The art of Piero della Francesca is unique. Of the Italian Renaissance masters, only Piero viewed the visual arts and mathematics with equal importance. Later in life he declared that the whole visual world could be described through five geometric forms. Indeed, his work is spare and uncluttered. His figures are dreamy and detached from their surroundings, showing little emotion.
We have to travel to see Piero’s work and this lecture will take us to those Italian cities where he left behind a visual legacy. Forgotten after his death, it was not until the nineteenth century that painters and art historians recognised his mastery of form and perspective, his studies of light and his optical realism.
Lecturer: Alice Foster
Alice has been a lecturer for Oxford University Department of Continuing Studies since 1996. She also lectures at the Ashmolean Museum and the Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock. Along with organising History of Art study days, Alice joined the Arts Society as a lecturer in 2004. This year she has been taking tours to Australia and New Zealand and is currently a residential tutor on the Isle of Iona, specialising in Scottish Art.