Journal articles on the topic 'Venetian Artists'

Political choices and historical imperatives dictated a rapprochement of the Eastern and Western Churches in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Venetian state, attracted by the superiority of Byzantine culture, always coveted a seat among its beneficiaries, while renowned Byzantine exiles sought Venetian assistance against the Ottomans. The Orthodox artworks they brought with them, gave the artists of Renaissance Venice the opportunity to commune with the art of Constantinople, creating new cultural contributions. In the first decades of the sixteenth century, the political and religious alliances of Ohrid and the West were associated with a Venetian-inspired artistic revival in painting on the territory of the Archbishop of Ohrid.

The role held by Job in fifteenth-century Venetian culture will be evaluated through the study of three High Renaissance paintings. The master artists Giovanni Bellini and Vittore Carpaccio each painted Job in a unique, visual manner. The analysis of the formal compositional characteristics, the iconographic elements and the historical context of the San Giobbe altarpiece and the Sacred Allegory by Giovanni Bellini and the Meditation on the Passion by Vittore Carpaccio compose a visual alternative for understanding Job. The issues of patronage, compositional artistic sources, and contemporary theological sources will be identified. Their direct relevance to these paintings contributes to the full understanding of how and why some of the artist's decisions were made for each commission. The specific Joban iconography is presented and interpreted as it relates to these three works of art. Bellini and Carpaccio are contemporaries who live, worship, and compete for work in the same city. They interpret the role that Job plays for the contemporary viewer/worshipper in different ways. The question of Job as an intercessor or prophet becomes essential in ascertaining their significance then and now to both the student of art and religion.

This essay investigates Benedetto Caliari's Nativity of the Virgin (1576) with its provocative and unorthodox depiction of a bare-breasted wet-nurse in the context of both Protestant and Catholic criticism of “indecent” religious imagery. Reformers on both sides drew a connection between the Virgin Mary's ostentatious display of her lactating breasts and her presumed, derided, or hoped-for miracle-working capacities or intercessory powers. In post-Tridentine Venice, several artists, including Tintoretto and Veronese, all of whom were connected to the Scuola de’ Mercanti that commissioned Caliari's painting, employed religious breastfeeding imagery in a wide array of iconographies in order to express dissent with the Counter-Reformation church's emphasis on orthodoxy. In contrast to writers, artists were able to claim a certain degree of nonconformity and freedom from prosecution. In light of Mikhail Bakhtin's concept of heteroglossia, it is argued that religious lactation imagery after Trent produced irony, parody, doubt, and dissent.

The subject of the article is a review of images of Venice recorded in Polish poetry between the years 1829–1870. The paper deliberately stops in the 1870s in the selection of the literary material to be analysed, focusing on the Romantic and post-Romantic tradition. Due to the different artistic value of the works, the author adopted the formula of a historical and literary “catalogue” ordered chronologically and partly problematicised according to the functions which Venetian scenery or culture perform in them. Attention is drawn to the fact that Venetian motifs present in the poetry of Polish artists tend to be related to particular phenomena and topics, such as Byronism, Gothicism, political and national camouflage, love and existential masks, conflict between people and power. The authors referred to in the paper include, among others, Adam Mickiewicz, Józef Ignacy Kraszewski, Zygmunt Krasiński, Edward Dembowski, Edmund Chojecki, Karol Baliński, Mieczysław Gwalbert Pawlikowski, Teofil Lenartowicz, Feliks Wicherski, Teofil Nowosielski, Aleksander Michaux and Wiktor Gomulicki.

I in the Mid-Sixteenth Century Venetian writers, artists, scholars, and musicians came increasingly to play out their cultural ideals within informal academies. These academies made no bylaws or statutes, nor did they keep the sorts of membership lists, minutes, and systematic records that were to become commonplace by the end of the century. In essence they were regular gatherings, chiefly in private homes, for discussion, debate, and performance. The diffuse demography of the republican city-state made it well-suited to the dynamic processes of artistic and intellectual interchange that such gatherings provided.

The medieval fortifications of Zadar were developed and enriched during the centuries as a consequence of changes in the entire defensive system of the town but also due to the political circumstances. Two main forts stood on opposite parts of the town, one facing away from the sea, next to the entrance from the moat (Foša) in the south corner, and the other at the entrance to the harbour in the north corner of the town. The information about the original fort next to the harbour entrance, which defended the chain barring enemy ships from entering the harbour, is scarce. However, after the famous Venetian siege and fall of Zadar in 1346, this fort was completely rebuilt and even given a new role. In 1437, the Venetian government decided to pierce the town walls and excavate a moat around the fortification, which would be filled with sea water, in order to create an open space around the fortification facing the town for defensive reasons. In other words, the nearby houses were torn down. In such a way the fortification, rather than being a fort which protects the town from external attacks, became a fort in which the Venetian crew could, in case of a new rebellion, fight off the attacks from the town itself, receive supplies from the sea, and enable its fleet to enter the town harbour. In this way the Venetian fortification at Zadar became a variant of sorts of ancient citadels which represented the last line of defence in the cases when the enemies reach the town itself, and, at the same time, served as a stronghold of the ruling governments against the town. The relief of the winged lion, symbol of the Venetian Republic, incorporated in the façade of the ‘Little Armory’, is one of the best reliefs of that type at Zadar, and it can be dated to mid-fifteenth century and brought into connection with a group of artists from the circle of Juraj Dalmatinac.

The Venetian printmaker Giacomo Franco produced several engravings for the 1597 coronation of Morosina Morosini, the wife of doge Marin Grimani (1595-1605). Focusing on three of these prints in which a bird's-eye view of the city is framed with illustrations of the festivities, this essay explores relations between space, gender, allegory and costume as they were manifested in this rare female procession. An examination of the pictorial conventions used by Franco and other artists to depict the event suggests that Morosina's coronation functioned both to resist existing codes of gender but also to reassert female patrician status.

Although little information survives on Antonio Sartorio's formative years, his date of birth can be placed at c. 1630 on the basis of the act of his death, which states that he died on 30 December 1680 at the age of ‘about 50‘. In all probability Sartorio came from a family of artists-craftsmen as the composer Gasparo Sartorio (1625/6–80), and the theatre architect and opera set-designer Girolamo (Hieronymo, Geronimo) Sartorio (d. 1716) were his brothers.

Senior representatives of the Venetian Republic inspired distinguished noblemen and rich citizens in Venice, as well as in Terraferma and Stato da Mar, to perpetuate their memory through lavish commemorative monuments that were erected in churches and convents. Their endeavour for self-promotion and their wish to monopolise glory could be detected in the choice of material for the busts that adorned almost every monument: marble. The most elaborate monument of this kind belongs to the Brutti family, erected in 1695 in Koper Cathedral. In 1688 the Town of Labin ordered a marble bust of local hero Antonio Bollani and placed it on the facade of the parish church. Fine examples of family glorification could be found in the capital of Venetian Dalmatia – Zadar. In the Church of Saint Chrysogonus, there is a monument to the provveditore Marino Zorzi, adorned with a marble portrait bust. Rather similar is the monument to condottiere Simeone Fanfogna in Zadar’s Benedictine Church of Saint Mary and the monument to the military engineer Francesco Rossini in Saint Simeon. All these monuments embellished with portrait busts have a common purpose: to ensure the everlasting memory of important individuals. This paper analyses comparative examples, models, artists, as well as the desires of clients or authorities that were able to invest money in self or family promotion, thus creating the identity of success.

It seems inherent in the nature of contemporary artist’s book production to continue to question the context for the genre in contemporary art practice, notwithstanding the medium’s potential for dissemination via mass production and an unquestionable advantage of portability for distribution. Artists, curators and editors operating in this sector look to create contexts for books in a variety of imaginative ways, through exhibition, commission, installations, performance and, of course as documentation. Broadening the discussion of the idea of the book within contemporary art practice, this paper examines the presence and role of book works within the context of the art biennale, in particular the Venice Art Biennale of which the 58th iteration (2019) is entitled ‘May You Live In Interesting Times’ and curated by Ralph Rugoff, with an overview of the independent International cultural offerings and the function of the ‘Book Pavilion’. Venetian museums and institutions continue to present vibrant diverse works within the arena of large-scale exhibitions, recognising the position that the book occupies in the history of the city. This year, the appearance for the first time, of ‘Book Biennale’, opens up a new and interesting dialogue, taking the measure of how the book is being promoted and its particular function for visual communication within the arts in Venice and beyond.

The contribution of Italian art, especially Venetian, was decisive to the secularisation of art in the Ionian Islands and the shaping of the so-called Ionian School, in the context of a broader Western influence affecting all aspects of life and culture, especially on the islands of Zakynthos and Corfu. Italian influences, mainly of Renaissance, Mannerism and Baroque art, can be identified both on the iconographic and the stylistic level of artworks, with theoretical support. This article explores facets of the dialogue of secular painting in the Ionian with Italian art in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, focussing on works and artists that highlight significant aspects of this multilayered phenomenon and also through secondary channels that expand the horizon of analysis. Procession paintings, with their various connotations, and portraiture, which flourished in secular Ionian art, offer the most interesting material as regards the selection, reception and management of Italian models and points of reference.

The statue of Madonna and Child in Ližnjan’s church “Na Muntu” has hitherto not been analysed in detail in scholarly literature, largely owing to its later polychrome additions, which completely obscure its original appearance. Nevertheless, based on comparison with the oeuvre of Paolo Campsa, a leading Venetian woodcarver, and his brother-in-law Giovanni da Malines, the statue has now been attributed to these two artists. Parallels in the concept of the figure, the system of draping, and various details have been identified in the Madonna of Buje, as well as triptychs in Baška and Monopoli. It also shows considerable similarities with sculptures produced in Campsa’s workshop before the death of Giovanni da Malines, which indicates that it was made in the last decade of the 15th century. A very similar example is the Madonna of Bale (“Our Lady of Monperin”), probably made under its influence, but the somewhat lower quality of sculpting indicates that it may be attributed to a follower of Campsa, perhaps a local Istrian master.

