Botticelli gave us some of the most stunning Renaissance masterpieces. Paintings like Primavera and The Birth of Venus are as beloved today as at the time of their creation, as evidenced by recent exhibitions around the world. Botticelli’s influence and innovations also continue to inspire interest and passionate debate among art historians and lovers of art.
In four chapters, spanning centuries of Botticelli’s artistic fame and reception, Botticelli Past and Present engages with the significant debates about Botticelli. Each chapter collects several essays and includes a short introduction that positions them within the wider scholarly literature on Botticelli. The chapters are organized chronologically, beginning with discussion of the artist and his work in his own time, moving on to the progressive rediscovery of his work from the late eighteenth to the turn of the twentieth century, through to his enduring impact on contemporary art and design.
In four chapters, spanning centuries of Botticelli’s artistic fame and reception, Botticelli Past and Present engages with the significant debates about Botticelli. Each chapter collects several essays and includes a short introduction that positions them within the wider scholarly literature on Botticelli. The chapters are organized chronologically, beginning with discussion of the artist and his work in his own time, moving on to the progressive rediscovery of his work from the late eighteenth to the turn of the twentieth century, through to his enduring impact on contemporary art and design.
332 pages | 6.14 x 9.21 | © 2019
Free digital open access editions are available to download from UCL Press.
Art: Art--General Studies
Table of Contents
"Introduction
Ana Debenedetti, Victoria and Albert Museum
Part 1: Botticelli in his own time
Introduction
Michelle O’Malley, Warburg Institute
1. Sandro Botticelli and the birth of modern portraiture
Patrizia Zambrano, Università degli Studi del Piemonte
Orientale
2. Botticelli’s Portrait of a Lady known as Smeralda Bandinelli:
a technical study
Nicola Costaras, Victoria and Albert Museum and
Clare Richardson, Courtauld Institute
3. Classicism and invention: Botticelli’s mythologies in our time
and their time
Paul Holberton, independent scholar
4. Jacopo del Sellaio’s adaptation of the Primavera
Jerzy Miziolek, Museum of the University of Warsaw
Part 2: The Botticelli effect
Introduction
Julius Bryant, Victoria and Albert Museum
5. Whigs and primitives: Dante and Botticelli in England from
Jonathan Richardson to John Flaxman
Mark Evans, Victoria and Albert Museum
6. Befriending Botticelli: psychology and connoisseurship at
the fin de siècle
Francesco Ventrella, University of Sussex
7. A woman’s touch, Michael Field, Botticelli and queer desire
Anna Gruetzner Robins, University of Reading
Part 3: Botticelli between art history and connoisseurship
Introduction
Caroline Elam, Warburg Institute
8. Crowe and Cavalcaselle on Botticelli: new results
Donata Levi, University of Udine
9. Why Botticelli? Aby Warburg’s search for a new approach
to Quattrocento Italian art
Claudia Wedepohl, Warburg Institute
10. ‘A Japanese Critic on Botticelli’: fragmentation and
universality in Yashiro’s 1925 monograph
Jonathan K. Nelson, Syracuse University, Florence
11. Jacques Mesnil’s Botticelli
Michel Hochmann, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes,
Paris (EPHE, PSL)
Part 4: Botticelli now
Introduction
Stefan Weppelmann, Gemäldegalerie, Kunsthistorisches Museum
Wien
12. Ninfa fluida (a post-scriptum)
Georges Didi-Huberman, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en
Sciences Sociales, Paris
13. Into the abyss. On Salvador Dalì’s Dream of Venus
Riccardo Venturi, Académie de France, Villa Medici, Rome
14. Giving an edge to the beautiful line: Botticelli referenced in the
works of contemporary artists to address issues of gender and
global politics
Gabriel Montua, Neue Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen
zu Berlin"
Ana Debenedetti, Victoria and Albert Museum
Part 1: Botticelli in his own time
Introduction
Michelle O’Malley, Warburg Institute
1. Sandro Botticelli and the birth of modern portraiture
Patrizia Zambrano, Università degli Studi del Piemonte
Orientale
2. Botticelli’s Portrait of a Lady known as Smeralda Bandinelli:
a technical study
Nicola Costaras, Victoria and Albert Museum and
Clare Richardson, Courtauld Institute
3. Classicism and invention: Botticelli’s mythologies in our time
and their time
Paul Holberton, independent scholar
4. Jacopo del Sellaio’s adaptation of the Primavera
Jerzy Miziolek, Museum of the University of Warsaw
Part 2: The Botticelli effect
Introduction
Julius Bryant, Victoria and Albert Museum
5. Whigs and primitives: Dante and Botticelli in England from
Jonathan Richardson to John Flaxman
Mark Evans, Victoria and Albert Museum
6. Befriending Botticelli: psychology and connoisseurship at
the fin de siècle
Francesco Ventrella, University of Sussex
7. A woman’s touch, Michael Field, Botticelli and queer desire
Anna Gruetzner Robins, University of Reading
Part 3: Botticelli between art history and connoisseurship
Introduction
Caroline Elam, Warburg Institute
8. Crowe and Cavalcaselle on Botticelli: new results
Donata Levi, University of Udine
9. Why Botticelli? Aby Warburg’s search for a new approach
to Quattrocento Italian art
Claudia Wedepohl, Warburg Institute
10. ‘A Japanese Critic on Botticelli’: fragmentation and
universality in Yashiro’s 1925 monograph
Jonathan K. Nelson, Syracuse University, Florence
11. Jacques Mesnil’s Botticelli
Michel Hochmann, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes,
Paris (EPHE, PSL)
Part 4: Botticelli now
Introduction
Stefan Weppelmann, Gemäldegalerie, Kunsthistorisches Museum
Wien
12. Ninfa fluida (a post-scriptum)
Georges Didi-Huberman, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en
Sciences Sociales, Paris
13. Into the abyss. On Salvador Dalì’s Dream of Venus
Riccardo Venturi, Académie de France, Villa Medici, Rome
14. Giving an edge to the beautiful line: Botticelli referenced in the
works of contemporary artists to address issues of gender and
global politics
Gabriel Montua, Neue Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen
zu Berlin"