Benedetto Varchi and the Visual Arts

Abstract

The article highlights the lectures of Italian historian and poet Benedetto Varchi about his views on visual arts. Varchi's "Due lezzioni" of 1550 was used to correct the optical and semantic distortions generated by the enthusiasm of Cinquecento trattatisti. The lectures were written in didactic purpose that reflects an attempt to exclude speculative thought from the visual arts. Moreover, in contrast to the popular Horatian dictum, ut pictura poesis, he stresses the differences between poetry and painting relative to their content. Evidently, the lectures were greatly influenced by Neoplatonism, particularly in his art theory in the sphere of descriptive rhetoric of beauty more than in the conception of art and artistic creation.