Robert Browning's music poem “A Toccata of Galuppi's” is built on a system of telescoping viewpoints that might best be diagrammed as concentric circles with Galuppi's music at the core. The speaker of this monologue, a type of smug nineteenth-century Englishman with a deep interest in science, uses the occasion of Galuppi's clavichord touch-piece to muse on possible reactions of the composer's eighteenth-century Venetian audience. As he does so, the speaker becomes something of an artist or creator himself, using his own imagination to recreate an evening at an eighteenth-century Venetian ball; but the speaker also is a critic, himself responding to and interpreting not only Galuppi's music but also the Venetians in their imagined responses to the music. In this best of all Browning's music poems, he has given us something of an analogue of his own method as artist and moralist, as well as an ironic understanding of the efficacy of art and its ongoing treatment by critical audiences.

The sculptor Matteo de’ Pasti left Rimini in 1461 bound for Ottoman Sultan Mehmed ii’s court at Constantinople with gifts from Sigismondo Malatesta. When his ship stopped in Crete, Matteo was detained by the island’s Venetian authorities on charges of espionage. Contemporaries report that he carried with him a map, now lost, but assumed to be a strategically valuable one of the Adriatic. Discussions of Matteo’s mission claim that it attempted to supply the sultan with essential intelligence for an invasion of Italy. Yet, this spy story finds little confirmation in historical sources. Indeed, our knowledge of the map’s very existence derives from the reports of Sigismondo’s enemies. I examine this prominent embassy as a means to reconsider attitudes toward the utility of maps in the scholarly imagination and the role of art and artists in early modern diplomacy. Revisiting documentary evidence and the claims scholars have grounded therein, I explore how we have told the tale of this journey in ways that conform to our own shifting expectations, sometimes at the expense of fidelity to the sources at hand. Overwhelming focus on the absent map has obscured both Matteo’s role as envoy and the distinctive place of evidently skillful and delightful visual culture in this attempted exchange.

There are many models in the entire history of architecture which have travelled across the world, from one to another part of the big world. For various reasons, very frequently not at all scientific or professional, in our part of the world, be it Serbian or Yugoslav, or south Slav, some like to remain silent, when it comes to the transition of a Byzantine model, which by nature is rooted in the Orthodox Christian faith at the south east of Europe and the outmost west of Asia, to their areas, pervaded to a great extent by the Roman Catholic Christian belief, or Islam. There are numerous evidences of the transition of a model, one of many which found their new home on the west-European soil after the fall of Byzantium, mostly after the Crusades, when looters, but also scientists and artists in Italy, came by new wealth, and new knowledge, in the capital of the fallen Empire, observing its magnificent edifices, and taking its parts to their boats and shipping them to Venice and other cities in Italy and placing them on their buildings and squares, as they have done with the columns of the Augusteion of Constantinople, the square dedicated to Justinian's mother Augusta, which now decorate the square near the famous Venetian church of Saint Marco. Some other, also numerous accounts, explain how the Ottoman Turkish architecture in almost the same way, adopted its mosque construction model at the same place, in the same manner, retaining the actual structures but changing the religious insignia, or by copying this Byzantine model in building the new mosques.

The illuminated Book of Hours dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary which was originally held in the former Paravia Library is today located at the Research Library in Zadar. Unfortunately, no information exists about this manuscript. It is bound between covers made of wood veneer and sheathed with black leather. It consists of 156 folios which contain the Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the book of hours dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the book of hours dedicated to the Holy Spirit, Holy Cross, a portion of the office for the dead, seven funerary psalms and various prayers for specific occasions. The text is written in a single column on folios made of vellum (8 x 11.4 cm). It is written in literary Latin, in the Italian-style Gothic script. The text is written in black ink which dominates the manuscript while the rubrics are in red. The text begins with a calendar of which only January, February, November and December remain. The painted decorations feature in the initials and in the margins; there are no stand-alone illustrations filling an entire text-free page. The manuscript has three types of illuminated initials: litterae historiate, litterae dominicalis and litterae ferialis. Of those, there are six litterae historiatae, the subjects of which follow the aforementioned offices contained in the text. Each decorated littera historiata is located within the text, which is framed by a wide border filled with a decorative rinceaux-type band, the main element of which is ivy enhanced with interwoven flower motifs. The Litterae dominicales were rendered so as to form stylized floral shapes and elements dominated by an intense blue, red, green and yellow colour. Initials which resemble stylized flowers are framed on both sides by an L-shaped vegetal scroll which is most commonly composed of multi-coloured blue and red flowers, leaves, and gold and black “fruits”, that is, the motif of a sun disc with rays. The Litterae ferialis were depicted in two ways, either in red and blue or in gold and blue. If the letter is blue, the decoration and the dense graphic ornament are in a contrasting colour such as red, and vice versa, the latter sometime accentuated with tiny gilt details. Each initial is accompanied by a littera arabescata with a small undulating graphic ornament descending from the litterae ferialis along the text. The Book of Hours contains only four Litterae dominicales (fols 15v, 28r, 31r and 38v). Most pages feature a littera dominicalis and a littera ferialis. Litterae arabescatae, which descend from the ornamental bases of the litterae ferialis, consist of three spiral scrolls with a necklace-like sequence of motifs such as birds, flowers, and peculiar huts with volute-like ornaments which resemble pagodas, and these are then interspersed with other, much smaller motifs, for example crosses, flowers and beads. Decorative margins found on the pages with the illuminated litterae historiatae display features of a sporadic Mannerist influence in the newly established refinement of the classical Renaissance, but also a solidity which is in contrast to the lush late Gothic drôleries which had dominated before. For example, on in the decorative margin on folio 59v there is a masked head. With regard to the painted initials inside the litterae historiatae, certain details, such as the rendering of volume with emphasized black outlines, the positioning of the bodies and similar designs, demonstrate compatibility with a number of contemporaneous examples of manuscript illumination which have been preserved in Croatia. In the first place are the illuminated manuscripts from the Treasury of Split Cathedral such as the image of king David in the initial B in the fifteenth-century Psalterium Romanum (ms 633, fol. 5, Cathedral Treasury, Split). Compared to the Renaissance manuscript illuminations at Zadar, it can be noted that the figural illuminations, the litterae historiate, in this Book of Hours are stylistically closest to the Missal of Abbot Deodato Venier. In her article Manoscritti miniati di area veneta e padana nelle biblioteche della Croazia: alcuni esempi dal XIII. al XVI. secolo, F. Toniolo linked the marginal decoration of the Zadar Book of Hours to the type used by the Venetian miniaturist Benedetto Bordone, to whom Susy Marcon too attributed the Zadar codex. However, F. Toniolo pointed out that she was not convinced that this miniaturist decorated it himself, stating that it is more likely that it was the work of a different illuminator from his workshop. She then compared the Zadar Book of Hours with a work of a miniaturist who has been named The Second Master of the Grifo Canzoniere (Il Secondo Maestro del Canzoniere Grifo) after a collection of poems composed by the court poet Antonio Grifo, in which he decorated several pages. She compared the Zadar Book of Hours with fol. 233 of the Grifo Canzoniere, which depicts the Triumph of Anteros and Venus Genetrix surrounded by a marginal decoration similar to the one at Zadar. The miniaturist who illuminated the Zadar Book of Hours must have interacted with or worked within the circle of artists whose works Toniolo identifies as the comparative material for the Zadar illuminations, which can be immediately observed at first sight. For example, the marginal decoration is typically Venetian, and similar to the type used by Julije Klović (Giulio Clovio), Girolamo da Cremona, Benedetto Bordone and other minaturists who worked in this circle. However, if one compares figural illuminations, only a number of differences can also be noted. Although the proposed definition of this circle of manuscript illuminators is highly likely, in my opinion, the issue of the miniaturist responsible for the Zadar codex remains open to debate. Since there is no information about the manuscript, and given that this is an easily portable object, it is difficult to say whether it was produced locally or brought to Zadar. Based on the stylistic and comparative analysis presented in this article, I suggest that this Book of Hours may have originated in the manuscript illumination circles of Ferrara or even Lombardy, and I argue that the workshop in question demonstrates either the strong influence of the Venetian school or the fact that some of its minaturists maintained connections with the Venetian lagoons.

The works of the sixteenth-century Venetian painter Jacopo Tintoretto (1518–94) present us with a radicalised idea of the cosmos that challenges both the humanist centring of the world on man and the hierarchy of divine authority that dominate the artistic traditions to which he is heir. In their place, Tintoretto confronts us with a ‘machinic’ staging of forces in which man, nature, religious figure and artificial element are integrated within an extended material plane. With this pictorial immanence, Tintoretto presents a ‘cosmic materialism’ unprecedented in Venetian painting. In this, his work gives provocative expression to Deleuze and Guattari's ontology of the artwork as ‘cosmic’ construction, and to their conception of the artist as ‘cosmic artisan’. Via readings of the art historical reception of Tintoretto's work by the art historian Arnold Hauser (1892–1978), and the artistic reception of Tintoretto's work by Paul Cézanne, I explore this expression, and attend to questions of modernity, temporality and art history as they are inflected in Deleuze and Guattari's thought.

