Monica Preti. Between Text and Image:Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso and its influence on arts

Monica Preti
Monica Preti is Head of Academic Programs at the Auditorium of Louvre Museum. She has published studies on the history of collecting (18th-19th centuries) and on the relationship between arts and literature in the Renaissance. Among her main publications: L’Arioste et les arts (ed., with M. Paoli), Éditions du Musée du Louvre – Officina Libraria, Paris-Milan 2011 and Delicious Decadence: The rediscovery of French 18th-century painting in the 19th century (ed.; with G. Faroult – C. Voghterr), Ashgate, London 2014.
Between Text and Image:
Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso and its influence on arts
The lecture focuses on one of the greatest romance epics of European literature, Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto, published exactly five centuries ago. It is a chivalric poem (almost 40,000 verses) exuding the exuberance, grace and intellectual curiosity of the Italian Renaissance. From the backdrop of war between Charlemagne and the Saracen army attempting to invade Europe, the poem wanders at will from Japan to the Hebrides. With its magicians and enchanted forests, fabulous fights, extravagant knights and troubling heroines, the text exerted a wide influence on later art and culture, stimulating the imagination of several generations of artists from all over Europe. Through their paintings and sculptures, the lecture will discuss the mutual influences of images and texts fuelling artistic and literary creation.