Painting • Sculpture • Architecture • Ceramic Art • Fashion • Music/Dance/Drama/Film • Literature • Culinary • Sicilian Culture • Museums

     It may be the defining standard of any culture, perhaps even what makes it a "culture." The arts take many forms - painting, sculpture, architecture, design and the performing arts - and in Sicily the earliest tangible examples date from antiquity. The Sicilians built the first Maltese temples, Europe's oldest man-made structures, around 4,000 BC (BCE), and a few of the figurines discovered on Malta are nearly as old. Then came the Phoenicians (with their Egyptian influences) and the Greeks.
    The arts, and our interpretation of them, are constantly evolving. Sicily was part of the more important Mediterranean and European movements, and in some cases (like the Sicilian Baroque and the Norman-Arab styles) actually fostered its own distinctive trends. Like its literature, the various arts and artistic movements are a reflection of a people, and here in Sicily that expression is never lacking.
    The articles and sites linked here are meant to convey something of the Sicilian arts and artistic movements known internationally, beyond Italy's borders.

• Painters
Antonello da Messina - Sicily's Renaissance master was a pioneer of oil painting. That's his Annunciation shown above.

Caravaggio in Sicily - The master spent some time in Sicily and Malta, where he left his mark.

Mario Minniti - A student of Caravaggio who continued his painterly tradition.

Francesco Lo Jacono - Romanticist painter of the late nineteenth century.

Decorated Horse Carts - A rustic tradition that has flourished over the centuries.

Heraldry - Coats of arms are a medieval tradition of architectural and genealogical relevance.

• Sculptors
Giacomo Serpotta - Serpotta used gesso (plaster) to create strikingly life-like, expressive forms.

Francesco Laurana - His work bridged the gap between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and met with greatness.

Francesco Messina - Classical sculpture that reached into the twentieth century.

• Architecture
This topic permeates dozens of pages on this site, including (for example) our pages on Monreale Abbey and Segesta. Here are a few dedicated to specific architectural subjects and movements.

Norman-Arab-Byzantine - there's only one place in the world where the distinctive architectural styles of three great civilizations came together. welcome to Sicily.

Arched Two-Light Windows - Discussion of a gothic detail very evident in Sicily.

Arched Gothic Portals - Hardly a single city in Sicily doesn't have at least one.

Sicilian Baroque - Influenced by Spanish and Italianate styles, this is the Baroque so very evident in many of Sicily's churches and palaces.

Romanesque Gothic - More Romanesque than Gothic, this style is a treasured vestige of the Middle Ages.

Art Nouveau - In Italy it is called "Liberty," and its incarnation here represents a purity of style.

Neoclassical - About this movement in Sicily.

Syracuse Cathedral - Built into (not simply "on" or "around") one of the largest ancient Greek temples, the duomo of Siracusa is the epitome of the earliest Christian architecture.

Palermo Cathedral - This singular structure probably has a greater diversity of architectural styles than any other medieval church in the world.

• Ceramic Art
Visit our page dedicated to Sicilian ceramic art, or maiolica.

• Fashion Designers
Fulco de Verdura - The resident designer at Tiffany's for many years was a trendsetter.

Domenico Dolce - The Sicilian half of Dolce & Gabbana. (This is a link to his commercial website.)

Marella Ferrera - Our profile of the creative genius of Catania.

Sicilian Style - Does it even exist for most Sicilian men?

• Music, Dance & Drama, Cinema
Aeschylus - He was Sicily's first known playwright, working circa 500 BC. His plays are still performed in Sicily's Greek amphitheatres today.

Alessandro Scarlatti - The maestro has an assured niche in baroque, classical music of the seventeenth century.

Vincenzo Bellini - This nineteenth-century composer left his mark on Italian music as no other during his era.

Eleanora Abbagnato - Sicily's prima ballerina, a fixture of the Paris Opera company.

Ballet in Sicily - Creating ballerinas in Sicily.

Luigi Pirandello - His plays set the stage for a generation or two.

Giuseppe Tornatore - The voice of Sicilian cinema today. Nuovo Cinema Paradiso is his most famous film.

Maria Grazia Cucinotta - One of Sicily's better-known actresses, formerly a fashion model.

Puppet Theatre - Marionettes (these aren't actually puppets) are part of a very old tradition evoking tales from the Middle Ages.

• Literature
We have a page dedicated to Sicilian writers of fiction, including novels, plays and poetry.