AbstractA number of longstanding questions have surrounded the early life of the fifteenth-century Venetian artist Giovanni Bellini (d. 1516), generally believed to have been the son of Jacopo Bellini (ca. 1400–70/71) and the younger brother of Gentile Bellini (1429/35–1507). The artist’s year of birth and the legitimacy of his birth have been the subjects of debate for well over a century. By reevaluating Bellini-related legal documents under the relevant fifteenth-century Venetian civil laws, this article makes a case that Giovanni Bellini was not Jacopo Bellini’s son, but rather his half-brother, and that they were both sons of Nicolò Bellini; that Giovanni was therefore Gentile Bellini’s uncle rather than his brother; and that he was born legitimate between the late summer of 1424 and 13 September 1428, several years earlier than the birth year of ca. 1435 (or later) favored by many contemporary Bellini specialists. The ramifications of situating Bellini’s birth year in the mid- to late 1420s are then considered.

AbstractThe information we have about Jan van Scorel's presence, work and contacts in Venice around 1520-21 comes from Karel van Mander and a number of paintings, some of them dated. Of the van Scorel paintings in Venetian collections mentioned by Marcantonio Michiel, this article places the recently found Crossing of the Red Sea chronologically in the artist's 'Venetian' oeuvre. The painting is reminiscent of the triptych in Obervellach, dated 15 19. In terms of technique, colouring and figuration it is less dependent on Venetian painting than Tobias and the Angel in Düsseldorf, dated 1521. With regard to a number of compositional and iconographical elements, on the other hand, Scorel's Crossing seems to draw on Titian's large woodcut of the same subject. The Amsterdam painter Lambert Sustris went to Venice about fifteen years after van Scorel. In the 1540s he settled in Padua. Sustris is chiefly known for his portraits and for his landscapes with religious and mythological themes, some of which are of outstanding quality. They unite the northern and Venetian, notably Titian, traditions in a suggestive manner, often featuring antiquary and Raphaclesque elements. In this article new arguments are presented in favour of Peltzer's assumption that Sustris was a pupil of van Scorel's, probably around 1530. In that connection the Sermon of John the Baptist (Utrecht, Centraal Museum), formerly regarded as van Scorel's work and bearing a signature commencing with the letter L and otherwise illegible, is attributed here to Sustris. Sustris may also have designed two frieze-like prints with hunting representations, which exhibit Scorelian traits in the landscape and elsewhere. The powerful influences of classical art and Raphael on the figures and composition apparently stem from Sustris' sojourn in Rome. In view of the fact that these prints are clearly devoid of the 'venetianized' style on which Sustris embarked shortly before 1540, the artist's designs probably predate his move to the Venetian Republic.

Article is devoted to a research of a role and the place of art installation in the modern world. At the same time the retrospective analysis of a role of art installation in the past and comparative characteristic with the present is carried out. The Ukrainian context of development of art installation is also revealed. At the same time it is found out that installation is not only an important component of modern art, but also an integral part of historical discourse. Due to its visual functions, the installation actively influences the viewer. For the most part, installations are not just an object in space, it is what is the very space - how much the installation work has the ability to fill the space, integrate into it organically and holistically. At the same time, the main factor in the creation and existence of an installation in the exhibition space, as well as in other relevant arts, is its relationship with the viewer. In this study, the socio-cultural aspect of the installation is important, understanding of the significance of this form of contemporary artistic practices for a common worldview system. Such problems as the assimilation of new experience from the point of view of global processes, on the one hand, and the preservation of the national cultural identity in contemporary art, on the other – actualize the pattern of the process of perception of a new culture. In article it is found out that graphic schools are based on existence of certain art and educational institutions where graphic artists who carry out the teaching activity and own creativity a high mission of formation of new generation of masters create. Not less important factor is acceptance of experience of teachers and its further development in creativity of pupils and followers. Art of installation is an integral part of the modern fine arts of Ukraine. Emergence and development of this art form in the national cultural environment became possible under conditions of intensive creative activity of artists which reached the high level of mastery in connection with deeply philosophical judgment of problems of the present. At the end of XX – the beginning of ХХІ century, looking for new ways of development, the Ukrainian artists addressed installation which as it is possible better answered esthetic inquiries of an era and became a symbol of spiritual updating of the personality. Installation turns into a key factor of development of different spheres of culture, thereby playing a noticeable role in development of national culture. Installation in the modern art helps to be focused and inform of the idea and understanding of global problems to adherents of different genres of art, the audience of different age categories and social groups. Since declaration of independence development of the independent state and formation of own cultural policy aimed at providing free development of national culture and preservation of cultural inheritance begins. The state forms the legislative base which can provide cultural development and an open entry of all citizens to its achievements. In 1992 the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine accepts "Principles of the legislation of Ukraine about culture" where the basic principles of public policy in the sphere of culture directed to revival and development of the Ukrainian national culture, ensuring freedom of creativity, free development of cultural and art processes, realization of the rights of citizens to access to cultural values, creation of material and financial conditions of cultural development were declared. It is found out that installation is an art equipment which uses the three-dimensional objects intended for change of perception of space by the person. The term "installation" in English appeared long ago – in the XV century. It means process of construction, collecting, drawing up something (now use it also for establishment definition, for example, of the software). With the advent of different technologies – videos, and later and the computer – arose also different types of installations which now peacefully coexist with other arts, for example, painting or a sculpture, without being inferior to them. Hardly somebody will be able to designate exact date of emergence of installations and their judgment as art form. Now installation represents the certain room according to the decision of the author transformed to art space. It is filled with a number of objects to which the symbolical value is often provided. Harmonious connection of things, their arrangement indoors is also art. Installations can be the constant objects exposed in the museums or be created temporarily in public and private spaces. The space of installation can include different types of the things and images circulating in our civilization: pictures, drawings, photos, texts, video, movies, tape recordings, virtual reality, Internet, etc. Installations are regularly presented at the international exhibitions of the modern art, such as Venetian the biennial. The most prestigious art museums and art galleries of the world give to installation art the best platforms from time to time. At the same time, the research of this form of art lags behind the progressing shaping a little. The phenomenon of installation is considered as a part of a performance that is entirely logical. But install processes, especially the last decades, proved what is absolutely self-sufficient the cultural phenomena which need serious scientific approach and judgment, require attention to a research of characteristics install the practician, activity of certain artists, a tipologization and the scientific analysis of modern processes

The Venetian nobleman Ambrosio Bembo (1652–1705) included this panorama of Aleppo by the French artist G.J. Grélot (see Figure 1), as one of the fifty-one carefully observed line drawings of cities, buildings, and people integral to his travelogue, proudly entitled Travels and Journal through Part of Asia during about Four Years Undertaken by Me, Ambrosio Bembo, Venetian Noble. During his visits to Aleppo between 1672 and 1675, Bembo may have crossed paths with the great Ottoman traveler Evliya Çelebi (1611–82?), who included his own description of that commercial capital of the eastern Mediterranean in his monumental Seyahatname (Book of Travels). Evliya's book does not include a single illustration. This divergence is emblematic of the distinct ways in which early modern societies (in this case, Middle Eastern and European) visualized cities and architecture, and highlights a major challenge to writing the architectural and urban history of the Middle East before the 19th century: the almost complete absence of images that represent architecture.

AbstractIn this article a drawing by Palma il Giovane, now owned by the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung in Munich, is identified as a study for a painting by the same artist. The present whereabouts of this painting, which early on in the 17th century was in the collection of the Amsterdam merchant and art-lover Hendrick van Os, are unknown. Identification of the drawing was facilitated by the lengthy description of this work in Karel van Mander's biography of Palma Giovane in the Italian Lives of his Schilderboeck (Haarlem 1604). Van Mander describes the painting as showing Venus, Juno and Minerva seated at a table, while the angry Discord has just thrown the apple of discord in their midst. His description of the Van Os painting conforms perfectly, almost down to the smallest detail, with the Munich drawing. Van Mander, during his entire stay in Italy, never visited Venice. For his notion of Venetian painting he relied largely on the information he received from visitors to Venice and its surroundings or on Venetian works he had seen elsewhere, either in other Italian cities or in the Netherlands. For his description of Palma Giovanc's artistic skills Van Mander could rely on his firsthand knowledge of the painting owned by Hendrick van Os.

Stylistic changes in a sculptor’s oeuvre are simultaneously a challenge and a cause of dilemmas for researchers. This is particularly true when attempting to identify the early works of a sculptor while the influence of his teacher was still strong. This article focuses on the Venetian sculptor Giovanni Bonazza (Venice, 1654 – Padua, 1736) and attributes to him numerous new works both in marble and in wood, all of which are of uniform, high quality. Bonazza’s teacher was the sculptor Michele Fabris, called l’Ongaro (Bratislava, c.1644 – Venice, 1684), to whom the author of the article attributes a marble statue of Our Lady of the Rosary on the island of San Servolo, in the Venetian lagoon, which has until now been ascribed to Bonazza. The marble bust of Giovanni Arsenio Priuli, the podestat of Koper, is also attributed to the earliest phase of Bonazza’s work; it was set up on the façade of the Praetorian Palace at Koper in 1679. This bust is the earliest known portrait piece sculpted by the twenty-five-year old artist. The marble relief depicting the head of the Virgin, in the hospice of Santa Maria dei Derelitti, ought to be dated to the 1690s. The marble statue of the Virgin and Child located on the garden wall by the Ponte Trevisan bridge in Venice can be recognized as Bonazza’s work from the early years of the eighteenth century and as an important link in the chronological chain of several similar statues he sculpted during his fruitful career. Bonazza is also the sculptor of the marble busts of the young St John and Mary from the library of the monastery of San Lazzaro on the island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni in the Venetian lagoon, but also the bust of Christ from the collection at Castel Thun in the Trentino-Alto Adige region; they can all be dated to the 1710s or the 1720s. The article pays special attention to a masterpiece which has not been identified as the work of Giovanni Bonazza until now: the processional wooden crucifix from the church of Sant’Andrea in Padua, which can be dated to the 1700s and which, therefore, precedes three other wooden crucifixes that have been identified as his. Another work attributed to Bonazza is a large wooden gloriole with clouds, cherubs and a putto, above the altar in the Giustachini chapel in the church of Santa Maria del Carmine at Padua. The article attributes two stone angels and a putto on the attic storey of the high altar in the church of Santa Caterina on the island of Mazzorbo in the Venetian lagoon to Giovanni’s son Francesco Bonazza (Venice, c.1695 – 1770). Finally, Antonio Bonazza (Padua, 1698 – 1763), the most talented and well-known of Giovanni Bonazza’s sons, is identified as the sculptor of the exceptionally beautiful marble tabernacle on the high altar of the parish church at Kali on the island of Ugljan. The sculptures which the author of the article attributes to the Bonazza family and to Giovanni Bonazza’s teacher, l’Ongaro, demonstrate that the oeuvres of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Venetian masters are far from being closed and that we are far from knowing the final the number of their works. Moreover, it has to be said that not much is known about Giovanni’s works in wood which is why every new addition to his oeuvre with regard to this medium is important since it fills the gaps in a complex and stylistically varied production of this great Venetian sculptor.

