[NetBehaviour] Dante and Leonardo

Tue Mar 2 15:55:06 CET 2021

Hi Max,
regarding your point on Virgil's perspective as being that of Roman times
or Dante's, this is something that a *dantista *would be able to explain
better than I do, but my guess is that Virgil's words are used to
legitimise Dante's contemporary knowledge*. *In Dante's times ancient
wisdom, particularly that of Aristotle and the 'classics',  was necessarily
true. Indeed, the Middle Ages had many different ways of introducing new
forms of knowledge and were certainly not stuck just with reading the
classics. But any new knowledge was always framed as a re-wording of the
ancient 'wise men' - those that Dante would see chatting in the limbo,
right before the entrance to Inferno, Canto III.  Virgil is certainly
presenting Dante's knowledge at the time, but in Dante's times any form of
knowledge is reliable only to the extent that it is confirmed by ancient
philosophers and poets such as Virgil. If that makes sense.
Best,

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 at 20:52, Max Herman <maxnmherman at hotmail.com> wrote:

>
> Hi Paolo,
>
> Your points are excellent -- I was quoting there the Ciardi translation,
> which has some advantages over say the Longfellow translation, but
> absolutely he made lots of judgement calls and unhelpful interpretation.  I
> have tried to view the Italian original (shown side-by-side in a
> user-friendly format at
> https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/) especially for
> key references to the word "esperienza" or garment, but absolutely my not
> knowing the original is a huge deficiency.
>
> I find the section to be very interesting though in part because of the
> oddness you describe.  Of course it is Virgil speaking, an ancient Roman,
> so it isn't clear if he is speaking only for ancient Roman myth or somehow
> reflects what Dante believed.  Medieval thought did have a major role for
> Fortune, which kind of goes against the idea of being rewarded for virtue
> and punished for vice.  Then again, the transience of all worldly things is
> part of most traditions so it is easy to see why Fortune can be
> incorporated into the *Comedia*.  Yet to portray Fortune as a good and
> just entity, beatific even, is different from say the Carmina Burana.
>
> By checking other translations and discussing with friends I did
> understand that "worldly goods" was perhaps the best translation, sadly
> accepting that there is no clear mention of garments (and so far I haven't
> found any metaphoric use of garments or bridges in Dante).  Leonardo did
> write about Fortune in several cases, so it prompted me to wonder if his
> understanding of the idea may have had any relationship to Dante's.  Work
> in progress.  🙂
>
> All best,
>
> Max
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Paolo Ruffino <p.ruffino at gmail.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, March 1, 2021 1:10 PM
> *To:* NetBehaviour for networked distributed creativity <
> netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org>
> *Cc:* Max Herman <maxnmherman at hotmail.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [NetBehaviour] Dante and Leonardo
>
> The original text is quite different. I'm afraid a certain degree of
> freedom has been taken when translating the poem in English, perhaps
> inevitably. Fortuna administers human's luck, following God's
> inscrutable plan, moving wealth across people and places, and it's
> impossible for human beings to know the rationale behind the
> distribution, how and when it might change. Fortuna's plan is hidden
> like a snake in the grass.
>
> I think the 'gears' is translating 'permutasse a tempo li ben vani',
> meaning Fortuna is governing and distributing the mundane goods of
> Earth on behalf of God. No references to 'garments' in the text,
> though. The image evoked is that of the wheel of luck, something that
> moves around but remains inscrutable. It's interesting how human
> agency is irrelevant in Dante's vision.
>
> Colui lo cui saver tutto trascende,
> fece li cieli e diè lor chi conduce
> sì, ch’ogne parte ad ogne parte splende,
>
> distribuendo igualmente la luce.
> Similemente a li splendor mondani
> ordinò general ministra e duce
>
> che permutasse a tempo li ben vani
> di gente in gente e d’uno in altro sangue,
> oltre la difension d’i senni umani;
>
> per ch’una gente impera e l’altra langue,
> seguendo lo giudicio di costei,
> che è occulto come in erba l’angue.
>
>
>
> On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 at 17:18, Max Herman via NetBehaviour
> <netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Hi Graziano,
> >
> > This is marvelous information and greatly appreciated!  I would love to
> be able to travel to Florence or Ravenna to see the events you speak of but
> may have to participate virtually.
