The Italian Renaissance, the Jews, and the Arts: “Michelangelo’s Moses and the Jews: A Renaissance Legend and its Reception.”

Led by Daniel Stein Kokin (ASU)

About the lecture: In his famous biography of the artist, the sixteenth-century painter and author Giorgio Vasari reports that the Jews of Rome came en masse every Sabbath to adore this renowned sculpture. In this lecture, we ask what accounts for this striking claim and how it has been received by historians and others since (Spoiler alert: it’s probably not true). 

About the series: As the arts (visual, sculpture and theater) flourished across fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italy, how did they intersect with the Jews who inhabited the region and with Jewish themes more broadly? The series explores this question from the vantage points of language, lore and literature.