a cura di L. Gulia, pp. LI-LVIII, 3-50, 133-150, 301-325, 549-578, 791-932.

M. Firpo, Tra politica e religione. Nuovi studi su immagini e storia nel ’500, Pisa 2016;

Re-thinking, re-making, re-living Christian origins, a cura di I. Foletti, M. Gianandrea, S. Romano, E. Scirocco, Roma 2018, pp. 9-146, 209-234, 333-346, 407-452;

Chapels of the Cinquecento and Seicento in the Churches of Rome, a cura di C. Franceschini, S. Ostrow, P. Tosini, Milano 2020.


Type of delivery of the course

The course offers a balanced combination of classroom lectures and seminar-type visits at exhibitions, museums, churches and monuments, in Rome but also in other Italian and European cities (compatibly with COVID restrictions).

Attendance

Altough optional, attendance is strongly recommended.

Type of evaluation

The exam consists of an oral test, in which is verified the knowledge of all the texts adopted and of all the topics discussed during the lessons. For non-attending students, an additional bibliography is provided, explicitly indicated in the program (“for non-attending students”). The final evaluation takes into account three factors: 1) the depth and breadth of the knowledge acquired; 2) the property of language and the mastery of the discipline’s specific vocabulary; 3) the ability to critically range between the issues addressed.