The Lives of the Artists (Oxford World's Classics)

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Despite some factual inaccuracies, Michelangelo praised Vasari for endowing artists with immortality. The Lives of the Artists is indespensible, and a colorful entry point to into a rich, living history. However, Vasari has also been accused of being the cause of the traditional neglect of the Northern Renaissance (Flemish, German and Scandinavian art), but this seems unfair having read Vasari's work. Vasari was responsible for the modern use of the term Gothic art, as well, although he only used the word Goth in association with the German style that preceded the rebirth, which he identified as "barbaric". The principal part of the volume begins with a preface, [19] followed by an introduction into the background, the materials and techniques of architecture, sculpture, and painting.

This paradoxical coupling of extreme public exposure and sense of invisibility might be chalked up to some manifestation of false modesty, as morally bankrupt as his indiscriminate activities, but it could also be attributed to the fulfilment of one of his philosophic maxims. The editors of this version wisely pared down the number of artists that Vasari actually wrote about, which he broke into three parts. My mind boggles at that last magnificent threesome, and how they were all together in the same place at the same time, even if they didn’t get along together all that well.The corridor passes alongside the River Arno on an arcade, crosses the Ponte Vecchio, and winds around the exterior of several buildings. Inspired by the great Vasari, Lives of the Artists, Lives of the Architects explores the meaning of art and artists today, their varying approaches to creating, and a sense of how their thinking evolves over time. At the time, his friend and teacher Michelangelo was the only living artist included in the encyclopaedia. Da Vinci spending long hours contemplating next steps in his painting, having a prior getting impatient and pressing him to hurry up and finish, and Da Vinci telling a duke that he could make the prior the model for Judas if necessary, much to the duke’s delight. A prolific collection of artists-many of them eccentric or otherwise challenging, all of them great (or at least noteworthy).

The work shows a consistent and notorious bias in favour of Florentines and tends to attribute to them all the developments in Renaissance art – for example, the invention of engraving. I learned SO much when I remembered to take my copy along with me to the museums and cathedrals of Florence.Donatello’s generosity with workmen and friends while he was alive, and then leaving his small farm to a peasant instead of greedy relatives because he deserved it more. His professed love for the media goes beyond its usefulness as a communication tool: ‘I believe in advertisement and the media completely.

During this early yet hyperactive phase in his life, his indecision about his vocation produced a maelstrom of creative activities.

Through character sketches and anecdotes he depicts Piero di Cosimo shut away in his derelict house, living only to paint; Giulio Romano's startling painting of Jove striking down the giants; and his friend Francesco Salviati, whose biography also tells us much about Vasari's own early career. Similarly, Joachim von Sandrart, author of Deutsche Akademie (1675), became known as the "German Vasari" and Antonio Palomino, author of An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects (1724), became the "Spanish Vasari". Andy Warhol wasn’t merely famous – he changed the nature of fame, and this impact was not limited to the world of art and artists.