NOTE: Ticket link to lecture coming soon.
The 2026 Annual Barbara A. Hanawalt Public Lecture will feature Dr. Peter Weller (University of California, Los Angeles). He will speak on Renaissance narrative art's relationship to modern film, covering the works of Giotto, Caravaggio, and Storaro. After acting as the original "RoboCop" in the famous 1987 film, Dr. Weller went on to earn his Ph.D. in art history from UCLA.
The following day, Dr. Weller will host a film screening of Ivans Xtc and a Q+A at Studio 35 Cinema and Draftouse in Columbus. Ticket information for this film screening is coming soon.
Abstract
In my novice days of art appreciation, while judging Kyoto’s International Film Festival, I asked Vittorio Storaro — Oscar winning cinematographer for Apocalypse Now, Reds, and the Last Emperor — whom he favored as a painter. Storaro inquired if I had ever been to Padua. I had not. “So, you have not seen modern history’s narrative genesis of film, Giotto’s frescoes of Mary and Jesus in the Capella Scrovegni.” I had not. Whereupon Storaro whiffed, “Well, Peter, we cannot talk about art. Any discussion of Rembrandt or Max Ernst, ignorant of Giotto’s space, time, emotion or composition would be pointless.” Indeed. As the crux of visual history is social evolution, so my talk here, to substantiate Storaro, will walk you through the Renaissance to modern film, disputing academic concept that any western school, period or movement of visual art can be studied exclusive of the Renaissance. For without the genius of Giotto through Caravaggio and beyond, we can only assess contemporary art and film, be it Matisse, Rothko, Pollack, Coppola, Kubrick or Spielberg in modern myopia.
About Dr. Peter Weller
Dr. Peter Weller is an Italian Renaissance art historian, actor and director. He received his Ph.D. from UCLA in the History of Art with a specialization in Italian Renaissance Art. He is the author of “Donatello’s Bronze David in the Twenty-First Century,” 2012, an article on the Italian Renaissance sculptor Donatello, as well as an essay contribution on the Italian Renaissance painter Antonello da Messina (in Visualizing Sensuous Suffering and Affective Pain in Early Modern Europe and the Spanish Americas, Brill, 2018). He is also known as the star of the films RoboCop (1987) and RoboCop 2 (1990), The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai (1984) and Naked Lunch (1991). His more recent appearances (roles and guest roles) include Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), the TV series Dexter (2010), and 24 (2006). Dr. Weller also directed numerous episodes of Sons of Anarchy (2011-2014), Longmire (2012-2017), and, most recently, Hawaii Five-O (2013-2019).
Dr. Weller recently published Leon Battista Alberti in Exile: Tracing the Path to the First Modern Book on Painting. In this volume, Peter Weller challenges the popular notion that De pictura's compendium on lines, points, mathematics, composition, narrative and portraiture is primarily the result of Alberti's return to Florence and his short exposure to its visual art. Weller argues that Rome, Padua, Bologna and northern Europe – environs where Alberti studied, worked and lived during exile – empowered his paramount intellectual-artistic gift. Scrutiny of Alberti's evolution before Florence illuminates how this original Renaissance man merged the two most conspicuous cultural developments of early modern Italy – visual art and humanism — to create De pictura, our first modern book on painting.
A link for free tickets to this lecture is coming soon. Join our mailing list for future notifications.
This event is free and open to the public. Admission to the CMA is free on Thursday evenings. Co-hosted by the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and the Humanities Institute.
Parking and Directions
The Columbus Museum of Art is located at 480 E Broad St Columbus, OH 43215. You can park in the museum’s adjacent lot for $7, or find street parking on Washington alongside the museum. There is a free CMA lot on the corner of Washington and Long Street. CMA members enjoy free parking. Visitors to the Museum Store and Schokko Café can receive $5 parking: just bring your receipt to the Welcome Desk for validation.
For public transportation, take the COTA #10 bus, which stops directly in front of the museum.
The Humanities Institute and its related centers host a wide range of events, from intense discussions of works in progress to cutting-edge presentations from world-renowned scholars, artists, activists and everything in between.
We value in-person engagement at our events as we strive to amplify the energy in the room. To submit an accommodation request, please send your request to Cody Childs: childs.97@osu.edu.