BEGIN:VCALENDAR METHOD:PUBLISH VERSION:2.0 CALSCALE:GREGORIAN PRODID:-//NONSGML WPForms//NONSGML Sugar Calendar Feeds v3.11.1//EN X-WR-CALNAME:2026 IAS/Kress Lecture in Italy\, Bologna X-WR-CALDESC:Italian Art Society X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/Chicago BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/Chicago BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0600 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 DTSTART:20260308T080000 TZNAME:CDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Rome BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 DTSTART:20260329T010000 TZNAME:CEST END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:2026 IAS/Kress Lecture in Italy\, Bologna DESCRIPTION:We warmly invite you to the 2026 IAS/Kress Lecture by Dr. Se an Roberts in Bologna!\n\n\n\nDr. Roberts is a former IAS President and currently\, Teaching Associate Professor in the School of Art at the Uni versity of Tennessee\, Knoxville. Having extensively published early mod ern Italy and the Mediterranean\, his current research looking at one of Bologna’s most important Renaissance masters Francesco Raibolini\, kn own as “Francia.” \; It is this current research in which he wil l present at the IAS/Kress Lecture.  \;\n\n\n\nWe invite you to atte nd the lecture in person with us in Bologna or on zoom. \; \;\n\ n\n\nThis year\, the IAS is also partnering with the Scuola di Specializ zazione in Beni Storico Artistici to bring the 15th annual lecture to Bo logna.\n\n\n\nThis event is free and open to the public.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n 2026 IAS/Kress Lecture – Tuesday 26 May 2026 at 4pm CEST (10 am EST) w ith aperitivo reception to follow.\n\n\n\nLocation: Dipartimento delle A rti\, Università di Bologna\, Piazzetta G. Morandi 2\, \;Bologna\n\ n\n\nIf you plan to attend in person\, please rsvp to events@italianarts ociety.org  \n\n\n\nThe zoom link to the virtual access to the lecture is as follows: https://zoom.us/j/99953725035 (Meeting ID: 999 5372 5035) \n\n\n\nSpeaker: Dr. Sean Roberts\, Teaching Associate Professor\, Schoo l of Art\, University of Tennessee\, Knoxville\n\n\n\nLecture Title: Fra ncia\, Michelangelo\, and the Problem of Metal\n\n\n\nAbstract: In his V ite Giorgio Vasari relates an encounter between his perennial hero Miche langelo and the Bolognese goldsmith and painter Francesco Raibolini\, kn own as “Francia.” Michelangelo was working on the now destroyed stat ue of his great benefactor Pope Julius II for the portal of San Patronio . Francia came to look for himself at the Florentine’s sculpture havin g “heard much of his fame and works\, but never having seen any of the m.”\n\n\n\nOn being asked what he thought\, he replied that it was a f ine casting from beautiful metal. But hearing this\, Michelangelo suppos ed that he was praising the bronze rather than the artist\, and remarked to Francia: ‘I am indebted to pope Julius\, who gave it to me\, as yo u are to the shopkeepers who supply you with your paint.’ He continued angrily\, in the hearing of all the men gathered around\, that Francia was an idiot.\n\n\n\nMichelangelo’s probably apocryphal insult follows a clear pattern for the Lives\, driven by Vasari’s sense of local Tus can pride. Francia is accused of being a provincial Bolognese rube who c ommits the cardinal sin of valuing base materials over their transformat ion through disegno\; of valuing gold over skill. The paradigm of Leon B attista Alberti’s – and later Michael Baxandall’s – conceptions of artistic evolution are thus assailed.\n\n\n\nIn fact\, over the cours e of a forty-year career\, Francia oversaw Bologna’s preeminent goldsm ith’s shop\, supervised the city’s mint\, and established himself as among the most sought-out painters of Italy. Vasari himself knew this. His own life of Francia presents a laudatory portrait that departs sharp ly from the role in which he cast the artist within the life of Michelan gelo. Despite this place in the visual and material fabric of one of the peninsula’s most vibrant cultural centers\, however\, Francia’s pos ition in both the scholarly tradition and popular conception outside of Emilia lags far behind his Roman\, Milanese\, and Florentine contemporar ies.\n\n\n\nThis lecture seeks to restore a sense of the historical cent rality of this pivotal artist and\, more importantly\, of works in metal at the start of the century. I shed light on the reasons for this nearl y five-century process of marginalization and focus on several core issu es raised by Francia’s location within changing conceptions of Renaiss ance media and their motivations. I consider the longstanding and mispla ced characterization of early sixteenth-century Bologna as peripheral to central artistic hubs\, especially Florence and Rome. I examine Francia ’s liminal status within Italian art history on account of his suppose d “foreignness.” The artist took his nickname from his teacher\, an unidentified Frenchman\, and Francia’s story may have a good deal to t ell us about the negotiation of immigrant and transnational identities w ithin the artistic communities of the Renaissance. Most importantly\, I explore the role that Francia’s reputation as a goldsmith played in th is marginalization\, situating my own inquiry within renewed attention t o materials\, reconsideration of the historical status of the applied ar ts\, and careful re-reading of Alberti\, Vasari\, and their later Bologn ese counterpoint Carlo Cesare Malvasia\n\n\n\nWe’re excited to see eve ryone in Bologna or on zoom!\n\n\n\nIf you have any questions\, please r each out to IAS Events Coordinator Rebekah Compton events@italianartsoci ety.org.\n\n\n\nExtra Zoom Details:\n\n\n\nTopic: IAS Kress Lecture in B olognaTime: May 26\, 2026 10:00 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)Join Zoom Meetinghttps://zoom.us/j/99953725035Meeting ID: 999 5372 5035---One tap mobile+13126266799\,\,99953725035# US (Chicago)+16465588656\,\,99953725 035# US (New York)\n\n\n\nJoin instructions:https://zoom.us/meetings/999 53725035/invitations?signature=DrHXGS7z_5l7grJI8hmwRoS2SZL6AAftkXHMGlu3R K4 URL;VALUE=URI:https://www.italianartsociety.org/events/15th-annual-ias-k ress-lecture/ UID:urn:uuid:bff1e803-7279-4ae1-9de4-1db8ec90aefe STATUS:CONFIRMED ORGANIZER: DTSTAMP:20260703T091405Z DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Rome:20260526T160000 DTEND;TZID=Europe/Rome:20260526T160000 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR