The 4th International Laboratory for the History of Science
Art, Science and Techniques of Drafting in the Renaissance

There are some works of art that have been so endlessly analysed that the industry of scholarship seems to be more about other writings than the work itself. We need only think of such Renaissance examples as Piero's Flagellation, Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Wedding, Leonardo's Last Supper, and Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling to wonder if a 10-year moratorium might not be a good idea. Why, then, look again and again at Masaccio's Trinity, which has apparently been the subject analytical over-kill?

The broad answer is that a work of such complex greatness is always susceptible to new acts of looking, but, more concretely, the recent conservation of the Trinity, following Tintori's major campaign in 1950, has produced an exciting body of new evidence about the condition and making of the fresco in terms of the physical reality of the artifact. This reality is being recorded in traditional and new ways, including video and computer imaging. The first day, in situ in Santa Maria Novella, will be devoted to the "archeology" of the fresco and its original setting.

The "archeological" evidence enters into a complex dialogue with more theoretical models for the understanding of the monument's form and content. These will be the subjects of the second day. The models embrace mathematical analyses of its space, including the latest techniques in computer vision, and the iconographical reconstruction of its meaning for the original patron(s) and viewers of the fresco. The intention will be to show that the formal and iconographical models will be seen to be inseparable in a way that in itself provides a model for Masaccio's creative imagination.

Bibliography:

J.V. Field, R. Lunardi and T.B. Settle, "The perspective scheme of Masaccio's Trinity fresco", Nuncius, IV, 2, 1988, 31-118.

J.V. Field, The Invention of Infinity: mathematics and art in the Renaissance, Oxford, 1997.

Rona Goffen ed., Masaccio´s Trinity, Cambridge, 1998.

L. Hertlein, Masaccios Trinität: Kunst, Geschichte und Politik der Frührenaissance in Florenz, Florence, 1979. (contains a full bibliography of work from 1569 to 1979)

Volker Hoffmann, "Masaccios Trinitätsfresko: Die Perspektivkonstruktion und ihr Entwurfsverfahren", Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorishen Institutes in Florenz, XL, 1996, 42-77.

Paul Joannides, Masaccio and Masolino. A Complete Catalogue, London/New York, 1993.

Martin Kemp, The Science of Art: Optical Themes in Western Art from Brunelleschi to Seurat, New Haven/London, 1990, 17-21.

Roberto Lunardi, "Note sulla Trinità affrescata da Masaccio nella chiesa di Santa Maria Novella in Firenze, II. La scomparsa e il ritorno", in Cristina Danti, Mauro Matteini and Arcangelo Moles eds., Le pitture murali: tecnica, problemi, conservazione, Florence, 1990, 251-60.

J. Polzer, "The Anatomy of Masaccio´s Holy Trinity", Jahrbuchder Berliner Museen, XIII, 1971.

Ursula Schlegel, "Observations on Masaccio's Trinity fresco in Santa Maria Novella", The Art Bulletin, 45, 1963, 19-33.

Otto von Simson, "Über die Bedeutung von Masaccios Trinitätsfresko in S. Maria Novella", Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen, 8, 1966, 119-59.

John T. Spike, Masaccio, New York/London, 1996.

Leonetto Tintori, "Note sulla Trinità affrescata da Masaccio nella chiesa di Santa Maria Novella in Firenze, II. La scomparsa e il ritorno", in Cristina Danti, Mauro Matteini and Arcangelo Moles eds., Le pitture murali: tecnica, problemi, conservazione, Florence, 1990, 261-68.