Giorgione and Caravaggio: Innovation and Influence. Monday 3 October October 12 December 2016

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1 School of Arts Module Outline Module Title Module Code Programme Giorgione and Caravaggio: Innovation and Influence ARVC217H4 Cert HE History of Art Credits/Level 15/Level 4 Entrance Requirements None First Class Term Dates Monday 3 October October 12 December 2016 Taught By Christopher Moock Module Description Two exhibitions in London this year provide the opportunity to re-asses two of the most enigmatic and influential Italian artists of their era: In the Age of Giorgione (Royal Academy, 12 March 5 June 2016) and Beyond Caravaggio (National Gallery, 12 October - 15 January 2017). These artists initiated and developed a new mode of painting, recognisable and individualistic- characteristics attractive to modern viewers. They are artists who have been linked by various commentators over the years and not always in terms of praise. We will explore Caravaggio s innovations in technique in relation to other current styles, and how he developed from Giorgione in terms of technique and subject matter. We will set his work within the context of a period in which the demands upon artists to represent sacred subjects becomes more urgent, but which also sees the development of secular art. Aims Module aims describe the knowledge and skills that the module seeks to advance. This module aims to: Develop students knowledge and understanding of developments in sixteenth to early seventeenth century painting as the context for the work of Giorgione and Caravaggio, and their relationship to a particular strand within this development. Both secular and religious works will be considered. Comparisons with additional selected artists are intended to illuminate this tradition. Provide students with first-hand experience of art objects. 1

2 Develop students critical analysis and judgement in relation to issues of (sometimes contested) connoisseurship, (sometimes disputed) theme and in general the interpretation of works by Giorgione and Caravaggio. Provide students with experience of close textual analysis of different kinds of art historical writing Demonstrate the importance of context and the relationship of art history to other disciplines such as literature, social history, film and visual media and the history of ideas. Develop academic study and writing skills. Outcomes Learning outcomes are directly linked to the aims set out above. They describe what you should know and be able to do by the end of the module. By the end of this module, you should be able to: Begin to engage with the concepts, values and debates that inform the study and practice of the history of art, including an awareness of the limitations and partiality of all historical knowledge Analyse, describe and interpret objects, images, buildings and artefacts closely and systematically Show understanding of the objects, contexts and issues relevant to two or more specific areas of the history of art Select relevant evidence from the wide range of possible types of evidence used in the history of art and apply it to the examination of art historical issues and problems Complete all coursework and assessment requirements. Teaching and Learning Methods Teaching on our modules is varied and interactive. It may include seminars, short lectures, group work, discussion, and student presentations. Active student participation is encouraged in all our classes. Reasonable adjustments will be made to accommodate students with disabilities. Coursework and Assessment Assessment is a crucial part of all of our modules. It helps you to develop relevant skills for studying history of art at this level, increasing the level of your engagement, and, ultimately, your enjoyment of the material. The essay will enable you to undertake independent research, deepen your understanding of the subject, and apply appropriate analytical skills. 2

3 Assessed Component Basic Weighting Deadline Requirements/Word Count Essay % 12 December 16 Note that the above deadlines refer to the date coursework must be submitted/presented to your lecturer. To qualify for module credit, you may be required to submit a coursework portfolio, containing your marked assignments and the lecturer s comments, to the programme administrator. Module Evaluation At the end of the module, you will be asked to complete an evaluation form, which gives an opportunity to feedback on all aspects of their learning experience. Module Content Coursework Deadlines: Session 1: 3 October 2016 Introduction- Giorgione and Caravaggio: parallel lives? Giorgione (born c.1478) moved to Venice in Most of his paintings seem to have been done in the first decade of the sixteenth century, before his death in 1511, in his early 30s. Caravaggio (born in 1571) arrived in Rome in His paintings were done from the mid-1590s and in the first decade of the seventeenth century, before his death in 1610, aged 39. Referring to Caravaggio s work in Rome, Federico Zuccaro is reputed to have said: What s all the fuss about? I do not see anything here other than the style of Giorgione indicating a perceived stylistic link between the two painters. Session 2: 10 October 2016 Giorgione, his oeuvre and his collectors. Giorgione s oeuvre has fluctuated since Vasari wrote that he formed the transition in Venice to the third style or period, which we like to call the modern age (in parallel with the work of artists including Leonardo, Raphael and Michelangelo). A core group comprising around seven paintings can be linked to early sources. Sixteen oil paintings are identified by Marcantonio Michiel, a Venetian recorder of collections in the city. Attributions to the artist have been disputed since the sixteenth century. According to Lodovico Dolce usually Giorgione only painted half-figures and portraits - new types of painting, often with enigmatic subjects, sometimes sensual, sometimes violent. 3

