Barbara Deimling Livres

" Botticelli dessinait souvent et tellement, qu'après sa mort les artistes ont eu un certain temps beaucoup de peine à s'en tenir à ses dessins. " GIORGIO VASARI

With the patronage of the powerful Medici family, a canon of secular and religious work, and contributions to the celebrated Sistine Chapel, Sandro Botticelli (1444/45–1510) was well placed for fame. After his death, however, his work was eclipsed for some four hundred years. It wasn’t until the 19th century that the painter began to gain major art-historical recognition. Today, Botticelli is hailed as a towering figure of the Florentine Early Renaissance. His secular works The Birth of Venus and Primavera, mostly read as an allegory of Spring, are among the most recognized paintings in the world, resplendent in their delicate details, graceful lines, and compositional balance. His arrangements are fluid yet poised, his figures serene yet sensual. Venus, in particular, is held up as art-historical icon of beauty: pale-skinned, delicately featured, soft with fecund promise. This essential introduction presents key works from Botticelli’s oeuvre to understand the making of a Renaissance legend. Through the painter’s most famous mythological and allegorical scenes, as well as his radiant religious works, we explore a mastery of figuration, movement, and line, which has gone on to inspire artists from Edgar Degas to Andy Warhol, René Magritte to Cindy Sherman. Barbara Deimling started working at Syracuse University in Florence in 1997 and was its director from 2000–2009; in this capacity she was responsible for all matters relating to the Florence Center. She has published books about Italian Renaissance painting.

Rediscovered genius of the Early Renaissance   During Sandro Botticelli’s lifetime (1444/45-1510), the influence of his art scarcely reached beyond his native Florence, and following his death he was soon forgotten, to be rediscovered only in the 19th century, by the Pre-Raphaelites. Since then, Botticelli has ranked among the greatest of the Renaissance artists. In the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, paintings such as ’Primavera’ and ’The Birth of Venus’ belong to the foremost attractions for tourists and art lovers. His captivating figures of women, his intimate portrayals of the Madonna and Child, and the angel-like beauty of his adolescents are famous the world over today.   About the Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series