ABSTRACT

“I know,” wrote Vasari in the Preface to the Lives, “that our art consists primarily in the imitation of nature but then, since it cannot by itself reach so high, in the imitation of the things made by those whom one judges to be greater masters.” 1 This passage alerts the reader to the importance of imitation as an overarching theme in the Lives: the modes of imitating nature itself (which, as Vasari repeatedly emphasizes, is the way art in the Renaissance was resurrected), the imitation of other artists, and the role played by discretion and judgment in selecting those masters one should imitate. Already present in the first edition of the Lives in 1550, ideas surrounding imitation became more sharply accentuated in the 1568 edition, as Vasari responded to contemporary theoretical debates among literary figures about the role of imitation in developing good style in written Latin, and in the Italian vernacular.