Calliope Arts' 'Gold' lecture series at the British Institute of Florence

This 2023 lecture series, supported by a Gold Sponsorship from Calliope Arts, at the British Institute, aims to share insight and research into female achievement in the feilds of art, literature, science and more.

The British Instutute of Florence, and its well-known library and cultural centre, have had ties with Florence's international community since the early 1900s, with the consolidation of the city's so-called 'English colony" of foreign intellectuals and artists. Today, it continues to be a point of reference for Florentines and Florence aficionados from abroad, as they strive to foster conversation with the city's past traditions.

Here are our 'Gold Lecture Series' highlights:

Artemisia UpClose, the lecture

January 18, 2023

During Artemisia Gentileschi’s 7-year stint in Florence, the artist formed friendships with artists and intellectuals, as part of Michelangelo Younger’s cultural salon. Her Allegory of Inclination – which graces the Casa Buonarroti Gallery ceiling – was the first painting of a 30 year project designed to honour the memory of ‘Michelangelo the Divine’. Now under restoration in the museum’s ‘Model Room’, Artemisia’s female nude continues to spark conversation, much as it did in her day. ‘Artemisia UpClose’ project coordinator Linda Falcone shares the stories surrounding Artemisia’s painting – from yesterday and today – as she follows the efforts of the project’s restoration team, headed by Elizabeth Wicks, to digitally discover how the painter originally envisioned her canvas, which was censored several generations after it was authored - to protect the ‘decorum’ of the wife and children of another Buonarroti descendent! Artemisia UpClose’, a project conceived and funded by not-for-profit organisation Calliope Arts and philantropist Christian Levett, is currently in the restoration phase, which will be followed by an exhibition at Casa Buonarroti in September 2023, as the conversation continues...

Linda Falcone is creator, presenter and managing editor of Restoration Conversations magazine and livestream series, and a consultant for Calliope Arts.