The Art of Disegno

Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Mogliano, 1720–1778),Carceri d'invenzione: Plate XI: The Arch with a Shell Ornament (Later State), 1749–50 and 1761. Etching on 18th-century laid paper 15 7/8 x 21 1/2 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; university purchase, GMOA 1973.2984

The Art of Disegno
Italian Prints and Drawings from the Georgia Museum of Art
O'Shaughnessy Galleries West

January 11–March 1, 2009, The Snite Museum of Art
University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA

The Art of Disegno presents over fifty Italian works on paper ranging from the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries. Selected by Prof. Babette Bohn (Texas Christian University) and Assoc. Prof. Robert Randolf Coleman (University of Notre Dame), the exhibition focuses on the power of line––the foundation of every work of art. In doing so, it presents the versatile ways in which artists modulated ink, red chalk, and wash from the sixteenth century onward, to subjects as varied as scenes from the life of Christ, portraits, sea battles, theatrical designs, architectural studies, and landscape settings.

While the Italian word disegno translates as “design” or “drawing,” the term also refers to broader conceptual underpinnings of Italian art, which are fully developed in the exhibition catalog essay.