View images related to the exhibition "Art and Love in Renaissance Italy," on view at the Met through February 16, 2009: http://www.metmuseum.org/special/art_love/images.asp

Poetry and art were inextricably linked in the Renaissance, and never more so than when the subject was love. Artists were inspired by the language of Boccaccio, Petrarch, Pietro Bembo, and Pietro Aretino, and poets in turn looked to the ravishing paintings of Botticelli, Palma il Vecchio, and Titian for their imagery. In excerpts from The Language of Love in the Italian Renaissance, Metropolitan Museum Director Emeritus Philippe de Montebello and actress Isabella Rossellini read in Italian, English, and French from great love poems and dialogues on the nature of love, including Bronzinos, Della Cipolla, Louise Labés Élégiés XVII, and "The Fifth Day," the eighth story from the Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio. The event was held in The Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium at the Metropolitan Museum on Tuesday, December 9, 2008.

Works of art appearing in the video:
Antonio del Pollaiulo (Italian, Florentine, 1431-1498), Apollo and Daphne (detail), possibly 1460s. Oil (?) on panel (possibly cypress), 11 5/8 x 7 7/8 in. (29.5 x 20 cm). The National Gallery, London. Wynn Ellis Bequest, 1876 (NG928).

Learn more about Bronzino's painting, Portrait of a Young Man in the Met's collection: http://tinyurl.com/a4dfdh

Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi) (Italian, Florentine, 1444/45-1510) and workshop, Nastagio in the Pinewoods of Ravenna, 1483. Tempera on panel, 32 5/8 x 54 3/8 in. (83 x 138 cm). Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid.

Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi) (Italian, Florentine, 1444/45-1510) and workshop, Nastagio Witnesses the Punishment of Guido deglio Anastagi and His Beloved, 1483. Tempera on panel, 32 1/4 x 54 3/8 in. (82 x 138 cm). Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid.

Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi) (Italian, Florentine, 1444/45-1510) and workshop, The Banquet in the Pinewoods, 1483. Tempera on panel, 33 1/8 x 56 in. (84 x 142 cm). Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid (2840).

Find out about concerts and lectures happening at The Metropolitan Museum: http://www.metmuseum.org/tickets/

Chris Noey - producer
Aaron Griffin - cameraman
Derrick Williams - cameraman
Kate Farrell - editor (less info)