Stylistic changes in a sculptor’s oeuvre are simultaneously a challenge and a cause of dilemmas for researchers. This is particularly true when attempting to identify the early works of a sculptor while the influence of his teacher was still strong. This article focuses on the Venetian sculptor Giovanni Bonazza (Venice, 1654 – Padua, 1736) and attributes to him numerous new works both in marble and in wood, all of which are of uniform, high quality. Bonazza’s teacher was the sculptor Michele Fabris, called l’Ongaro (Bratislava, c.1644 – Venice, 1684), to whom the author of the article attributes a marble statue of Our Lady of the Rosary on the island of San Servolo, in the Venetian lagoon, which has until now been ascribed to Bonazza. The marble bust of Giovanni Arsenio Priuli, the podestat of Koper, is also attributed to the earliest phase of Bonazza’s work; it was set up on the façade of the Praetorian Palace at Koper in 1679. This bust is the earliest known portrait piece sculpted by the twenty-five-year old artist. The marble relief depicting the head of the Virgin, in the hospice of Santa Maria dei Derelitti, ought to be dated to the 1690s. The marble statue of the Virgin and Child located on the garden wall by the Ponte Trevisan bridge in Venice can be recognized as Bonazza’s work from the early years of the eighteenth century and as an important link in the chronological chain of several similar statues he sculpted during his fruitful career. Bonazza is also the sculptor of the marble busts of the young St John and Mary from the library of the monastery of San Lazzaro on the island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni in the Venetian lagoon, but also the bust of Christ from the collection at Castel Thun in the Trentino-Alto Adige region; they can all be dated to the 1710s or the 1720s. The article pays special attention to a masterpiece which has not been identified as the work of Giovanni Bonazza until now: the processional wooden crucifix from the church of Sant’Andrea in Padua, which can be dated to the 1700s and which, therefore, precedes three other wooden crucifixes that have been identified as his. Another work attributed to Bonazza is a large wooden gloriole with clouds, cherubs and a putto, above the altar in the Giustachini chapel in the church of Santa Maria del Carmine at Padua. The article attributes two stone angels and a putto on the attic storey of the high altar in the church of Santa Caterina on the island of Mazzorbo in the Venetian lagoon to Giovanni’s son Francesco Bonazza (Venice, c.1695 – 1770). Finally, Antonio Bonazza (Padua, 1698 – 1763), the most talented and well-known of Giovanni Bonazza’s sons, is identified as the sculptor of the exceptionally beautiful marble tabernacle on the high altar of the parish church at Kali on the island of Ugljan. The sculptures which the author of the article attributes to the Bonazza family and to Giovanni Bonazza’s teacher, l’Ongaro, demonstrate that the oeuvres of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Venetian masters are far from being closed and that we are far from knowing the final the number of their works. Moreover, it has to be said that not much is known about Giovanni’s works in wood which is why every new addition to his oeuvre with regard to this medium is important since it fills the gaps in a complex and stylistically varied production of this great Venetian sculptor.

A portrait bust of an African placed among the antiquities in the Royal Museum at Stockholm once belonged to the Roman artist Giovanni Battista Piranesi. It was brought to Sweden at the end of the 18th century at the instance of King Gustav III. The head is a work of the middle or second half of the 16th century. It belongs to a specific, local, Roman form of Mannerist portraits, which have in common a remarkable affinity to antique imperial portrait busts. While the head is an eclectic work combining an idealized countenance—a contemporary peculiarity of portrait art—with antique usages of portrayal, the bust itself seems to be a work that stands directly in the tradition of cinquecentesque Venetian busts. Obviously head and bust were not originally created as an ensemble.

AbstractDespite the prominent career of Paolo (Caliari) Veronese (1528–88), much remains to be discovered about his patrons and peers. Several letters written by the artist are presented here for the first time, and their recipient is identified as the humanist Marcantonio Gandino. The letters reference artworks, visitors to Veronese’s studio, and economic data pertaining to the painter. Analyzing the correspondence from a variety of methodological viewpoints reveals how Veronese fulfilled commissions, interacted with nobility, and invested his painterly profits in land on the Venetian terraferma. In addition to promoting Veronese’s career and advising on financial matters, Gandino translated Plutarch and Xenophon, whose texts share classical subjects and content with Veronese’s paintings. The comparison of texts and images leaves open the possibility of an exchange between the writer and painter concerning matters of classical motifs.

Abstract In 1916, Sir Robert Henry Woods (1865–1938), eminent surgeon and Unionist Member of Parliament, presented two large-scale paintings by Walter Osborne (1859–1903) to the University Club, Dublin, now known as the Kildare Street and University Club. Drawing on new research, this article seeks to counter the long-standing suspicions surrounding the attribution of these works to Osborne, and through hitherto unused contemporary materials, outline the circumstances of their creation, the larger group to which they once belonged, and the story they tell about an ambitious artist seeking to further his career in Victorian Dublin. Further to this, the case of Osborne’s Venetian paintings illuminates a previously unexplored area of collecting in nineteenth-century Dublin, demonstrating the networks that existed between the city’s artistic and professional élites.

Abstract Although the Veronese revival is the formative phenomenon of Venetian painting in the eighteenth century, the causes for this circumstance are not entirely clear. The love of splendor is considered to be a significant motif that can be easily misinterpreted as shallow. The fundamental element of the Veronese revival is magnificenza, which also recognizes splendor, luxury, and imagination as aesthetic qualities in the art and literature of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries while presenting them in a complex reciprocal relationship whose aim is meraviglia, the amazement of the viewer. Fantasia plays the central role in Algarotti’s, Muratori’s, Vico’s, Maffei’s, and Conti’s theories as well as in Sebastiano Ricci’s and Giambattista Tiepolo’s artistic practices. This quality is as important for the patron as it is for the artist whose work is supposed to stimulate the fantasia of the audience.

AbstractThrough the biographies of a dynasty of practitioners who were active in some of the mountainous villages of the Venetian Terraferma the article brings to light unknown aspects of the professional world of surgeons. Their activities were profoundly influenced by the economic and geographic peculiarities of the territory where they lived and worked. Provincial towns and their territories offered professional opportunities both to licensed and to non-university trained practitioners. However, it was generally in small villages, especially those situated in border areas and part of the main commercial networks, that surgeons preferred to establish their practices, thus supplementing the medical services supplied by the town. Normally their knowledge was largely empirical and was transmitted from father to son. The apprenticeship-based training does not appear alternative to the academic education typical of learned practitioners: much evidence points to the existence of ‘scientific autodidacts’, self-taught practitioners who possessed and read medical texts or had attended academic courses, even if only in part. Practising surgery in this area was a highly mobile activity, stretching from the village to the neighbouring valleys, and even to areas outside the boundaries of the city and across the border of the Venetian state. Surgeons, furthermore, were able to transfer their skills and knowledge across a range of different occupations such as shoemakers, leather workers and tailors, a fact that confirms their close ties with the local artisan milieu.

