Giancarlo Fiorenza joined the Department of Art and Design in 2008 as an Assistant Professor of Art History. His research focuses on the production and reception of mythological painting within the Italian Renaissance court as well as on the relationship between literary and visual genres. His book, Dosso Dossi: Paintings of Myth, Magic, and the Antique (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008), investigates Dosso’s highly allusive and eloquent portrayal of ancient and vernacular forms. A related article, “Penelope’s Web: Francesco Primaticcio’s Epic Revision at Fontainebleau” appeared in 2006 in the journal Renaissance Quarterly, and addresses the pictorial combination of epic subject matter and lyric sentiments as it pertains to the portrayal of Ulysses and Penelope at the French court of Fontainebleau. His teaching covers matters of artistic invention, the creative process of imitation, reception theory, materials and technique, patronage, the role of the market, and nature and the arts. Course topics include the Art of Love, Michelangelo, and general surveys on ancient to Renaissance and Baroque art. Professor Fiorenza received his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University and has worked in both the museum and academic fields, holding curatorial positions at the Toledo Museum of Art (Ohio) and the Georgia Museum of Art, while also teaching at the University of Toronto and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He has organized exhibitions ranging from Italian Renaissance gold ground painting to religious prints from Germany and the Netherlands. He has been awarded fellowships from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. Professor Fiorenza is currently working on the relationship and rivalry between painting and sculpture in fifteenth-century Italy.
Articles
Penelope’s Web: Francesco Primaticcio’s Epic Revision at Fontainebleau, Renaissance Quarterly (2006)
Francesco Primaticcio designed his celebrated Galerie d’Ulysse at Fontainebleau (now destroyed) at a time when...
Review of Rebecca Zorach "Blood, Milk, Ink, Gold: Abundance and Excess in the French Renaissance", Renaissance Quarterly (2006)
Fables, Ruins, and the “bell’imperfetto” in the Art of Dosso Dossi, Modern Language Notes (2004)
Pandolfo Collenuccio's "Specchio d'Esopo" and the Portrait of the Courtier, I Tatti Studies: Essays in the Renaissance (2001)
Books
Devotional Prints from Germany and the Netherlands (Athens: Georgia Museum of Art), Art & Design (2008)
Dosso Dossi: Paintings of Myth, Magic, and the Antique (2008)
In Dosso Dossi: Paintings of Myth, Magic, and the Antique, Giancarlo Fiorenza draws on a...