Drawing and Printmaking in Botticelli’s Florence

Presented by Dr. Jamie Gabbarelli

Using works from the Art Institute of Chicago as points of departure, in this talk Dr. Gabbarelli will explore the radical shifts that occurred in Florentine art during Botticelli’s lifetime, focusing on the crucial role drawings and prints played in that paradigmatic artistic revolution. Touching upon central themes and practices, such as the rise of drawing from life, the rediscovery of ancient art, and the influence of Botticelli himself on the graphic arts, the talk will provide a brief introduction to late 15th-century Florentine treasures in Chicago collections, as well as highlight links to many narrative threads in the milestone exhibition “Botticelli and Renaissance Florence: Masterworks from the Uffizi”, organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Centered on the close examination of drawings and prints from the period, the talk will also foreground important works only recently acquired by the Art Institute.

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Jamie Gabbarelli is the Prince Trust Associate Curator in Prints and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he oversees the collection of European works on paper from the 15th to the 18th centuries. His research focuses on artistic exchanges between Italy and northern Europe, on the history of printmaking techniques, and on the relationship between prints and other media. A native of Assisi - and a dual Italian and British national - Gabbarelli is a graduate of Oxford University's Corpus Christi College, and holds an MA from the Warburg Institute in London and a PhD in Art History and Renaissance Studies from Yale University. He is currently preparing an exhibition about the shared histories of drawing and printmaking.

The lecture series “Quattrocento Florence: the City and its Artists” is co-sponsored by the Italian Cultural Institute of Chicago and the Newberry Library's Center for Renaissance Studies and complements the Minneapolis Institute of Art exhibition “Botticelli and Renaissance Florence: Masterworks from the Uffizi.” Four art historians explore urbanism and the production of art in fifteenth-century Florence through close analysis of works in the MIA exhibition. 

The exhibition “Botticelli and Renaissance Florence: Masterworks from the Uffizi” is open at the Minneapolis Institute of Art from October 16, 2022 through January 8, 2023. For more information, visit artsmia.org