The Italian Renaissance: Art, Literature and Political Thought
Summer/Winter School

Employment prospects: Class attendance - held entirely in English - will allow students to gain the knowledge and skills they will be able to use internationally in various areas throughout the business world, especially related to teaching (literature, history, philosophy, art history, etc.), to museum and historical research, and to cultural communication: publishing, tourism, journalism, and information dissemination through the media (traditional and new).

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La frequenza al corso - tenuto interamente in lingua inglese - permetterà di acquisire conoscenze e competenze spendibili a livello internazionale in vari settori del mondo del lavoro, legati soprattutto all'insegnamento (letteratura, storia, filosofia, storia dell'arte, ecc.), alla ricerca storica e museale e alla comunicazione culturale: editoria, promozione turistica, giornalismo, diffusione informazioni attraverso i media (tradizionali e nuovi).

Programme Director/Direttore del corso

Prof. Antonio Corsaro

Associate Professor of Italian Literature at the University of Urbino "Carlo Bo". Professor of Renaissance Literature at the University of Ferrara: 1993-2001. Visiting Professorship: Middlebury College (Vermont, USA - 1985); Dublin UCD (1988, 1998); The University of Leuven (1998, 2003); the Centre d'Etudes Supérieurs de la Renaissance, Univ. De Tours (2007).

Studies in  Renaissance Literature with special interests in History of Culture and of Thought. Publications and conferences on the relationship between literature, religious censorship, and printed material in the 16th century.

He has written extensively on Michelangelo, Machiavelli, and other writers, is author of the monograph, "Percorsi dell'incredulità. Religione, amore e natura nel primo Tasso" (Rome 2003), has published a critical edition of  "Paradoxes" by Ortensio Lando (Rome 2000; reissued for the series "Les Belles letters" in Paris, 2012), and the critical edition of the Literary Works of Machiavelli (Rome 2012). 

Scientific and steering committee / Comitato di direzione scientifica

1. Prof. Antonio Corsaro

2. Prof. Guido Dall'Olio 

3. Prof. Giorgio Nonni

4. Prof.sa Nicola Panichi

5. Prof.sa Giovanna Perini

6. Dott.sa Marcella Peruzzi

Courses taught / Insegnamenti

1. Italian Renaissance Art (15th-16th centuries)

(Letteratura italiana: L-FIL-LET/10 - 6 Credits/CFU)

2. Culture and Literature in the Italian Renaissance (15th-16th centuries)

(Storia dell'arte moderna: L-ART/02 - 6 credits/CFU)

3. Italian and European Renaissance Political Thought (16th-17th centuries)

(Storia della filosofia: M-FIL/06 - 6 credits/CFU)

Final exam: 2 credits/CFU

1. Italian Renaissance Art (15th-16th centuries) 

Course description. This course aims to show the main artistic trends in Italy between the 15th and 16th  centuries, through the study of the great masters: Giotto, Brunelleschi, Donatello, Masaccio, Leon Battista Alberti, Piero della Francesca, Sandro Botticelli, Giovanni Bellini, Leonardo da Vinci, Donato Bramante, Raffaello, Michelangelo, Giorgione, Tiziano, and Federico Barocci. Artistic productions of this period will be analyzed through  investigating  style, iconography, technique, patronage, function, connection with classical antiquity, as well as historical, geographical, and social context. Special attention will be given to pictorial and architectural masterpieces of the Renaissance in Urbino, with a focus on the artists Piero della Francesca and Raffaello. 

Course objectives. The purpose of this course is to give students, through a stylistic and iconographical reading of the art work, the basic knowledge and methodological tools required to correctly  contextualize the movements, artists, and works in their specific historical, social, and geographical context.   

Lecturer: Dr. Marilena Luzietti - After completing a degree in History of Medieval and Modern Art in 2009 at the University of Urbino "Carlo Bo", Marilena Luzietti received a PhD in History of Modern Art in 2013 from the University of Rome "La Sapienza" with a dissertation on the "Iconography of the True Cross during the Counter-Reformation", which has since been published online at www.padis.uniroma1.it.  Her publications include a monograph on Saint Joseph's Oratory of Urbino ("Arte e devozione nella Urbino degli Albani: l'Oratorio di San Giuseppe di Urbino", Centro Studi G. Mazzini, Fermignano, 2012) in addition to essays on art in the Marche Region. She now teaches History of Art in a "Liceo Classico" (High School) in Pesaro.   

2. Culture and Literature in the Italian Renaissance (15th-16th centuries) 

Course description. The course will consist of 18 lessons of two hours each. After a preliminary introduction to the Renaissance period in Italy (15th-16th centuries), the course will focus on some main authors and literary gendres. A general pattern will be reconstructed about the principal cultural and literary events of the period in the Italian peninsula, using a thematic perspective and an interdisciplinary pausing approach (focusing on some Renaissance capital cities). A special attention will be given to the territories of Urbino and Florence, analyzing some of the foundation texts of this period ("Il libro del cortegiano", "Il Principe"). Finally, a special emphasis will be given to some musical and theatrical aspects of this period.  

Course objectives. The aim is to introduce students to a first approach to the complex territory of Italian Renaissance Culture and Literature, with a particular stress on its main authors and characters.

Lecturer: Prof. Antonio Corsaro (see above).

3. Italian and European Renaissance Political Thought (16th-17th centuries) 

Course description. The course is intended as an introduction to the political philosophy of the Renaissance as seen through an examination of some of the major texts and thinkers, especially in an Italian context, but considered under a European perspective. The course will analyze the main political  ideas and topics developed in Renaissance thought, such as the relationship between ethics and politics, the theoretic foundations of "buon governo" (good government), the theories of princely and republican governments, political prudence and "reason of State", the satirical critique of power, the relationship between politics and religion, and the birth of political science.

Course objectives. The aim is to provide students with the basic knowledge of an important section of western political thought, at the dawn of the theoretic developments that would lead to modern democratic ideas.  - Expected Learning outcomes: Students should be able to directly address  a number of primary sources, in order to examine and critically analyze the main topics in Renaissance political thought. They should also be able to place problems and ideas in their peculiar historical context and also discuss them in a comparative perspective and in their relationship with more modern views.

Lecturer: Dr. Raffaella Santi - Lecturer in the Department of Human Sciences, she received her PhD in Philosophy in 2000 from the University of Urbino Carlo Bo, with a dissertation on Plato and Hegel (published as "Platone, Hegel e la dialettica", Vita e Pensiero, Milan 2000). She is a translator of Hobbes's "Leviathan" (Bompiani, Milan 2001, 2004, 2012), a correspondent from Italy, and reviewer for the Bulletin Hobbes ("Archives de Philosophie", Paris). Her recent publications include  two monographs, "Ragione geometrica e legge in Thomas Hobbes" and "Etica della lettura e scrittura filosofica in Thomas Hobbes" (Cedam, Padua 2012 and 2013). She is currently working on the research project, "History of Modern Natural Right", directed by Prof. Franco Todescan.

La prova finale consisterà nella presentazione e discusiione di un elaborato scritto unitamente ad un esame orale sui contenuti del corso.