Leon Battista Alberti: Beyond Architecture

Fascinating two day online course from the London Art History Society on Leon Battista Alberti, the Renaissance architects and polymath.

On day one Andrew Spira put Alberti in the context of 15th century humanism and gave us an excellent outline of the main protagonists prior to Alberti. He then looked at Alberti’s theories on art, in particular linear perspective, and outlined why these changes in how space could be defined were important. I’d never considered before that it allowed technical ideas to be shared more easily via more detailed, realistic diagrams. There was a good outline of the main artists who were early adopters of the ideas.

Day 2 concentrated on Alberti’s architectural writings and projects. Spira outlined the principles in Vitruvius and how some architects and theorists had tried to apply these before Alberti. I was interested to see some early versions of the Vitruvian man which didn’t quite work. He also talked about how Alberti’s ideas spread and become more popular with printed, illustrated versions becoming more of a technical rather than intellectual tool.

It was nice to finish the session by going through the main buildings which Alberti had worked on or been a consultant for. We went though how he had used his own principles but most of all it was lovely to look at pictures of Italian churches in sunny climes on a grey day in lockdown!

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