The Collector of Lives

The authors' greatest service to their subject is to reestablish him as a tireless artist and a central witness to an epic period of Italian history. -- Michael Prodger - The Sunday Times ... an insightful and gripping new book... Ms Rowland and Mr Charney draw a panoramic view of the art-world during the Renaissance, placing Vasari at the centre... This is an important book and long awaited. The authors have done a commendable job of returning to his rightful place the man who inflated the reputation of art and artists so successfully that he himself was squeezed out of the picture. -- The Economist ... absorbing... a page-turningly compelling overview of Giorgio Vasari and his age... -- Literary Review Ingrid Rowland and Noah Charney give full measure to his [Georgio Vasari's] artistic skills (and the diplomatic adroitness he needed to exercise them) and place him again at the centre of 16th-century Italian art. -- Michael Prodger, Art Books of the Year 2017 - The Sunday Times Ingrid Rowland, a prominent scholar of Renaissance art and history, and her fellow writer and historian Noah Charney, wear their erudition lightly in their gracefully written biography. -- Deborah Solomon - New York Times Book Review Readers curious about the making of Renaissance art, its cast of characters and political intrigue, will find much to relish in these pages. This is a lively, highly readable point of entry into an important and fascinating text. -- Cammy Brothers - The Wall Street Journal [Rowland and Charney's] account of Vasari's Tuscany, and of the facts (and fictions) that went into his Lives, is a fitting tribute to their subject's biographical achievements. -- The New Yorker