Michael Hirst (1) (1933–2017)

David Michael Ge­of­frey Hirst, FBA (5 Sep­tem­ber 1933 – 14 De­cem­ber 2017), com­monly known as Michael Hirst, was an art his­to­rian and an ex­pert on Ital­ian Re­nais­sance art. He was Pro­fes­sor of the His­tory of Art at the Cour­tauld In­sti­tute of Art from 1991 to 1997.

David Michael Ge­of­frey Hirst was born on 5 Sep­tem­ber 1933 and stud­ied at New Col­lege, Ox­ford, and the Cour­tauld In­sti­tute of Art. Lec­turer, Reader and Pro­fes­sor of Cour­tauld In­sti­tute of Art, Uni­ver­sity of Lon­don, and a Fel­low of the Acad­emy since 1983, Hirst has been one of the fore­most spe­cial­ists on the draw­ings of Michelangelo. In­deed, such was his in­ter­na­tional stand­ing in the world of Michelan­gelo stud­ies that he was made a mem­ber of the Pon­tif­i­cal Com­mis­sion for the Restora­tion of the Sistine Chapel's ceil­ing in 1987, and the fol­low­ing year cu­rated an ex­hi­bi­tion on Michelan­gelo as Drafts­man for the National Gallery of Art in Wash­ing­ton.

He has made a sig­nal con­tri­bu­tion to knowl­edge and un­der­stand­ing of sixteenth-century Ital­ian art, de­vot­ing most of his schol­arly pub­li­ca­tions to the life and works of Michelan­gelo. His stud­ies of the Flo­ren­tine mas­ter have shaped a gen­er­a­tion of art his­to­ri­ans and con­sti­tute a point of ref­er­ence for Re­nais­sance art his­tory in gen­eral. His book on Michelangelo's draw­ings is widely con­sid­ered to be the most per­cep­tive study on the sub­ject thus far. Hirst's mono­graph on Se­bas­tiano del Pi­ombo is also fun­da­men­tal in the field. Be­yond Michelan­gelo, he pub­lished im­por­tant ar­ti­cles and es­says on artists such as Francesco Salviati, Perin del Vaga and Parmi­gian­ino.

He was an Ac­ca­d­e­mico d'Onore, or hon­orary mem­ber, of the Ac­cad­e­mia delle Arti del Dis­egno of Flo­rence.