ITALIAN CASTRATI & THEIR PORTRAITS with Mark Shepheard

Although their voices are lost forever, the likeness of many seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Castrati continue to attest to the fame, notoriety and public success enjoyed by the Castrato singer. They were, and still are, ambiguous figures: as an emasculated male, he was the object of vilification and derision; as a unique singer of exceptional range and power, he was the object of adulation and even desire.

Mark Shepheard, a PhD Candidate at Melbourne University, will examine a range of Castrato portraits - including those of the most famous of Castrati, Farinelli - to explore the ways in which they were represented and, more significantly, the ways in which they chose to represent themselves.