Lectures

John T. Spike in the galleries of the exhibition, Botticelli and the Search for the Divine, Muscarelle Museum of Art, Williamsburg, VA

John T. Spike has given lectures at leading universities and museums around the world. His wide range of topics include the Italian Renaissance and many great artists such as Masaccio, Fra Angelico, Botticelli, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Mattia Preti, Auguste Rodin, Fairfield Porter and David Hockney.

Selected Lectures:

SANDRO BOTTICELLI (Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Pilipepi)
Botticelli and the Search for the Divine:
Florentine Painting between the Medici and the Bonfire of the Vanities

PAUL CÉZANNE
“This is how I once dreamed of painting!” Paul Cézanne’s Homage to Mattia Preti

THE CONCEPT OF TIME IN WESTERN ART

CONTEMPORARY ART
Live and in Color: Sixties’ Painting Turns Up the Heat
Seeing Colors: Secrets of the Impressionists

FLORENCE
The Ideal City: Florence in Perspective
Florence in the Time of Leonardo

FRA ANGELICO
Secret Messages of Faith: Fra Angelico’s Frescoes at San Marco

FRANCISCO JOSÉ DE GOYA Y LUCIENTES
Goya’s Disasters of War: A Visual Suite

LEONARDO DA VINCI
Leonardo da Vinci and the Idea of Beauty
Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and their Competing Ideas of Beauty

MASACCIO
The Brancacci Code: Reading Masaccio from the Beginning

MASTER OF THE ANNUNCIATION OF THE SHEPHERDS
The Mysterious Master of the Annunciation to the Shepherds Identified

MATTIA PRETI
A Life Well Lived: Mattia Preti, Knight, Painter, and Stoic
Mattia Preti: A Brush with Passion
Caravaggio and Mattia Preti and the Cultural policies of the Order of St. John

MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI
Michelangelo and Anatomy
Michelangelo and the Price of Fame
Michelangelo: Architecture as Anatomy
Michelangelo: In the Beginning
Michelangelo: Sacred and Profane

MICHELANGELO MERISI DA CARAVAGGIO
Caravaggio’s Ambiguities
Caravaggio and Shakespeare
Caravaggio’s Eyes: Viewing Caravaggio Connoisseurship
Caravaggio’s Optical Realities
Caravaggio's Optics
Caravaggio’s Late Paintings

AUGUSTE RODIN
The Hand of Rodin

DIEGO RODRIGUEZ DE SILVA Y VELÀZQUEZ
Velàzquez and Caravaggio’s Influence on Spanish Painting