> >
> > I agree the original name being "Comedia" is a wonderful bit of
> background, and Dante's exile from Florence (along with the Gherardini
> family, to which some say the model for the Mona Lisa belonged).  I'm
> reading Dante and all about him as fast as I can these days, and finished
> La Vita Nuova yesterday.  To me he seems clearly the Italian Shakespeare,
> or really, since Dante was three centuries earlier perhaps it is more
> appropriate to call Shakespeare the English Dante.
> >
> > However, several close friends and colleagues have told me that focusing
> on Leonardo and Dante is a recipe for irrelevance and audience boredom,
> even suggesting that to discuss Dante verges on divisive denominationalism
> and that Leonardo is too elite and remote.  I am prone to dissent, but that
> aside I think Dante and Leonardo were both trying to open up society and
> bring more equality, freedom, etc., i.e. many of the aspects of modern
> culture we now take for granted (and sadly see under attack so often of
> late).  Rather than dismissing both as too obscure or from a separate era I
> think re-engaging with them might yield surprising results.
> >
> > I hope to learn much more about Dante as the year proceeds and will
> certainly view the link you sent.  The concept "re-behold the stars" is a
> very interesting one, especially since Dante ends each book of the Comedia
> with the word "stars."  I especially like his ending image, of his
> awareness and self "revolving" in time with the stars.  (This reflects to
> me the kind of metaphor that the neuroscience of meditation and many
> indigenous cultures propose.)  The blending of traditions, such as placing
> the river Lethe from ancient Roman mythology between Purgatorio and
> Paradiso, is another instance of cultural openness and comparison which I
> think is very significant in the Comedia.  Dante's use of the vernacular is
> of course of huge importance, and occurred some 202 years before Luther
> published his vernacular translation of the Bible.
> >
> > I wonder if to "re-behold the stars" could be a time of great cultural
> progress, hope, and renewal?
> >
> > In 2019 I was able to travel to Europe and saw a few Leonardo exhibits.
> However, I missed the one at the Louvre (because the museum was closed due
> to strike on the day we set aside to visit) and had limited time.  That
> trip prompted my interest in Leonardo and has motivated me to study more,
> and because I have been interested in Calvino since early 2018 and studied
> literature in school my interest in Leonardo has a strong literary
> perspective.  (I think this makes sense, in a way, given the sheer volume
> of his writings on almost every topic imaginable.)  I had also seen an
> exhibit at the Museo Galileo about Leonardo's library.
> >
> > Therefore it has surprised me to see that the influence of Dante on
> Leonardo is said to be minor (see citation below).  I'm very interested to
> investigate whether the opposite might be true, and if in fact the works of
> Dante were fundamental to Leonardo's thought and are referenced in much of
> his work.  This is new research for me, and speculative in some instances,
> but I do see highly plausible connections.
> >
> > And both were very interested in astronomy too!
> >
> > For example I find the following passage, where Dante compares the
> physics of light to the transience of human luck, very intriguing (from
> Virgil's description of Fortuna to Dante, Inferno VII.67-96):
> >
> >
> > That king whose perfect wisdom transcends all,
> >
> > made the heavens and posted angels on them
> >
> > to guide the eternal light that it might fall
> >
> >
> > from every sphere to every sphere the same.
> >
> > He made earth's splendors by a like decree
> >
> > and posted as their minister this high Dame,
> >
> >
> > the Lady of Permutations.  All earth's gear
> >
> > she changes from nation to nation, from house to house,
> >
> > in changeless change through every turning year.
> >
> >
> > I am interested in whether "gear" can be translated as "garment" as well
> as "goods," since clothing is often a core attribute of Fortuna (i.e. rags
> to riches).  This would align with the metaphoric significance I believe
> may attach to the bridge and garment in the Mona Lisa.  In any event, I do
> see a lot of imaginative similarity between the Mona Lisa and "the Lady of
> Permutations" as well as Beatrice.
> >
> > Last year I wrote up many of these ideas in a blog for the Leonardo
> journal, and starting in January I have begun adding a discussion of Dante
> (as well as Machiavelli).  I would be very interested to hear any thoughts
> or feedback on the ideas therein!
