ITALY LOST – FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF THE OLD MASTERS

It is widely accepted that the poet John Milton could not have laid out his Paradise had he not gazed upon the ridges, slopes, waterways, grottos, and greenery of the Italian countryside. Indeed, early-modern Italy supplied Milton with his conception of an Earthly Paradise. A century later, the Vedutisti captured the views upon which Milton gazed. These artists not only recorded the beauty of landscapes now so changed by wars and perceived progress, but also simple, quotidien Italian life, likewise threatened by extinction.