The Italian Visual Arts hail from ancient times, as Italy was a centre of art and architecture in Ancient Rome. Italian artists flourished in the Gothic, Medieval and Italian Renaissance periods. Later, styles in Italy were represented by Baroque, Mannerism and Rococo. Futurism emerged in Italy in the 20th Century, as Florence became a significant cultural centre, especially for museums of art.

From the Byzantine mosaics in the churches of Ravenna to the Roman amphitheatres in many Italian cities and the Greek temples of Sicily, many forms of Italian art have passed from the Roman Empire to the present day. Italy was home to the painters Donatello, Titian, Tintoretto and Giorgione. The 14th-century painter Giotto, who trained in the School of Cimabue, painted the frescoes which cover the Upper Basilica of St Francis in Assisi and the Bell Tower in Florence. In the 15th and 16th Centuries, princes commissioned sculptors, painters and architects to beautify their towns and residences, a practice which was imitated by the Papal State, where Raphael and Michelangelo worked in the first half of the 16th Century. Michelangelo is best known as a sculptor, architect and painter of the Sistine Chapel. Renaissance painting borrowed its themes from classical mythology. Gian Lorenzo Bernini was one of the greatest 17th-century artists of the Baroque style, known as a painter, stage designer and comedy writer, but most of all, as an architect whose works included the piazza, the colonnades of St Peter’s and several Roman palaces. Italian art produced many original and diverse painters of the Futurist School, such as Carra, Boccionim Balla, Renato Guttuso, Giorgio De Chirico and Alberto Burri.

Italy is also one of the fashion centres of the world. It is said that Italian fashion began in 1951, when Count Giorgini held a fashion show for an international audience in Florence. Italian fashion and designers, such as Versace, Dolce & Gabana and Prada, are fundamentally different from that of Paris, London and New York. Italians generally understand fashion as an instrument of social deliverance, whereby class is defined according to what one wears.