Introduction. The attitude to Venice as one of the most poetic and picturesque cities in the world is firmly established in artistic practice. The city appears multifaceted and contradictory in numerous literary works. It appears as a space of eternal carnival and an education center (C. Gozzi, C. Goldoni), a place of secret conspiracies, gloomy massacres (“Angelo, Tyrant of Padua” by V. Hugo), a dream, an earthly paradise (I. Kozlov, “Eugene Onegin” by A. Pushkin). But always Venice is a special place where antiquity is closely intertwined with youth (G. Byron, J. W. von Goethe, A. Chénier, A. de Musset, A. Apukhtin, A. Maykov, F. Tyutchev, J. Brodsky, and others). Literary and poetic Venetian cultural stratum was supplemented by artistic journalism – essays, sketches, travel notes of prominent representatives of Romanticism. Such a variety of material contributed to the formation of the image, the topos of Venice, myth of the city in artistic and creative practice. Numerous interpretations of the chosen theme in works of art form the “Venetian text” of art. This topic has not been fully embodied in the form of independent musicological research, despite the large number of works in European music that glorify Venice and need to be included in scientific and performing practice. Theoretical and methodology background. The theme of the city, urban text, urbanism in general is a very developed concept in various fields of modern science. The concept of “St. Petersburg text” has been affirmed in literary studies since the 1980s (V. Toporov, 1995). Such an artistic text (Y. Lotman, 1998) is not just a mirror of a real city, but a device that realizes the transition from visible reality to the inner meaning of things. Real objects, such as squares, waters, islands, gardens, buildings, monuments, people, history, ideas, are the “language” of the city. They act in the form of toponymical, landscape, historical and cultural, personal and biographical elements of urban space. On the one hand, they create the text of the city, on the other hand, they become a well-known code of the city, and generate artistic images. By analogy with the “St. Petersburg text” on the basis of the proposed methodology, in literary studies there were a number of works on “local” texts, including Venetian (N. Mednis, 1999, O. Soboleva, 2010, K. Sivkov, 2015, N. Ilchenko & I. Marinina, 2015 and others). The concept of the image of the city (V. Li, 1914, N. Antsiferov, 1991) is inextricably linked with the text in its semiotic meaning as a structured sign system. Due to the universality and comprehensiveness, concept “topos” in music can be used instead of “image”, “sphere”, and other musicological concepts (L. Kirillina, 2007). In modern musicology, there are very few systematic studies in this area. Apart from research on the topic of musical urbanism (L. Serebryakov, 1994. I. Barsova, 2000, L. Gakkel, 2006, I. Yakovleva, 2014, T. Bilalova, 2005, G. Zharova, 2009), there are almost no works on the topic of Venetia in music. Therefore, this area of research is relevant. Objective of the researching is to determine the features of the “Venetian text” in the chamber-vocal music by Ch. Gounod on the example of his romance “Venice” (on the poem by A. de Musset). Research results and conclusions. Ch. F. Gounod (1818–1893) became one of the first French composers to draw attention to the theme of the city of Venice in his chamber and vocal music. The romance “Venice” (1842) was written by him at the age of 24. At that time, the young author had been in Italy for two years as a scholarship holder of the prestigious Prix de Rome. Ch. Gounod documented his impressions of the trip in an autobiographical book – “Mémoires d’un Artiste” (1896). The romance is based on the poem by A. de Musset “Dans Venise la Rouge…” (1828). The artistic space of Venice is constructed due to a number of constant images, such as sea lagoon, gondola, bronze lion, old doge, mask, carnival, ladies, mirror, night date. Clearly read signs of the city are metaphors for certain emotional states, often binary, which are strongly associated in most art sources with Venice: anxiety, loneliness, senility, death and sensuality, eroticism, youth, carnival of life. A. de Musset’s text is transferred to the conditions of the chamber-vocal genre and undergoes radical changes. When comparing the two options – the poetic original and the text of the romance, it becomes clear their inconsistency from about the middle of the poem. The composer’s simplification of the textual side of the romance was caused by the refusal to mention the sculptural and architectural dominants of the city, color and chronological contrasts that are inherent in the topos of Venice. This softened the overall emotional mood, virtually freeing the text from the dominance of loneliness, emptiness, anxiety. In the text of “Venice” by Ch. Gounod’s, the topos of the city is revealed as a space of mystery and dreams, a fusion of divine nature and man-made beauty, the triumph of earthly love. The representative of the contrast is the music side of this romance. It brings that note of excitement, anxiety, which seems to clear the musical image of Venice from the excessive gloss of the poetic text. It makes him alive, trembling, proving, on the one hand, the inseparable connection of words and music in chamber-vocal genres; on the other hand, characterizing Ch. Gounod as the greatest master who possessed not only an exceptional melodic gift, but also a rare sense of musical harmony. The composer seems to be going from the opposite: wrapping the text, “major” in mood, in the frame of the minor key; using capricious harmonic juxtapositions, he makes the intonation of the romance take on different colors, like the playing of moon reflections on the water. And in this balancing on the verge of “majorminor”, “enlightenment-sadness”, the precariousness, fragility and paradoxicality of the Venetia city image are revealed. Thus, the music of the Ch. Gounod’s romance that appeals to the barcarole genre attributes, in the same time, is lyrical and disturbing. It perfectly reproduces the melancholy state that was familiar to young authors, both, the poet and the composer.

AbstractIn 1956 Ilaria Toesca published an article in Bolletino d'Arte on a group of 19th-century drawings of North European origin cntitled : 'Alcuni disegni delle gallerie di Venezia. The drawings in question were by the Englishman William Young Ottley and the Dutchmen David Pierre Giottin Humbert de Superville and Hcndrik Voogd. I confine my remarks to the latter, who lived in Rome from 1788 until his death in 1839. The drawings come from the bequest of the Milan art-lover Giuseppe Bossi, with whom Voogd had a good business relationship. Discussing a signed drawing by Voogd, Toesca attributed 21 other drawings to him. The signature on the Venetian sheet is not the only proof of Voogd's authorship. Further evidence is provided by the circumstance that it is a preliminary study for a worked-up wash drawing in Hamburg (Kunsthalle) and also that it was preceded by a sketch in the Amsterdam Historical Museum. The topographical particulars of these three drawings arc discussed here. The attribution of the other 21 drawings is made 'dubitativamente' by Toesca. In my opinion her doubts are justified. Neither stylistically nor technically do they bear a resemblance to the rest of Voogd's oeuvre. The fact that the motifs (landscapes, cattle, studies of trees and plants) do occur in Voogd's work probably led to the attribution. The back of one of the drawings is inscribed 'Londonio'. The sale catalogue of Bossi's bequest (1818) lists both the Voogd drawing and work by Londonio. Francesco Londonio (1723-1783) was a Milan engraver and draughtsman who is chiefly known for his prints. Various print rooms in Europe possess work by him. It appears that the drawings attributed to Voogd are really preliminary studies by Londonio which he used for his oeuvre of prints. Indeed, some of the motifs in a series of etchings in the Rijksprentenkabinet in Amsterdam derive from the Venetian drawings. I therefore conclude that the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice own only one (signed) drawing by Hendrik Voogd, purchased by Bossi personally from the artist during his second visit to Rome (1810), and that the name of the true artist - Francesco Londonio - was lost when the sheets were removed from the original collector's albums.

The intention of this work is to examine the profile of Mann’s protagonist as one of the typical literary representations of artist, from the aspect of Nietzsche’s concept of Appollonian and Dionysian taking closer look at complex relation of motives of love, beauty and death within the life that is inseparable from an artistic existence. Gustav von Aschenbach, a writer of firm will, rationality and conscious principles, on his final journey to Venice, transcends borders and does something like an ancient hubris, yielding to Dionysian intoxication and seduction. This kind of duality within his character is the starting point for our interpretation. The analysis intents to show how the encounter with a Polish boy affects Aschenbach’s life and art, how the writer reacts in contact with beauty, and how this causes the release of his true Dionysian nature. The Venetian chronotope and unusual carnival atmosphere also influence changes in Ashenbach’s behavior, so that in a different environment, which activates the Dionysian element of his being, his character is necessarily transformed. Aschenbach’s art, as ambivalent as his life, exists between the Apollinian and Dionysian elements that constantly condition and supplement each other. Keywords: Thomas Mann, Nietzsche, Apollinian, Dionysian, art, beauty, death, Venice.

