ABSTRACT
Plato, in the Republic, distinguished between imitative representation and cognitive process. The artist invests form with concept. Aristotle, in the Metaphysics, described the form of the work of art as pre-existing in the mind of the artist. Plotinus, in the Enneads, defi ned form as that which enters matter through intellect. The artist reproduces the principles of nature rather than its appearance. Form or eidos, in both art and nature, is produced by the ordering principles of intel-
lect, or nous. Marsilio Ficino, in Sopra lo amore, or Commentary on the Symposium of Plato, written in 1444, distinguished between bellezza, sensible beauty, and the bello, disegno interno, of which bellezza is a product. Res extensa, external form, is a realization of res cogitans, ideas. In Ficino’s Theologia Platonica, design is seen as a mirror to the intellect, reasoned through “metaphor and similitude”. This concept is developed in the transcripts of the Accademia di San Luca in Rome, Origine et progresso dell’ Academia del Disegno, written in 1604 by Romano Alberti. The distinction between bello and bellezza is developed by Pietro da Cortona in his treatise Trattato della pittura e scultura, written in 1652 with Domenico Ottonelli, using the pseudonyms Britio Prenetteri and Odomenigico Lelonotti.
