1511-1574. Italian art historian, architect,
and painter, author of Lives of the Most
Excellent Architects, Painters and Sculptors
1550 (enlarged and revised 1568), in which he
proposed the theory of a Renaissance of the
arts beginning with Giotto and culminating
with Michelangelo. He designed the Uffizi
Palace, Florence. Vasari was a prolific
Mannerist painter. His basic view of art
history has remained unchallenged, despite
his prejudices and his delight in often
ill-founded, libellous anecdotes.