> >
> > All very best regards,
> >
> > Max
> > "The Mindful Mona Lisa"
> > May 14 - October 29, 2020
> > Leonardo.info/blog
> >
> https://www.leonardo.info/blog/2020/05/14/the-mindful-mona-lisa-a-bridge-garment-experience-hypothesis
> >
> > +++++
> >
> > https://www.rct.uk/collection/912581/a-woman-in-a-landscape
> >
> > Description
> >
> > A drawing of a woman standing in a landscape, with her body turned to
> the right, and her head turned to face the spectator. She wears full
> drapery, which blows out behind her in elaborate folds. Her right hand
> rests on her breast and with her left hand she points into the distance.
> Melzi's number 216.
> >
> > The most plausible explanation of this mysterious drawing is that it
> depicts Matelda, appearing to Dante in Purgatory (Cantos 28–29), the second
> book of his Divine Comedy: ‘I came upon a stream that blocked / the path of
> my advance; […] / I halted, and I set my eyes upon / the farther bank, to
> look at the abundant / variety of newly-flowered boughs; / And there […] /
> I saw a solitary woman moving, / singing, and gathering up flower on
> flower. / […] No sooner had she reached the point where that / fair river’s
> waves could barely bathe the grass, / than she gave me this gift: lifting
> her eyes. / […] / Erect, along the farther bank, she smiled, / her hands
> entwining varicoloured flowers.’
> >
> > The fluttering drapery here echoes that of Matelda in Botticelli’s
> illustration of the same scene (Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett), though the
> distinctive pose is derived from a figure in one of Mantegna’s canvases of
> the Triumph of Caesar, the Bearers of Trophies and Bullion (c.1484–92;
> Royal Collection, RCIN 403960), perhaps known to Leonardo via a print. The
> pointing gesture and direct gaze relate the drawing to Leonardo’s
> compositions of the Angel of the Annunciation (RCIN 912328) and St John the
> Baptist (Paris, Louvre), and would put us here in the position of Dante, as
> Matelda indicates her earthly paradise to us. But Leonardo had, it seems,
> little sustained interest in Dante, and most quotations from the Divine
> Comedy in his notebooks are on natural phenomena; though the background
> here is hard to read it seems rocky, and we know from the Leda that
> Leonardo would not miss an opportunity to illustrate a flowery setting (eg.
> RCIN 912424). The context and function of the drawing thus remain unknown.
> >
> > Text adapted from Leonardo da Vinci: A life in drawing, London, 2018
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: NetBehaviour <netbehaviour-bounces at lists.netbehaviour.org> on
> behalf of Graziano Milano via NetBehaviour <
> netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org>
> > Sent: Monday, March 1, 2021 9:55 AM
> > To: NetBehaviour for networked distributed creativity <
> netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org>
> > Cc: Graziano Milano <grazmaster at googlemail.com>
> > Subject: Re: [NetBehaviour] Dante and Leonardo
> >
> > Hi Max,
> >
> > The Divine Comedy was originally simply titled Comedìa and the first
> printed edition was published in 1472. The word Comedìa was later adjusted
> to the modern Italian Commedia. The adjective Divina was added by Giovanni
> Boccaccio, an Italian writer and poet (1313-1375), due to its subject
> matter and lofty style, and the first edition to name the poem Divina
> Comedìa in the title was that of the Venetian humanist Lodovico Dolce
> (1508/10-1568), a man of letters and theorist of painting, published in
> 1555 by Gabriele Gioliti de’ Ferrari (1508-1578), a 16th-century Italian
> printer active in Venice.
> >
> > Dante was born in Florence most probably around May-June 1265, although
> his date of birth is not exactly known. Dante was exiled in 1293 because he
> sided with the White Guelphs who were trying to defend the independence of
> the city of Florence by opposing the hegemonic tendencies of Pope Bonifacio
> VIII. He died in Ravenna, the night between 13th and 14th September 1321,
> where he had been invited to stay in that city in 1318 by its prince, Guido
> II da Polenta.