Recent conservation and restoration work on the icon of the Virgin and Child which stood on the altar in the Church of St. Nicholas at Prijeko in Dubrovnik has enabled a new interpretation of this paining. The icon, painted on a panel made of poplar wood, features a centrally-placed Virgin holding the Child in her arms painted on a gold background between the two smaller figures of St. Peter and St. John the Baptist. The figures are painted in the manner of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Dubrovnik style, and represent a later intervention which significantly changed the original appearance and composition of the older icon by adding the two saints and touching up the Virgin’s clothes with Renaissance ornaments, all of which was performed by the well-known Dubrovnik painter Nikola Božidarević. It can be assumed that the icon originally featured a standing or seated Virgin and Child. The Virgin is depicted with her head slightly lowered and pointing to the Christ Child whom she is holding on her right side. The chubby boy is not seated on his mother’s lap but is reclining on his right side and leaningforward while his face is turned towards the spectator. He is dressed in a red sleeveless tunic with a simple neck-line which is embroidered with gold thread. The Child is leaning himself on the Virgin’s right hand which is holding him. He is firmly grasping her thumb with one hand and her index finger with the other in a very intimate nursing gesture while she, true to the Hodegitria scheme, is pointing at him with her left hand, which is raised to the level of her breasts. Such an almost-realistic depiction of Christ as a small child with tiny eyes, mouth and nose, drastically departs from the model which portrays him with the mature face of an adult, as was customary in icon painting. The Virgin is wearing a luxurious gold cloak which was repainted with large Renaissance-style flowers. Her head is covered with a traditional maphorion which forms a wide ring around it and is encircled by a nimbus which was bored into thegold background. Her skin tone is pink and lit diffusely, and was painted with almost no green shadows, which is typical of Byzantine painting. The Virgin’s face is striking and markedly oval. It is characterized by a silhouetted, long, thin nose which is connected to the eyebrows. The ridge of the nose is emphasized with a double edge and gently lit whilethe almond-shaped eyes with dark circles are set below the inky arches of the eyebrows. The Virgin’s cheeks are smooth and rosy while her lips are red. The plasticity of her round chin is emphasized by a crease below the lower lip and its shadow. The Virgin’s eyes, nose and mouth are outlined with a thick red line. Her hands are light pink in colour and haveelongated fingers and pronounced, round muscles on the wrists. The fingers are separated and the nails are outlined with precision. The deep, resounding hues of the colour red and the gilding, together with the pale pink skin tone of her face, create an impression of monumentality. The type of the reclining Christ Child has been identified in Byzantine iconography as the Anapeson. Its theological background lies in the emphasis of Christ’s dual nature: although the Christ Child is asleep, the Christ as God is always keeping watch over humans. The image was inspired by a phrase from Genesis 49: 9 about a sleeping lion to whom Christ is compared: the lion sleeps with his eyes open. The Anapeson is drowsy and awake at the same time, and therefore his eyes are not completely shut. Such a paradox is a theological anticipation of his “sleep” in the tomb and represents an allegory of his death and Resurrection. The position, gesture and clothes of the Anapeson in Byzantine art are not always the same. Most frequently, the ChristChild is not depicted lying in his mother’s arms but on an oval bed or pillow, resting his head on his hand, while the Virgin is kneeling by his side. Therefore, the Anapeson from Dubrovnik is unique thanks to the conspicuously humanized relationship between the figures which is particularly evident in Christ’s explicitly intimate gesture of grasping the fingers of his mother’s hand: his right hand is literally “inserting” itself in the space between the Virgin’s thumb and index finger. At the same time, the baring of his arms provided the painter with an opportunity to depict the pale tones of a child’s tender skin. The problem of the iconography of the Anapeson in the medieval painting at Dubrovnik is further complicated by a painting which was greatly venerated in Župa Dubrovačka as Santa Maria del Breno. It has not been preserved but an illustration of it was published in Gumppenberg’sfamous Atlas Marianus which shows the Virgin seated on a high-backed throne and holding the sleeping and reclining Child. The position of this Anapeson Christ does not correspond fully to the icon from the Church of St. Nicholas because the Child is lying on its back and his naked body is covered with the swaddling fabric. The icon of the Virgin and Child from Prijeko claims a special place in the corpus of Romanesque icons on the Adriatic through its monumentality and intimate character. The details of the striking and lively Virgin’s face, dominated by the pronounced and gently curved Cimabuesque nose joined to the shallow arches of her eyebrows, link her with the Benedictine Virgin at Zadar. Furthermore, based on the manner of painting characterized by the use of intense red for the shadows in the nose and eye area, together with the characteristic shape of the elongated, narrow eyes, this Virgin and Child should be brought into connection with the painter who is known as the Master of the Benedictine Virgin. The so-called Benedictine Virgin is an icon, now at the Benedictine Convent at Zadar, which depicts the Virgin seated on a throne with a red, ceremonial, imperial cushion, in a solemn scheme of the Kyriotissa, the heavenly queen holding the Christ Child on her lap. The throne is wooden and has a round back topped with wooden finials which can also be seen in the Byzantine Kahn Virgin and the Mellon Madonna, as well as in later Veneto-Cretan painting. The throne is set under a shallow ciborium arch which is rendered in relief and supportedby twisted colonettes and so the painting itself is sunk into the surface of the panel. A very similar scheme with a triumphal arch can be seen on Byzantine ivory diptychs with shallow ciborium arches and twisted colonettes. In its composition, the icon from Prijeko is a combination ofthe Kyr i ot i ss a and the Hodegitria, because the Virgin as the heavenly queen does not hold the Christ Child frontally before her but on her right-hand side while pointing at him as the road to salvation. He is seated on his mother’s arm and is supporting himself by pressing his crossed legsagainst her thigh which symbolizes his future Passion. He is wearing a formal classical costume with a red cloak over his shoulder. He is depicted in half profile which opens up the frontal view of the red clavus on his navy blue chiton.He is blessing with the two fingers of his right hand and at the same time reaching for the unusual flower rendered in pastiglia which the Virgin is raising in her left hand and offering to him. At the same time, she is holding the lower part of Christ’s body tightly with her right hand.Various scholars have dated the icon of the Benedictine Virgin to the early fourteenth century. While Gothic features are particularly evident in the costumes of the donors, the elements such as the modelling of the throne and the presence of the ceremonial cushion belong to the Byzantine style of the thirteenth century. The back of the icon of the Benedictine Virgin features the figure of St. Peter set within a border consisting of a lively and colourful vegetal scroll which could be understood as either Romanesque or Byzantine. However, St. Peter’s identifying titulus is written in Latin while that of the Virgin is in Greek. The figure of St. Peter was painted according to the Byzantine tradition: his striking and severe face is rendered linearly in a rigid composition, which is complemented by his classical contrapposto against a green-gray parapet wall, while the background is of dark green-blue colour. Equally Byzantine is themanner of depicting the drapery with flat, shallow folds filled with white lines at the bottom of the garment while, at the same time, the curved undulating hem of the cloak which falls down St. Peter’s right side is Gothic. The overall appearance of St. Peter is perhaps even more Byzantine than that of the Virgin. Such elements, together with the typically Byzantine costumes, speak clearly of a skilful artist who uses hybrid visual language consisting of Byzantine painting and elements of the Romanesque and Gothic. Of particular interest are the wide nimbuses surrounding the heads of the Virgin and Child (St. Peter has a flat one) which are rendered in relief and filled with a neat sequence of shallow blind archesexecuted in the pastiglia technique which, according to M. Frinta, originated in Cyprus. The Venetian and Byzantine elements of the Benedictine Virgin have already been pointed out in the scholarship. Apart from importing art works and artists such as painters and mosaic makers directly from Byzantium into Venice, what was the extent and nature of the Byzantineinfluence on Venetian artistic achievements in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries? We know that the art of Venice and the West alike were affected by the Fourth Crusade and the sack of Constantinople in 1204, and by the newly founded Latin Empire which lasted until 1261.The Venetians played a particularly significant political and administrative role in this Empire and the contemporary hybrid artistic style of the eastern Mediterranean, called Crusader Art and marked by the strong involvement of the Knights Templar, must have been disseminated through the established routes. In addition to Cyprus, Apulia and Sicily which served as stops for the artists and art works en route to Venice and Tuscany, another station must have been Dalmatia where eastern and western influences intermingled and complemented each other.However, it is interesting that the icon of the Benedictine Virgin, apart from negligible variations, imitates almost completely the iconographic scheme of the Madonna di Ripalta at Cerignola on the Italian side of the Adriatic, which has been dated to the early thirteenth century and whose provenance has been sought in the area between southern Italy (Campania) and Cyprus. Far more Byzantine is another Apulian icon, that of a fourteenth-century enthroned Virgin from the basilica of St. Nicholas at Bari with which the Benedictine Virgin from Zadar shares certain features such as the composition and posture of the figures, the depictionof donors and Christ’s costume. A similar scheme, which indicates a common source, can be seen on a series of icons of the enthroned Virgin from Tuscany. The icon of the Virgin and Child from Prijeko is very important for local Romanesque painting of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth century because it expands the oeuvre of the Master of the Benedictine Virgin. Anicon which is now at Toronto, in the University of Toronto Art Centre Malcove Collection, has also been attributed to this master. This small two-sided icon which might have been a diptych panel, as can be judged from its typology, depicts the Virgin with the Anapeson in the upper register while below is the scene from the martyrdom of St. Lawrence. The Virgin is flanked by the figures of saints: to the left is the figure of St. Francis while the saint on the right-hand side has been lost due to damage sustained to the icon. The busts of SS Peter and Paul are at the top.The physiognomies of the Virgin and Child correspond to those of the Benedictine Virgin and the Prijeko icon. The Anapeson, unlike the one at Dubrovnik, is wrapped in a rich, red cloak decorated with lumeggiature, which covers his entire body except the left fist and shin. On the basis of the upper register of this icon, it can be concluded that the Master of the Benedictine Virgin is equally adept at applying the repertoire and style of Byzantine and Western painting alike; the lower register of the icon with its descriptive depiction of the martyrdom of St.Lawrence is completely Byzantine in that it portrays the Roman emperor attending the saint’s torture as a crowned Byzantine ruler. Such unquestionable stylistic ambivalence – the presence of the elements from both Byzantine and Italian painting – can also be seen on the icons of theBenedictine and Prijeko Virgin and they point to a painter who works in a “combined style.” Perhaps he should be sought among the artists who are mentioned as pictores greci in Dubrovnik, Kotor and Zadar. The links between Dalmatian icons and Apulia and Tuscany have already been noted, but the analysis of these paintings should also contain the hitherto ignored segment of Sicilian and eastern Mediterranean Byzantinism, including Cyprus as the centre of Crusader Art. The question of the provenance of the Master of the Benedictine Virgin remains open although the icon of the Virgin and Child from Prijeko points to the possibility that he may have been active in Dalmatia.However, stylistic expressions of the two icons from Zadar and Dubrovnik, together with the one which is today at Toronto, clearly demonstrate the coalescing of cults and forms which arrived to the Adriatic shores fromfurther afield, well beyond the Adriatic, and which were influenced by the significant, hitherto unrecognized, role of the eastern Mediterranean.

In 1493, a Czech nobleman named Jan Hasištejnský z Lobkovic embarked on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. As nearly all Central European pilgrims did, he traveled south through the Tyrol to Venice and joined a large, multinational group there before setting out across the Mediterranean. He remained nearly a month in Venice, meeting prominent political figures, visiting churches and cloisters, and admiring the realism of the painting and sculpture of the Venetian quattrocento. Among all the other marvels of Venice that he describes in his 1505 travelogue is the memory of his day trip to the island of Murano. “In this little town,” he writes, “there are, I think, close to seventy artisans or more, and all are glass makers.” He describes some of the fine works that he saw there, and eagerly adds, “and there is always a great quantity of these various things completed, so that whoever arrives wants to buy something of it.” In this moment, the fifteenth-century tourist is not that far removed from his counterpart in the twenty-first century.

