Six Tuscan Poets

Vasari's Six Tuscan Poets from 1544 depicts six great Italian literary figures including Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, gathered in a fictional assembly. The painting reflects Vasari's deep engagement with Italian cultural history that would culminate in his seminal Lives of the Artists. Oil on canvas — by the sixteenth century the dominant medium for ambitious works — allowed successive glazes of transparent color and freedom to rework the composition.

The group portrait format arranges the six poets in a classicizing composition, with Vasari's Mannerist palette of refined, cool colors and the careful rendering of each poet's distinctive features.