From the Eternal to the Temporal: Beauty in Italian Art and Literature

This lecture endeavours to trace the evolution of the concept of beauty in Italian art and literature from the 13th to the 16th century. Utilising Immanuel Kant’s theoretical framework from his “Critique of Judgement”, which distinguishes between the ‘agreeable’ and the ‘beautiful,’ the analysis illustrates how perceptions of beauty transitioned from the medieval synthesis of divine, monstrous, and ethical aesthetics to more human-centred and naturalistic representations seen in the Renaissance. The analysis begins with an examination of late medieval art and Dante’s integration of aesthetics and ethics into literature, highlighting his innovative use of poetic and visual symbolism to navigate complex theological and philosophical ideas. The study then transitions to the Renaissance era, where art and literature began to emphasise naturalism and human emotion, significantly influenced by advancements in techniques such as perspective. Artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli are discussed to illustrate how their works not only reflected natural beauty but also incorporated deeper spiritual and philosophical meanings. Furthermore, the lecture encourages students to analyse how the dimensions of the monstrous and terror in Dante’s hell, represented by figures such as Charon, Minos, and Lucifer, are depicted in both medieval and Renaissance art. The analysis concludes with a direct comparison between Giotto’s ‘The Last Judgement’ in the Scrovegni Chapel and Michelangelo’s ‘The Last Judgement’ in the Sistine Chapel, from which a clear and precise comparison between late medieval and Renaissance art emerges. This evolution in artistic representation mirrors the broader transition in Renaissance thought, moving from a strictly divine focus to incorporating the human and the temporal, thus exemplifying the essence of the presentation title, ‘From the Eternal to the Temporal’.