Resum: Aquest treball pretén emfatitzar l’errònia identitat que ha arribat fins als nostres dies de Lucrècia Borja i l’equivocada atribució que se n’ha fet d’alguns retrats. Com ara, la pintura de Flora (c.1520), pintada per Bartolomeo Veneto, que ha passat a la història com una indissoluble identificació de Lucrècia. Els estudis actuals han demostrat que representa un model ideal influït pel context literari probablement relacionat amb Pietro Bembo. Durant el Renaixement, els retrats representen molt més que una identitat concreta i mimètica. Són suports de prestigi i transmissió ideològica, de virtuts morals, memòria, etc. En l’àmbit artístic venecià de principis del segle XVI sorgeixen múltiples retrats femenins de difícil identificació que la crítica freqüentment ha relacionat amb cortesanes, amants, dones. Moltes, però, representen ideals poètics a través dels quals la pintura demostra la seva capacitat de rivalitzar amb la poesia quant a demostració de l’ideal estètic de la bellesa. Aquest breu treball pretén examinar les successives interpretacions historiogràfiques que erròniament han identificat la pintura de Flora amb Lucrecia Borja a causa del valor eròtic pejorativament relacionat amb ella, però també vol posar èmfasi en les altres propostes que han permès que l’obra sigui interpretada amb l’exegesi més adequada. Paraules clau: Lucrècia Borja, Pol Coronado, Retrat, Bartolomeo Veneto, Flora Abstract: This study intended to emphasize the identity has been wrong that has reached our days of Lucrezia Borgia and the wrong attribution has been made of some pictures. One of the most paradigmatic paintings is Flora (c.1520), painted by artist Bartolomeo Veneto. This work has gone down in history as one indissoluble portrait of Lucrezia, but recent studies have shown represents an ideal model influenced by the literary context probably related to Pietro Bembo. During the Renaissance, portraits represent much more than a specific and mimetic identity. They are supports of prestige and ideological transmission, of moral virtues, memory, etc. In the Venetian art scene of the early sixteenth century, multiple female portraits often difficult to identify that criticism have related courtesans, mistresses, wives. Many of these paintings also represent poetic ideals through which painting demonstrate its ability to compete with poetry in terms of demonstrating the aesthetic ideal of beauty. This short paper aims to examine the successive historiographical interpretations erroneously identified the painting of Flora with Lucrezia Borgia due to the erotic value related to her pejoratively, but also wants to highlight other proposals that have allowed the work to be performed with the most appropriate exegesis. Keywords: Lucrezia Borgia, Pol Coronado, Portrait, Bartolomeo Veneto, Flora

Il Seicento napoletano fu caratterizzato da un così grande fermento culturale e artistico da meritarsi l’appellativo di Secolo d’Oro. Una miriade di architetti, scultori, pittori e artigiani diedero vita a opere di grande pregio che cambiarono per sempre il volto della capitale del Viceregno. Tra i pittori ai tempi più apprezzati, come dimostrano le tante opere che oramai fanno parte del suo catalogo, ma per tanto tempo caduti nell’oblio, anche per la quasi totale assenza di dati documentari, c’è sicuramente Antonio De Bellis: un artista che dagli anni ’70 del Novecento ha stuzzicato l’interesse degli studiosi entrando anche a far parte della rosa di pittori coinvolti nella vexata quaestio sull’identità del Maestro degli Annunci ai pastori. Spesso confuso con il Cavallino, a riprova della qualità di molte sue opere, dal quale si discosta per un certo arcaismo persistente in tutta la sua opera, il suo percorso artistico affonda le radici nel Naturalismo di matrice caravaggesca, ‘napoletanizzato’ da Battistello, Filippo Vitale e dal deus ex machina della pittura di quel periodo nella città partenopea, Jusepe de Ribera. E seguendo le orme di quest’ultimo, come tanti altri partecipa a quella rivoluzione coloristica che arriva da un lato da Roma, tramite la riscoperta dei Maestri veneti del ‘500 da parte di un gruppo di pittori francesi, primo fra tutti Poussin, e dall’altro dalle tele piene di luce ‘mediterranea’ del Van Dyck. Il tentativo di Antonio di mantenere il legame con i modi della sua formazione, pur aderendo a queste nuove istanze, non regge però a lungo e quelle che al momento sono ritenute le sue ultime due tele, non hanno quel mordente che aveva caratterizzato invece la sua produzione precedente.

As the former capital of Dalmatia, Zadar abounded in monuments produced during the 17th and 18th century, especially altars, statues, and paintings. Most of this cultural heritage had been lost by the late 18th and the first decades of the 19th century, when the former Venetian Dalmatia was taken over by Austrian administration, followed by the French and then again by the Austrian one. Many churches were closed down, their furnishings were sold away or lost, and the buildings were either repurposed or demolished. One of them had been home to two hitherto unpublished angels-putti located on the top of the inner side of the arch in the sanctuary of Zadar’s church of Our Lady of Health (Kaštel) at the end of Kalelarga (Fig. 1). Both marble statues were obviously adjusted and then placed next to the marble cartouche with a subsequently added inscription from 1938, which tells of a reconstruction of the church during the time it was administered by the Capuchins. The drapery of the right angel-putto bears the initials I. G., which should be interpreted as the signature of the Venetian sculptor Giuseppe Groppelli (Venice, 1675-1735). This master signed his full name as IOSEPH GROPPELLI on the base of a statue of St Chrysogonus, now preserved in the Permanent Exhibition of Religious Art in Zadar (Fig. 2). Same as the signed statue of St Anastasia by master Antonio Corradini (Fig. 3), it used to form part of the main altar in Zadar’s monumental church of St Donatus, desacralized in 1798. Recently, two more angels have been discovered, inserted in the tympanum of the main altar in the church of Madonna of Loreto in Zadar’s district of Arbanasi, the one to the right likewise bearing the initials I. G. (Fig. 4). Undoubtedly, these two artworks were once part of a single composition: the abovementioned former altar in the church of St Donatus, transferred to the cathedral in 1822 and reconstructed to become the new altar in the chapel of St Anastasia. Giuseppe and his younger brother, Paolo Groppelli, led the family workshop from 1708, producing and signing sculptures together. Therefore, the newly discovered statues produced by Giuseppe are a significant contribution to his personal 174 Damir Tulić: Nepoznati anđeli Giuseppea Groppellija u Zadru... Ars Adriatica 6/2016. (155-174) oeuvre. It is difficult to distinguish between his statues and those by his brother, but it is generally believed that Paolo was a better artist. It is therefore important to compare the two sculptures, as they are believed to have been made independently. Paolo’s statue of Our Lady of the Rosary (1708) was originally located in the former Benedictine church of Santa Croce at Giudecca in Venice, and acquired early in the 19th century for the parish church of Veli Lošinj. If one compares the phisiognomy of the Christ Child by Paolo to that of Giuseppe’s signed sculpture of angel-putto in Zadar, one can observe considerable similarities (Figs. 5 and 6). However, Paolo’s sculptures are somewhat subtler and softer than Giuseppe’s. The workshop of Giuseppe and Paolo Gropelli has also been credited with two large marble angels on the main altar of the parish church in Concadirame near Treviso, as they show great similarity in style to the angels in Ljubljana’s cathedral, made around 1710 (Figs. 7, 8, 9, and 10). The oeuvre of Giuseppe and Paolo Gropelli can also be extended to two kneeling marble angels at the altar of the Holy Sacrament in the Venetian church of Santa Maria Formosa, with their marble surface somewhat damaged (Figs. 11 and 12). Coming back to the former main altar in Zadar’s church of St Donatus, it should be emphasized that it was erected following the last will of Archbishop Vettore Priuli (1688-1712), that contains a clearly expressed desire that the altar should be decorated as lavishly as possible. As the construction contract has been lost and the appearance of the altar remains unknown, it can only be supposed what it may have looked like (Fig. 13). It is known that the altar included an older, 13th-century icon of Madonna with the Child, which was later transferred to the Cathedral and is today preserved in the Permanent Exhibition of Religious Art. Scholars have presumed that the altar may had the form of a triumphal arch, with pillars enclosing the pala portante with an older icon and statues placed lateraly. However, it can also be presumed that the executors of the archbishop’s last will, canons Giovanni Grisogono and Giovanni Battista Nicoli, found a model for the lavish altar in Venice, in the former altar of the demolished oratory of Madonna della Pace. That altar had been erected in 1685 and included an older Byzantine icon of Madonna with the Child. It was later relocated to Trieste and its original appearance remains unknown, but can be reconstructed on the basis of its depiction on the medal of Doge Alvise IV Mocenigo (1764), preserved in the parish church of Plomin (Fig. 14). This popular solution undoubtedly served as a model for the main altar in the church of Madonna delle Grazie at Este (Fig. 15), constructed between 1692 and 1697. Today’s appearance of the chapel of St Anastasia does not reveal much about its previous altars (Fig. 16). A recently discovered document at the State Archive of Zadar sheds a new light on the hypothesis that the old main altar was transferred from St Donatus in 1822 and became, with minor revisions, the new altar of St Anastasia, demolished in 1905. According to a contract from 1821, the saint’s altar was designed by Zadar’s engineer and architect Petar Pekota, and built by parish priest Giovanni Degano by using segments from older altars, including that of St Donatus. The painting ordered for the new altar, Martyrdom of St Anastasia by Giuseppe Rambelli from Forli (Fig. 17), is the only surviving part of the 19thcentury altar. The overall reconstruction of the chapel of St Anastasia took place between 1903 and 1906, according to a project of architect Ćiril Metod Iveković, which intended to have the chapel covered in mosaics ordered from Venice. However, during the reconstruction works, remnants of 13th-century frescos were discovered in the apse and the project had to be altered. The altar from 1822 was nevertheless demolished and a new marble mensa was built, with a new urn for the saint’s relics, made in the Viennese workshop of Nicholas Mund, as attested by receipts from 1906 (Fig. 18). A hundred years after the intervention, another one took place, in which the marble altar was disassembled and replaced by a new one, made of glass and steel, yet bearing the old marble urn of Bishop Donatus.