> >
> > He began writing The Divine Comedy (Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso), a
> long Italian narrative poem, in 1304 and completed it in 1320, a year
> before his death. The amazing artistic mosaics in the historic Ravenna’s
> churches inspired his writing of the Paradiso:
> https://www.ravennamosaici.it/en/
> >
> > Dante Alighieri is the father of the Italian language. Because of that,
> in Italy, children start reading and studying The Divine Comedy at their
> primary schools. At the age of 9 I did that and I was really impressed by
> the artistic mosaics, drawings, paintings and print artworks linked to it.
> >
> > The Divine Comedy has been a source of inspiration for countless artists
> for almost seven centuries. There are many references to Dante's work in
> literature. In music, Franz Liszt was one of many composers to write work
> based on the Divine Comedy. In sculpture, the work of Auguste Rodin
> includes themes from Dante, and many visual artists (Gustave Dore’, Philipp
> Veit, Sandro Botticelli, Antonio Manetti, Federico Zuccari, etc…)
> illustrated Dante's work.
> >
> > Rarely seen drawings, paintings and sculptures of Dante’s The Divine
> Comedy have been recently put on virtual display at the Uffizi Gallery in
> Florence as Italy has begun a year-long calendar of events to mark the
> 700th anniversary of the poet’s death:
> > https://www.uffizi.it/en/online-exhibitions-series/to-rebehold-the-stars
> >
> > All the best,
> > Graziano
> >
> >
> > On Sat, 27 Feb 2021 at 19:26, Max Herman via NetBehaviour <
> netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Hi all,
> >
> > Yesterday I found out that Dante (1265-1321) passed away five centuries
> to the year before Keats, making 2021 the 700th anniversary.
> >
> > Even though I did graduate study in English I never read Dante until
> this year.  I knew fragments of course, the general outline, some
> commentary, and even had a paperback translation of Inferno.  However it
> was only after reading Calvino's Six Memos for the Next Millennium -- a
> book that discusses the writing of both Dante and Leonardo -- in January
> 2018 that I got motivated to study Italian literature and painting more in
> depth.
> >
> > Leonardo is not generally thought to have been much influenced by Dante,
> although he is known to have been an expert on Dante's work.  As research
> for a book on the Mona Lisa I studied a very interesting drawing dated
> 1517-18, one of Leonardo's last major works before his passing in 1519,
> known as Woman Standing in a Landscape:
> >
> > https://www.rct.uk/collection/912581/a-woman-in-a-landscape
> >
> > This wonderful image seems somehow allegorical and is often compared to
> Botticelli's 1485 illustration of Matilda, Dante, and the river Lethe in
> Purgatorio XXVIII:
> >
> >
> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Sandro_Botticelli%27s_illustrations_to_the_Divine_Comedy#/media/File:Botticelli,_Purgatorio_28.jpg
> >
> > Leonardo did not title his drawing or explain anywhere in text what its
> subject might be.  Therefore as the Royal Collection Trust page above
> states, "The context and function of the drawing thus remain unknown."
> >
> > Comparing the two drawings makes clear one major difference: Leonardo's
> image includes a bridge, but Botticelli's does not.  Furthermore, in
> Leonardo's image the woman is pointing downstream, toward the bridge,
> whereas Botticelli's Matilda is pointing upward.
> >
> > Infrared scans of the Mona Lisa show that the bridge was added very
> late, as possibly the last element of the work:
> >
> >
> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Infrared_reflectograms_of_Mona_Lisa.jpg
> >
> > Why would Leonardo have added a bridge at such a late stage of the
> composition?  Nothing whatsoever is mentioned in his notebooks, and no
> Leonardo scholar has ever addressed this question.  The bridge is assumed
> almost universally by Leonardo scholars to have no meaning or function in
> the painting, either visually or thematically.  This may be an oversight of
> significant proportions.
> >
> > Therefore I'm writing another book about possible influences of Dante on
> Leonardo's writing, visual art, and overall thought.  If anyone on the list
> has good references to recommend they would be most welcome!  I know that
> the Commedia can seem terribly antique, dogmatic, patriarchal, and plain
> stodgy at times.  However I try to remember that in its day Dante's project
> was fairly radical.  It sought to integrate newly discovered art and
> literature from antiquity into medieval life, presaging the Renaissance; it
> was written in the vernacular Italian to expand access to a wider audience
> (over 200 years before Luther's 1534 translation of the Bible); Dante wrote
> it from political exile, commenting at significant personal risk on the
> politics of his day; and the work addresses many spheres of knowledge such
> as philosophy, astronomy, natural sciences, ethics, and history that at the
> time were strictly censored but are today considered modern and taken for
> granted.
