Tag: Nudes
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Leonardo’s Measure – The Genitals of Vitruvian Men
There seems to have been something of a genital fixation amongst commentators on Vitruvius’ in the 1490s and early 1500s. Vitruvius’ book on architecture was a favourite for many renaissance theorists, and his small passage about human proportion was revisited several times, notably by Leon Battista Alberti in his On Sculpture, by Francesco di Giorgio…
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Pollaiuolo’s Battle of Naked Africans?
This week has been concerned a strange, but fun, mixture of finalising our renaissance make up recipes for the Making Up the Renaissance study day (finding red sandalwood, allum and vinegar to make lipstick and blusher, for example), and avid reading of Alvise Cadamosto’s account of his voyages to Africa in the 1450s. As the…
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Men with Breasts (Or Why are Michelangelo’s Women so Muscular?) Part 1
When I give a talk, or run a class that includes work by Michelangelo, generally at some point someone will suggest that Michelangelo’s female figures look like “men with breasts”. I have to admit, that I sometimes deliberately task students with describing a picture of Michelangelo’s Night (right) just so I can elicit this reaction…