Art History Alum Returns to Truman

Ryan Gregg, who graduated from Truman in 1999 with a degree in art history, will return to campus for a public lecture and to meet with students. Since graduating from Truman, Gregg has worked at the Art Institute of Chicago, earned a master's degree from Virginia Commonwealth University, and received his Ph.D. in Italian Renaissance Art History from Johns Hopkins University. He currently teaches Art History at Webster University in St. Louis.

During his visit Gregg will meet with art history and other students as well as with the student club Art History Society. In addition, he will give a public lecture about his research, entitled “False Advertising in the Renaissance: Fabricating Military Architecture in Images of Siege Warfare,” at 6 p.m. Oct. 19 in Ophelia Parrish 2210. His presentation is free and open to the public.

Abstract for "False Advertising in the Renaissance":

It was common practice in the Renaissance to include a bird's-eye view of a city in images of warfare. Such images normally offered a recognizable portrait of the city. Occasionally, however, artists would alter or embellish a city's fortifications for propagandistic purposes. This paper, after first explaining how such city views were made, will discuss an example by the Florentine artist Giorgio Vasari of such fabrication, found in his painting in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence celebrating Europe's 1532 defense of Vienna against the Islamic Ottoman Empire—a battle that never actually occurred.