De divina proportione: From a Renaissance treatise to a multimedia work for theatre

Abstract

The theatrical work De Divina Proportione, which made its debut in Urbino in 2009 - the year which celebrated the five-hundredth anniversary of the print publication of the book by Luca Pacioli- and performed again with success during the Ravenna Festival of 2011, is a multimedia spectacle with live music, dance and video projections inspired by - indeed, taken from - the famous text of 1509. Pacioli's text is not only considered to be a watershed of scientific knowledge of the day, but one which in many respects is interdisciplinary. It was precisely in virtue of the work's interdisciplinary nature that we developed the idea of bringing an ancient mathematical text to the theatre in the form of a musical work in a modern key. In the very first pages of the treatise we come upon an interesting declaration: the author explains at the outset that his study will be useful and necessary for all 'perspicacious and curious minds' interested in philosophy, perspective, painting, sculpture, architecture, music and other kinds of mathematics.1 Where do we begin, what should we take from a five-hundred year old treatise to construct a musical work for the present day?