About: Nigel McGilchrist

I’ve lived and worked in Italy, Greece, and Turkey for almost 30 years. An art historian by training, I’ve served as director of the Anglo-Italian Institute in Rome, taught at the University of Rome, and been dean of European Studies for Rhodes College and the University of the South at Sewanee, Tennessee. I’m also on the board of editors of the Blue Guides series and have contributed to several new editions on Italy. Over the last seven years I’ve walked every path and village of the inhabited Greek Islands for the new Blue Guide of its archaeology, history, and ecology, which was released in September 2010 and named one of the best books of the year by The Economist. I live near Orvieto, Italy, where I produce my own olive oil and red wine.

Posts by Nigel

Posted in Antiquities, J. Paul Getty Museum

My Odyssey through the Aegean Islands

Paros marble, Milos Obsidian, and Naxos emery

Art historian and archaeologist Nigel McGilchrist is taking us to the Aegean—and you can come along! On January 13, he’ll give a free illustrated talk at the Getty Villa on his nearly seven years exploring seventy of these beautiful islands,… More»

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      dominusvenustas:

      Andrea del SartoVarious studies, c.1520’s

      Son of a tailor (sarto). Andrea became one of the best loved artists of Florence. Vasari had good things to say about him.

      …Andrea del Sarto, in whose single person Nature and art showed all that painting can achieve by means of drawing, colouring and invention: and indeed if Andrea had possessed a little more boldness and daring of spirit, to match his very profound judgement and talent as a painter, he would, there is no doubt at all, have been without equal. 

      Browning wrote poems about him:

      Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,
      Or what’s a heaven for?

      His drawings are natural, graceful and sensitive, an excellent draughtsman.

      …and he was very much in love with his wife… (something we don’t often hear about Renaissance artists!)

      Our curator Julian Brooks is in Florence now researching del Sarto for an exhibition in 2015.


      05/22/13

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