> >
> > There is a good digital version with multiple translations and
> commentary online at https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/
> >
> > In general terms, I'm investigating whether the bridge in the Mona Lisa
> may symbolize a kind of evolution by Leonardo of some of Dante's ideas
> mixed with other influences and some of Leonardo's own unique perspectives
> on art and science.  In particular, the sitter may be a combination of
> Dante's Beatrice and Fortune into the principle which Leonardo personified
> as "Esperienza," meaning both experimental method in science and expressive
> action in art.  In such an interpretation the bridge and garment function
> as a structural metaphor about the flow of the history of art, science, and
> engineering (or what we might call technology) into their current form
> which is "worn" by humanity in the present day.  One can even interpret the
> left background as Inferno (with Styx or Acheron), the right background as
> Purgatorio (with Lethe), and the sitter as Paradiso (with
> Esperienza/Beatrice/Fortune "inhabiting" the higher realm).
> >
> >
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gherardini_family#/media/File:La_Gioconda.jpg
> >
> > Michelino's famous 1465 painting of Dante in Florence Cathedral could be
> a possible influence:
> >
> >
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domenico_di_Michelino#/media/File:Dante_Domenico_di_Michelino_Duomo_Florence.jpg
> >
> > Below are a few quotations from Leonardo and Dante which are of course
> not conclusive in any way but do seem to evoke parallels which further
> research might help corroborate.
> >
> > All best regards,
> >
> > Max
> >
> > +++++
> >
> >
> >
> > Leonardo: “Sound rules are the issue of sound experience — the common
> mother of all the sciences and arts."
> >
> >
> >
> > Dante: "From this instance [of confusion] if you will do your part / you
> may escape by experiment, that being / the spring that feeds the rivers of
> man's art."  (Paradiso II.94-96)
> >
> >
> >
> > The Italian "esperienza" is translated as "experiment":
> >
> >
> >
> > 94  Da questa instanza può deliberarti
> >
> > 95  esperïenza, se già mai la provi,
> >
> > 96  ch’esser suol fonte ai rivi di vostr’ arti.
> >
> >
> >
> > +++
> >
> >
> >
> > Leonardo: “Men wrongly complain of Experience; with great abuse they
> accuse her of leading them astray…. Men are unjust in complaining of
> innocent Experience, constantly accusing her of error and of false
> evidence.”
> >
> >
> >
> > Dante: "And this is she so railed at and reviled / that even her debtors
> in the joys of time / blaspheme her name.  Their oaths are bitter and wild,
> / but she in her beatitude does not hear. / … she breathes her blessedness
> and wheels her sphere."  (Inferno VII.91-96, on Fortune)
> >
> >
> >
> > +++
> >
> >
> >
> > Leonardo: "Painting is poetry which is seen and not heard, and poetry is
> a painting which is heard but not seen. These two arts, you may call them
> both either poetry or painting, have here interchanged the senses by which
> they penetrate to the intellect."
> >
> >
> >
> > Dante: "I yearned to know just how our image merges / into that circle,
> and how it there finds place; / but mine were not the wings for such a
> flight."  (Paradiso XXXIII.137-138)
> >
> >
> >
> > +++
> >
> >
> >
> > Leonardo: "If you [the poet] would say: but I describe for you the
> Inferno, or Paradise, or other delights or terrors, the painter can beat
> you at your own game, because he will put it directly in front of you."
> >
> >
> >
> > Dante: "When finally you stand before the ray / of that Sweet Lady whose
> bright eye sees all, / from her you will learn the turnings of your way."
> (Inferno X.130-132)
> >
> >
> >
> > +++
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > NetBehaviour mailing list
> > NetBehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org
> > https://lists.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > NetBehaviour mailing list
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>
>
>
> --
> Paolo Ruffino
> http://paoloruffino.com
>

-- 
Paolo Ruffino
http://paoloruffino.com
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