4 Session 3: 17 October 2016 Giorgione s influence. Sixteenth-century painting techniques in Venice and beyond. Giorgione can be thought of as the artist who fills the stylistic gap between Giovanni Bellini and Titian, due to his supposed training with the former and his influence on the latter. Other painters who show his immediate influence (and whose work is often confused with Giorgione s) include Titian, Sebastiano del Piombo, Lorenzo Lotto, Giovanni Cariani, Dosso Dossi. Technical aspects including painting from life, the use of chiaroscuro and a painterly handling of oil paint (typical of Venetian painting), as well as common themes make the works of these artists comparable. Session 4: 24 October 2016 The transition from Giorgione to Caravaggio: some comparable examples. Most accounts of Caravaggio compare him with his contemporary from Bologna Annibale Carracci ( ), a painter who came into competition with him in Rome. In this session other artists, mostly from North Italy including Giovanni Battista Moroni, Federico Barocci and Lavinia Fontana establish an overview of some stylistic and thematic aspects characteristic of the transition between Caravaggio and Giorgione. Later Venetian painting is characterised by painterly handling and an emphasis on colour, unlike the more sober naturalism associated with Lombardy, and the emphasis on Disegno which typifies the style of the Florentine school. Session 5: 31 October 2016 Caravaggio in Rome I. Unlike Federico Zuccaro and the Cavaliere D Arpino, leading Mannerist artists of the day, Caravaggio s work in Rome is characterised by an extreme naturalism, and the development of new gallery pictures like the collectable works pioneered by Giorgione. Collectors of Caravaggio including Cardinal del Monte, Cardinal Scipione Borghese, and the Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani, who collected religious and secular pictures by the artist. Cardinal Federico Borromeo from Milan was another patron of Caravaggio- he owned the artist s only pure still life painting (Basket of Fruit, Milan Ambrosiana). Session 6: 12 November 2016 (Saturday) Gallery visit This visit will focus on the work of Giorgione and later Venetian painting and the art of North Italy, as well as encompassing works by some contemporaries of Caravaggio in The National Gallery. Session 7: 14 November 2016 Caravaggio in Rome II. Caravaggio s religious paintings in Rome include major commissions such as the Cerasi chapel (S.M. del Popolo), the Contarelli Chapel (S. Luigi dei Francesi) and the Cherubini Chapel (S.M. della Scala) as well as other altarpieces for S. Agostino, 4

5 S.M. in Vallicella and St. Peter s. His striking and controversial approach to these commissions drew attention of artists including Rubens, although some patrons rejected them. Collectors including Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani and Vincenzo Gonzaga, the Duke of Mantua bought these rejected works, securing the artist s reputation. Session 8: 21 November 2016 Caravaggio s later work (and his influence in Naples.) The late style of Caravaggio as practised in Naples, Malta and Sicily, increases the chiaroscuro and introduces a more profound spirituality in his altarpieces. Amongst the local followers of Caravaggio in Naples we must include two incomers: Jusepe de Ribera and Artemisia Gentileschi, both of whom created a mature personal style there following their earlier engagement with Caravaggio s art in Rome. They both modified elements of his style (including his emphasis on chiaroscuro) and combine this with Venetian influences. Session 9: 28 November 2016 Caravaggio s influence on Orazio and Artemisia Gentileschi. A striking example of the direct influence of Caravaggio s Roman work can be seen in the work of the father and daughter team of Orazio and Artemisia Gentileschi, the former a contemporary, the latter a famous innovator with a distinctive personal take on his style, which appears to further intensify the tenor of his expression in dramatic scenes of darkness and violence. Session 10: 5 December 2016 Caravaggio s influence on Spanish artists. The influence of Caravaggio on Spanish artists begins with Jusepe de Ribera, who along with Luis Tristán (a pupil of El Greco s from Toledo) saw his work during his early years in Rome (in Caravaggio s own lifetime) and was profoundly affected by his style. Some other Spanish artists also travelled to Rome during this period (e.g. Juan Bautista Maino), but others including Francisco Ribalta, Diego Velázquez and Francisco de Zurbarán innovated a Caravaggesque style in Valencia and Seville without direct contact with Caravaggio s works. Session 11: 12 December 2016 Caravaggio s influence on Dutch artists. The Dutch followers of Caravaggio in Rome, the Utrecht Caravaggisti, include Gerrit van Honthorst (called Gherardo delle Notti ) whose work (like that of Caravaggio) was collected by Cardinal Scipione Borghese and the Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani, Hendrick ter Brugghen and Dirck van Baburen. The direct experience of Caravaggio s work on these artists at a formative stage in their development had later repercussions on art in the Dutch Republic, especially in the work of Rembrandt. 5

