4.662
The City of Florence
Instructor: David Friedman
Phone: 617-253-7572
Office: 3-305F
dhfriedm@mit.edu
Units: 3-0-6 or 3-0-9
Level: H
Florence is a unique site in which to study the early modern city. A sophisticated artistic tradition gives rich expression there to a dynamic political and social history. Architecture, urban design, and the figural arts are marshaled to satisfy the ambitions for display of a complex community. An extensive archives and a famous literary tradition in poetry, history, and political theory has provided the resources for what may be the most extensive body of modern historical and art historical writing about any city in the world. The seminar will focus on those events, monuments, and parts of the historical literature that bear most directly on the development and character of the physical city. It will examine buildings and public spaces and also sculpture and painting that played a role in defining the public domain of the city. It will focus on the famous fifteenth century of Brunelleschi, Alberti, Massacio, Donatello, and Lorenzo de'Medici, and also on the Late Medieval moment of the city 's greatest political and economic achievement as well as on the sixteenth century when the Medici Dukes crafted a court culture that resonated around Europe. Students will follow a syllabus of reading and prepare a class presentation (and for 12 credit student, a paper) on a topic of the city's urban/art/architectural history.
