Celebrate the life of a creative genius
May 2, 2019 marks the 500th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s death, and museums around the world are planning a series of 
important events aimed at celebrating Leonardo’s enormous contribution to art and science. The Uffizi and the Museo Galileo in Florence, Haarlem’s Teylers Museum, the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace and the Louvre are among those showcasing his exceptional art, mathematics and engineering through his manuscripts and paintings, innovations and experimentation.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation is also promoting several events all over the world aimed at celebrating this very important anniversary, and for the occasion the Italian Cultural Institute has secured the collaboration of the Art Gallery of NSW by organizing a Symposium to honour a figure of an artist who has embodied like no other the ultimate Renaissance Man. The Symposium will see the participation of some of the best Italian Renaissance art experts present in Australia, who will illustrate the following aspects of Leonardo‘s universe:
- Dr Lisa Beaven (La Trobe University): Leonardo and the Depiction of Emotion
- Ass. Prof. Francesco Borghesi (University of Sydney): Leonardo and Folly
- Dr Louise Marshall (University of Sydney): Leonardo’s Inventive Imagery
- Dr Michael Hill (National Art School): Leonardo’s Large and Little Worlds
Dr Lisa Beaven teaches art history and history at La Trobe University. Her scholarship centers on early modern Italian art and religion, patronage and collecting in Rome, and the emotional responses to art in the counter-reformation period. Her book An Ardent Patron: Cardinal Camillo Massimo and his artistic and antiquarian circle: Claude Lorrain, Nicolas Poussin and Diego Velazquez, was published in 2010 (London and Madrid), and her co-edited book (with Prof. Angela Ndalianis), Baroque to Neo-baroque: Emotion and the Seduction of the Senses, was published in 2018. Most recently she has contributed chapters on elite patronage and collecting in Rome to the Early Modern Companion to Rome 1492-1692 (Brill 2019), and to the Routledge History Handbook to Emotions in Europe, 1100-1700 (Routledge 2019).
Dr Francesco Borghesi teaches in the Department of Italian Studies of the University of Sydney. His research is concerned with the development of philosophical ideas in European history, especially between the 13th and the 16th century, and places itself at the intersection of the histories of philosophy, religion, and literature. He is also interested in digital methodologies for research in the humanities. Among his publications are: Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Oration on the Dignity of Man (Cambridge University Press 2012) and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Lettere (Olschki 2018). His current project focuses on the diffusion of the idea of ethical concord during the Renaissance and, by shedding new light on the thought of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, aims at providing an enriched view of the Renaissance’s contribution to the definition of common good.
Dr Louise Marshall is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Art History and Film Studies at the University of Sydney, where she teaches late medieval and Italian Renaissance art. Her principal field of research is Italian Renaissance plague images, on which she has published extensively and is preparing a book; other research interests include devotional imagery and early representations of purgatory (and how to escape it!). She has delivered conference papers and guest lectures at universities and museums throughout Australia and internationally, and is a regular contributor to the annual lecture program of the Art Gallery Society of New South Wales.
Dr Michael Hill is Head of Art History at the National Art School. His research areas include classical architectural theory, Renaissance and Baroque, modernist art criticism, and Australian sculpture. Michael’s peculiar obsession is Francesco Borromini’s Roman church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, which he has been attempting to fathom for three decades.
Refreshments will be served in the interval.
- Entry: $55
- IIC & AGNSW members: $45
Information and bookings: 02 9225 1878
Online booking: www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au