COLLECTION NAME:
Undergraduate Thesis Collection
Record
Title:
Lorenzo Lotto’s Adoration of the Christ Child (1508) and Early Canon Formulations
Creator:
Nicholson, Madeline Claire
Subject:
Thesis (B.F.A.) -- Art History
Subject:
Savannah College of Art and Design -- Department of Art History
Rights:
Copyright is retained by the authors or artists of items in this collection, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.
Abstract:
“This thesis focuses on the 16th century Italian Renaissance painter Lorenzo Lotto (1480– 1557). Specifically, it focuses on the lack of response to his Adoration of the Christ Child c. 1508, from early modern art writing by Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574) and Francesco Tassi (1716– 1782) through to Lotto’s ‘rediscovery’ during the modern period by Bernard Berenson (1865–1959) and other scholars, with an epilogue describing how Lotto’s work translated into twentieth-century art historical discussions. Although Berenson’s monograph on Lotto, published in 1895, did not devote sustained attention to Lotto’s Adoration, it inadvertently created generated responses to the painting in scholarship of the late twentieth and twenty-first century. Berenson’s nineteenth century response to Lotto mainly describes the artist’s work, recognition, and the influence of masters before him. The author only presents a brief synopsis in his monograph of the Adoration c. 1508, not an in-depth response that would clarify the painting’s art historical importance. Berenson defines the figures and compares the painting to other works by Lotto. Tracking Lotto’s critical fortunes and in particular explaining why Berenson and other scholars from his time did not respond in depth to this specific Lotto painting reveals its status as a work with features that did not fit with early canon formulations. Its status as a Raphael-esque painting by a Venetian gives it a difficult spot in art history that art historians have not understood well. The questions the Adoration raises will be answered by historiographic research of responses to Lotto’s work and his 1508 Adoration in particular.” –Abstract
Keywords: Adoration of the Christ Child (c. 1508), Bernard Berenson, canon formulation, historiography, Lorenzo Lotto, Francesco Maria Tassi, Raphael Sanzio, Giorgio Vasari, Venetian painting.
Keywords: Adoration of the Christ Child (c. 1508), Bernard Berenson, canon formulation, historiography, Lorenzo Lotto, Francesco Maria Tassi, Raphael Sanzio, Giorgio Vasari, Venetian painting.
Publisher:
Savannah, Georgia: Savannah College of Art and Design
Date:
2020-08
Format:
1 online resource: 1 PDF (Thesis, 47 pages, color illustrations)