6 Recommended Reading and Resources Students are advised not to purchase extensively from the list prior to ensuring that their chosen module will be running. Recommended Reading for Reading/Purchase The following will be referred to frequently in class: Brown, B.L., The Genius of Rome , Exhibition Catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts, 2001 Franklin, D. & Schütze, S. (eds.), Caravaggio and his Followers in Rome, Exhibition catalogue, Yale University Press, Facchinetti, S, & Galansino, A., P., In the Age of Giorgione, Exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts, London, Fried, M., The Moment of Caravaggio, Princeton University Press, 2010 Hall, M.B., The Sacred Image in the Age of Art, Titian, Tintoretto, Barocci, El Greco, Caravaggio, Yale, University Press, 2011 Hibbard, H., Caravaggio, Thames & Hudson, London, Humfrey, P., Painting in Renaissance Venice, Yale University Press, 1995 Langdon, H., Caravaggio, A Life, Chatto & Windus, London, Spear, R.A., Caravaggio and His Followers, revised edition, Harpers & Row, Recommended Reading The following are recommended as useful ancillary reading: Ames-Lewis, F. (ed.), New Interpretations of Venetian Renaissance Painting, Birkbeck College, University of London Department of History of Art, Askew, P.: Caravaggio s Death of the Virgin, Princeton University Press, Bayer, A. (ed.), The Legacy of Leonardo and Caravaggio in Lombardy. Exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Yale University Press, Bissell, R. Ward: Orazio Gentileschi and the Poetic Tradition in Caravaggesque Painting. Pennsylvania State University Press, Cannon-Brookes, P, (ed.), Lombard Paintings c c.1630, The Age of Federico Borromeo, Exhibition catalogue, City Museums and Art Gallery, Birmingham, Christiansen, K. et al, The Age of Caravaggio, Exhibition Catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York/ Electa Editrice, Milan, 1985 Christiansen, K. & Mann, J.W.: Orazio and Artemisia Gentileschi, Exhibition catalogue, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York/Yale University Press, Facchinetti, S, & Galansino, A., Giovanni Battista Moroni, Exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts, London, Friedlander, Walter: Caravaggio Studies, Princeton University Press, 1953/74. Garrard, M.D.: Artemisia Gentileschi. The Image of the Female Hero in Italian Baroque Art, Princeton University Press,

7 Graham-Dixon, A.: Caravaggio, A Life Sacred and Profane, Allan Lane/ Penguin, London, Humfrey, P. et. al.: The Age of Titian: Venetian Renaissance Art from Scottish Collections, exhibition catalogue, National Galleries of Scotland, Joannides, P., Titian to 1518, Yale University Press, Lingo, S., Federico Barocci, Allure and Devotion in Late Renaissance Painting, Yale University Press, Locker, J.M., Artemisia Gentileschi and the Language of Painting, Yale University Press, Mann, J.W., Bohn, B. & Plazzotta, C., Federico Barocci, Renaissance Master of Color and Line, Exhibition catalogue, Saint Louis Art Museum, Yale University Press, Martineau, J. & Hope, C. (Eds), The Genius of Venice , Exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts/ Weidenfeld & Nicholson, Murphy, C.P., Lavinia Fontana. A Painter and her Patrons in Sixteenth Century Bologna, Yale University Press, Nichols, T., Tintoretto Tradition and Identity, Reaktion Books, Olson, T.: Caravaggio s Pitiful Relics, Yale University Press, Robertson, C., Rome 1600 The City and the Visual Arts under Clement VIII, Yale University Press, 2015 Salomon, X.F. (ed.): Paolo Veronese, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery, London/ Yale University Press, Scrase, D., A Touch of the Divine, Drawings by Federico Barocci in British collections, Exhibition catalogue, The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Sohm, P., Pittoresco: Marco Boschini, his critics and their critiques of painterly brushwork in 17th & 18th century Italy, Cambridge University Press, Whistler, C. (ed.) et.al, Drawing in Venice. Titian to Canaletto, Exhibition Catalogue, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, Whitfield, C. & Martineau, J. (Eds), Painting in Naples from Caravaggio to Giordano, Exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts/ Weidenfeld & Nicholson, Wilde, J., Venetian Art from Bellini to Titian, Clarendon Press, Oxford, Reference The following are useful reference texts: Bellori, G.P. (eds. Wohl, A.S., Wohl, H. & Montanari, T.), The Lives of the Modern Painters, Sculptors and Architects, Cambridge University Press, Borromeo, F. (eds. Rothwell Jr, K. S. & Jones, P. M.), Sacred Painting. Museum, Harvard University Press, Enggass, R. and Brown, J.: Italian and Spanish Art Sources and Documents. Northwestern University Press. 7

8 Hall, M., After Raphael. Painting in Central Italy in the Sixteenth Century, Cambridge and New York, Jones, P. M.: Federico Borromeo and the Ambrosiana. Art Patronage and Reform in Seventeenth-Century Milan, Yale U.P Spicer, J., (Ed.): Master of Light: Dutch Painting in Utrecht during the Golden Age, San Francisco and Baltimore, Yale University Press Vodret, R.: Caravaggio s Rome, , Exhibition Catalogue, Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Venezia, Rome/ Skira, Milan, 2011, (two volumes). G. Warwick (ed.), Caravaggio Realism, Rebellion, Reception. Newark, University of Delaware Press, Birkbeck, University of London 8