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Art and Power: Renaissance Festivals 1450-1650
The spectacular festivals mounted by the princes of the Renaissance were a marriage of all the arts and an expression of political theory. Here Roy Strong provides a guide to their origins, their purpose, and their lasting influence.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1984
33 people want to read
About the author
Roy Strong
175 books27 followersSir Roy Colin Strong FRSL (23 August 1935 - ) is an English art historian, museum curator, writer, broadcaster and landscape designer.
He has been director of both the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He was knighted in 1983.
He has been director of both the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He was knighted in 1983.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 25, 2019
By far the best introduction to the topic. Scholarly and engaging. A pleasure to read.
April 5, 2013
Sir Roy Strong's seminal study of how Renaissance festivals were both a means for princes to showcase their power, wealth, and fine tastes and also a crucial environment for the further development of the arts as we know them today—including such advances as the advent of ballet.
By focusing on both a general overview of the artistic, political, and social setting at hand, Strong provides a good theoretical framework in the first half of his book and in the second portion goes on to provide examples of actual courts where such festivals were promoted and held with emphasis on the ways these festivals explicate his earlier points. As arts historical research, it's masterfully well-done as you'd expect from a scholar of Strong's caliber. The section on Catherine de' Medici I found especially interesting but the entire book is worth reading if you have an interest in history of this period of the general evolution of the arts in the West. It is, however, rather dry in places: I'd purchased this book for a seminar I was in on Renaissance architecture and recalled the book being one of our most-plodding readings then but coming back to it now, it was in fact very interesting yet I revisited some of the passages that made me sleepy the first time around, too.
By focusing on both a general overview of the artistic, political, and social setting at hand, Strong provides a good theoretical framework in the first half of his book and in the second portion goes on to provide examples of actual courts where such festivals were promoted and held with emphasis on the ways these festivals explicate his earlier points. As arts historical research, it's masterfully well-done as you'd expect from a scholar of Strong's caliber. The section on Catherine de' Medici I found especially interesting but the entire book is worth reading if you have an interest in history of this period of the general evolution of the arts in the West. It is, however, rather dry in places: I'd purchased this book for a seminar I was in on Renaissance architecture and recalled the book being one of our most-plodding readings then but coming back to it now, it was in fact very interesting yet I revisited some of the passages that made me sleepy the first time around, too.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews