Picturing Dante
The Art of Dante's Divine Comedy
- Date/time:
- 26 October 2010 - 23 November 2010
Tuesdays 10.45am - 12.45pm - Venue:
- 1 Berkeley Street, London W1J 8DJ
- Lecturer:
- Graham Fawcett
- Fees:
- Full course (5 lectures) £150.00
Single lecture £35.00
Described by T.S. Eliot as 'the highest point that poetry has ever reached or ever can reach', Dante's epic poem Divine Comedy, describing a journey through Hell, Purgatory and Heaven, has been a rich source of inspiration for generations of artists, poets, sculptors and illustrators.
In this series of lectures we'll discover how Dante's poem has influenced the likes of Botticelli, Salvador Dali, John Flaxman, Gustave Dore and William Blake; and how Dante's tales of love and the grotesque has influenced their work.
Course outline
26 Oct 2010 On not abandoning all hope
Emerging from the Dark Wood of Error, Dante meets the ghost of Virgil, sent by Beatrice to save him from himself. As their journey begins, our artists mirror his landscapes of Hell, including the famous Gate; Charon the Ferryman; Cerberus the Three-Headed Dog; and The City of Dis.
02 Nov 2010 Pacing the nightmare beautifully
In scenes to delight and tax any artist to the limit, Dante and Virgil ride the Great Precipice, land in the amphitheatre of nether Hell; meet demons; witness a double shape-shifting; talk to flames that speak; see giants; come face to face with 'the Emperor'; and discover an unexpected Way Out.
09 Nov 2010 Per ardua ad astra
From the base of the cliff beneath the Mount of Purgatory in the Southern Ocean, the two travellers now challenge the artist to picture them climbing seven cornices, through a flowering valley, borne aloft by an eagle, into bright sun, blinding smoke, a mountain earthquake and a wall of fire.
16 Nov 2010 With Beatrice into paradise
How our artists envision Dante's Earthly Paradise and capture the face of Beatrice; the Heavenly Pageant; The Griffon and other creatures, before voyaging beside him up into the Spheres of Fire, the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, and Mars.
23 Nov 2010 Through a glass darkly and then...
Traversing the final cantos of his Comedy through Paradise's ever more unimaginable heaven scape, Dante defies his future illustrators to paint the sights and sounds he claims to have seen in the Spheres of Jupiter, Saturn, the Fixed Stars, the Primum Mobile, and the Empyrean.