Art History Professor Publishes New Book on Catholic Reform, Sacred Images

ATLANTA — Grace Harpster, an associate professor of art history in the Georgia State University College of the Arts, has published a new book with Cambridge University Press: “Carlo Borromeo and the Sacred Image in Sixteenth-Century Italy: A Reformer's Itinerary.”

The publication marks a significant contribution to the fields of early modern art history and Renaissance studies, offering fresh perspectives on one of the discipline's long-standing debates: How did the Catholic Reformation reshape the role of art?

Scholars have long recognized that the reforms following the Catholic Council of Trent (1545–63) represent a watershed moment in art history, yet consensus has remained elusive on whether, and how, those reforms actually influenced artistic practice. Harpster's study cuts through that ambiguity with focused, original research. By examining the social roles of sacred images in late 16th-century Italy, she argues that the pressures of Catholic reform ultimately increased the authority of the image, rather than limited it.

Central to Harpster's approach is the figure of Carlo Borromeo (1538–84), the zealous and widely traveled reformer who developed new frameworks for both policing and venerating sacred images in the wake of Trent. Through close attention to Borromeo's itinerary and the diverse corpus of images he encountered, Harpster reveals how Catholic reformers came to embrace the image as a powerful object, a truth-teller and miracle-worker, rather than a threat to doctrinal order.

"This book represents the culmination of over a decade of research and writing, and I am so excited to share it with the academic community at last," said Harpster.

The project was made possible with generous support from the GSU College of the Arts and the Villa I Tatti Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies in Florence, Italy.

Harpster specializes in the art of early modern Italy. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and most recently held the Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship at Columbia University in New York. Her work has also been generously supported by the Townsend Center for the Humanities, the Getty Scholar's Program, the Fulbright Program and the Beinecke Scholarship, among other organizations.

“Carlo Borromeo and the Sacred Image in Sixteenth-Century Italy: A Reformer's Itinerary” is available now through Cambridge University Press.