Center for Italian Studies
Rome Book Club: The Journey
The Truce operates on several different levels. It is a richly detailed account of an actual journey of nine months, on trains, on foot, on horsedrawn cart, across mountains,...
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Raphael’s School of Athens: The Medium and the Message – Who was Raphael? The Artist, His World, and His Painting
This week we will meet Raphael. We’ll start in his birthplace and follow his travels and growth from a young orphan to an independent master. From Urbino, to Umbria, to...
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Raphael’s School of Athens: What is Fresco Painting? Materials and Process
This week we will learn about the fresco painting process: What were the materials involved, and how did the artist prepare and paint on the wall? Follow along as a fresco copy of...
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Raphael’s School of Athens: The Medium and the Message – What Does it All Mean? The Painting and its Subject
Finally, we come to terms with the School of Athens. How was it painted, and what does it mean? How do how it was painted and what it means intersect?
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Lenten Music Through the Ages – The Notre Dame Folk Choir’s Passion Project
When we talk about the Passion, we’re first and foremost referring to the last days of Jesus’s life, from the Last Supper through his death on the cross. The story of...
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Lenten Music Through the Ages – All Together Now: Sacred Music of the Baroque
In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the tides of sacred music began to turn. Reformation ideals shaped much of the music in northern Europe, and these changes were matched...
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Lenten Music Through the Ages – From One Voice to Many: Renaissance Polyphony
During the early Renaissance, musicians started to experiment with singing different musical lines at the same time. You might even say that boredom was the catalyst for...
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Lenten Music Through the Ages – Praying With One Voice: Gregorian Chant
We’ll start our learning journey through Lenten music with Gregorian Chant — this is the earliest music of the Church. We don’t really know exactly what this music sounded...
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A Hell of a City: Dante’s Inferno on the Road to Rome – Infernal Rome (Inferno 18 & 27)
In Inferno 18, Dante and Virgil enter Malebolge (or Evil Pouches) in the eighth circle of Hell where fraud is punished. In the first pouch, the crowd of panderers and seducers...
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A Hell of a City: Dante’s Inferno on the Road to Rome – Hell’s Vineyard (Inferno 13)
Dante and Virgil are in the seventh circle of Hell where violence is punished. In the second section, those who had been violent to themselves have been transformed into trees....
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A Hell of a City: Dante’s Inferno on the Road to Rome – Paolo and Francesca: Words of Desire (Inferno 5)
Dante and his guide Virgil are in the second circle of Hell, where lust, one of the sins of incontinence, is eternally punished in the 'hellish squall.' Here, the two poets meet...
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A Hell of a City: Dante’s Inferno on the Road to Rome – From the dark wood to Rome
When Dante is lost in the dark wood of sin, the soul of the Roman poet Virgil is sent from Heaven to rescue him and guide him on his way to salvation through Hell and Purgatory....
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