Sandro Botticelli: The Drawings for Dante's Divine ComedyIn the 1480s, the great Italian Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli was commissioned by Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici to make a series of drawings to illustrate Dante's Divine Comedy. Botticelli gave stunning visual form to the poet's epic journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, but the project was never completed and the sheets were scattered. Now, more than 500 years after their creation, all 91 existing -- and very fragile -- vellum sheets will be shown together for the first time, in Berlin, Rome, and London. This book, which accompanies the exhibition, illustrates each of Botticelli's canto sheets in superb color, faced by a commentary on Botticelli's pictorial response to Dante's poem by Hein-Thomas Schulze Altcappenberg of the Kupferstichkabinett in Berlin, where 84 of the sheets are permanently housed. Eight essays on Botticelli, the Medici, and the Divine Comedy complete this unprecedented volume. |
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1481 Landino edition angel appears artist ascent Baccio Baldini Beatrice's Berlin bolgia Botticelli/cod Brieger Cacciaguida canto Charitable Trust Chart of Hell circle of Hell Cocytus codex commentary composition Cristoforo Landino Dante Alighieri Dante and Beatrice Dante and Virgil Dante drawings depicted detail Divine Comedy Dreyer engravings episodes eyes face flames Florence Baccio Baldini Florentine gaze Geryon gestures Guelfs Hamilton 201 illuminated manuscripts Illustration to Inferno Inferno XVIII inscribed Kupferstichkabinett left of centre light Lightbown 1978 Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco lower edge Malebolge manuscripts Matelda Medici miniatures motifs mount of Purgatory narrative painted parchment planetary sphere planetary sphere heaven poem poets punishment Robert Fuchs Sandro Botticelli scene sequence shades sheet sketch souls spirits Statius stylus terrace text of Inferno text of Paradiso text of Purgatorio turn upper Vasari Vatican City verso viewer Virgil Virgil and Dante visual Yates Thompson 36