Three cinquecento polychrome wood-carved altars have been preserved on the island of Lopud near Dubrovnik, the most monumental of which is situated in the parish church of Our Lady of Šunj. Its retable was constructed to resemble a classical aedicule, with an intricately carved frame and a central figural depiction of the Assumption of the Virgin, complemented by a complex iconographic programme in the symmetrically arranged adjoining scenes. Filling the small cassettes of the predella are reliefs of the Annunciation and Christ as the Man of Sorrows, together with perspectively rendered narrative scenes of the Last Supper and the Washing of the Feet, while in the pediment is a frontal depiction of the Coronation of the Virgin by the Holy Trinity. In the narrow side wings between the columns and pilasters are four bas-reliefs of local patron saints depicted half-turned towards the central image, and thus achieving an overall plastic harmony for a demanding content. In terms of space, the main scene is well-developed through a pronounced sculptural modelling of the figures of the eleven apostles in the round, the most prominent of which is that of St Peter, placed in the foreground and turned to face the nave of the church, while the others are consumed by the miraculous assumption of the Virgin into heaven. She is followed high up by a pair of small angels and several tiny symbolical cherubim heads, all of which helps to achieve an extremely convincing religious scene. Its attractiveness is significantly heightened by the all’antica realism and pedantic Roman-inspired modelling which highlight the skill of a highly trained and talented master wood carver, which leaves no doubt that this is a special work of art, and indeed, the most beautiful carved wood retable in the east Adriatic which has survived to date. In this first complete study of the altar, the author traces historical records in which it is mentioned without the exact year of its creation, origin or carver being cited. He dispels the tradition that the altar was brought from England, supposedly from the Chapel of Henry VIII, and explains this tradition as having been based on the discovery of an alabaster altar, a typical product of late Gothic workshops at Nottingham, several examples of which exist in Dalmatia. From the seventeenth-century records, on the other hand, we learn that the altar in the church of the „Madonna del Sugni” (a vernacular Italo-Croatian transformation of the word Assunta) was dedicated in 1572. An examination of comparative material establishes that the altar’s compositional scheme draws upon altarpieces painted by Alvise Vivarini around 1480, while its morphological features find their closest parallel in the activities and mannerisms of the Venetian workshop of Paolo Campsa, who worked from the 1490s to the early 1550s, and who sold his works in the wide area under the government of La Serenissima. The Republic of Venice profited a great deal from this export, while its urban centre’s innumerable wooden altars disappeared following subsequent changes of fashion. A group of securely attributed works shows that Paolo Campsa frequently borrowed formulas and idioms from Venetian painters of the older generation; analogies with two of Vivarini’s altar paintings confirm that he repeated this technique on the Lopud altar, even though altars as complex as this are not found in the surviving oeuvre of this artist. An overview of the extremely numerous works attributed to this fecund wood carver has not led to a secure attribution of this scenically developed altar to his hand. However, an analytical observation points to significant similarities with individual figures considered by scholars of Renaissance wooden sculpture to be products of his workshop - more a factory, in fact - or of his circle which, without a doubt, Paolo stamped with his mark. Apart from the assumption that there are master wood carvers who have not been identified, or formally and clearly differentiated, who followed his teachings and mannerisms, this paper opens the possibility of locating more exactly the place of the altar’s creation. Since Campsa’s workshop was active even after his death, it can be assumed that the altar was made in the 1560s or 1570s, and that it was transported and assembled on the island of Lopud for its dedication of 1572. Furthermore, the author observes the meaning of the subsequent addition of the background, which was painted once the altar reached its destination; it shows a summarized depiction of the scenery of Lopud and a tiny settlement with a precisely and proportionately drawn sailing ship docked at the island’s bay. The background reveals that the nature of the work was votive and, by identifying the layers of local historical circumstance and by combining them with the relevant written sources, it can be connected to the activities of the distinguished ship owner Miho Pracat, the richest citizen of the Republic of Dubrovnik during the cinquecento. Two more wooden sculptures can be added to Miho Pracat’s donation to his home island: the figures of St Catherine and St Roch which were also made in Venice and which had originally belonged to a small altar of his family in the local church of St Francis, known from archival records. This altar was composed of an older polychrome triptych, now unfortunately lost, and which, together with a pair of side statues, formed a piece resembling a number of altarpieces from Paolo Campsa’s workshop. Thus, the analysis of these works of art reveals key components of visual culture, and a peculiar mosaic of sixteenth-century artistic production in a peripheral community of the small island of Lopud under the government of the Republic of Dubrovnik.

Bonino di Jacopo da Milano occupies a significant place in Dalmatian sculpture of the first half of the fifteenth century. In a relatively short period of time during which he was active – less than twenty years – this master managed to create numerous carvings and sculptures in almost every major Dalmatian town. Despite the fact that in the last ten years or so, a number of new and rather important works have been attributed to Bonino, while the works of a lesser quality have been identified as being produced by his collaborators, the assessment of this Lombard sculptor as an artist has remained the same and is based on the arguments put forward by Milan Prelog (1961) which portray him as having a backward looking, essentially Romanesque, understanding of the human figure and limited creative abilities. Because of this, he tends to be considered responsible for the works of a lesser quality with the major exception of a high relief depicting an angel bearing the coat of arms of the de Judicibus family from the bell tower of Split Cathedral (Fig. 1). The relief, now at the Museum of the City of Split, comes from the ground floor of the Cathedral bell tower where it stood on its south side. It replaced by a replica during the restorations works in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The first scholar who identified it as part of Bonino’s oeuvre or, more specifically, as a work of one of his assistants, was Cvito Fisković (1950). In contrast to this, earlier researchers such as A. Venturi (1908), H. Folnescis (1914), and Ljubo Karaman (1936) considered the relief to be more stylistically advanced and connected it to the mid-fifteenth century artistic activity of Juraj Dalmatinac. Since Ljubo Karaman (1954) maintained his initial opinion even after C. Fisković’s attribution and softened his estimation only slightly, C. Fisković went on to attribute the angel from the bell tower to Bonino himself in a later, somewhat more detailed, discussion of the works this sculptor produced in Split (1969). He pointed out that the angel may well have been produced around 1426-1427 when the ground floor of the bell tower was being consolidated and when, as we learn from the sources, Bonino was working on the ciborium of St Domnius for the local Cathedral. Even a superficial comparison between the angel from the bell tower and the angels on Bonino’s ciborium (Fig. 2) reveals not only significant differences in the modelling technique, but, even more importantly, a completely different feeling for sculptural form. The angel with the de Judicibus coat of arms comes across as being dynamic in the available pictorial space and as having a far livelier facial expression as well as physical impostation all of which demonstrate that the noted discrepancies in style, chronology, and attribution are not accidental. The figure of the de Judicibus angel gentler, slimmer and more graceful than those made by Bonino and was brought to life by a slight turn of his small round head featuring full cheeks and resting on a thin, slightly elongated neck which is not found on Bonino’s angels. Significant differences are also evident in the angels’ hair: the hair on the de Judicibus angel is lush and somewhat unnaturally pulled up from the face so that it resembles a wig. Particularly lively are his large drilled eyes and a faint smile which hovers at the corners of his mouth – a feature absent from Bonino’s figures. Almost identical features as on this serene and lovely face can be found in the sepia preparatory sketch of St Matthew on the vault of the ciborium of St Domnius (Fig. 4) which is why it is logical to assume that the masters responsible for its completion or painting in 1429 – Dujam Vučković and Giovanni di Pietro da Milano – also made the preparatory drawing which served as a model for the de Judicibus angel from the bell tower. Close analogies with the angels on Bonino’s ciborium, another obvious source of inspiration, point to the fact that the artist responsible for the angel holing the de Judicibus coat of arms should be sought among Bonino’s close assistants as C. Fisković had initially suggested. A different role of the angels, that is, the predominantly religious one in the case of the angels on the ciborium above the altar of the local patron saint, and the mostly secular location of the angel on the bell tower sheds more light on the circumstances in which the de Judicibus angel may have been produced. One of the members of the de Judicibus family, a local noble family, was the Archbishop of Split Domnius II (1415-1420) who began raising funds for the completion of the bell tower in 1416 and who appointed a certain master Tvrdoj as the foreman but he never started the job. Dissatisfied with the passing of Split into Venetian hands in 1420, Archbishop Domnius left for Hungary where he stayed at the court of King Sigismund until his death in 1435. This information was used by Lj. Karaman to disprove the argument that the angel was made during Bonino’s sojourn at Split because he thought that the new Venetian government would not have allowed the installing of the coat of arms belonging to this self-exiled archbishop. Given that the coat of arms does not feature the episcopal mitre and cross, as noted by C. Fisković, it cannot be interpreted as belonging to him. In addition, the fact that this bishop is mentioned on the sarcophagus of his mother which was placed in the peripter of the Cathedral in 1429 clearly demonstrates that political reasons did not prevent the family connection with this bishop from being displayed. Moreover, the angel relief was carved on a large stone block which was organically linked to the masonry meaning that it was made during the consolidation of the ground floor of the bell tower carried out by Bonino’s workshop. Although the issue of authorship does not depend on the exact date of the angel relief, conspicuous similarities with the figure of St Matthew on the vault of the ciborium of St Domnius open up the possibility that the angel may have been produced during 1428, after Bonino went to Šibenik to work on the portal of the future Cathedral of St James. This might help explain a certain freedom of expression which is evident in the de Judicibus angel and which is absent from other works produced by Bonino’s workshop. Regardless of these circumstances surrounding what might be called hidden, political and subversive artistic freedom, perhaps acquired at a later date, evident in the de Judicibus angel, the main reasons for the angel’s lively movement and dynamism within the pictorial space lie in the fact that this relief expresses a completely different visual aesthetics and sculptural poetics when compared to the angels on the Cathedral ciborium. This is also corroborated by the capital above the angel’s head (Fig. 5). The capital’s intensely curling leaves distance it from Bonino’s variations of the ‘northern’ vegetal ornaments which can be seen on the capitals of the ciborium of St Domnius and bring it closer to the Venetian capitals with lush and curling leaves which appeared a decade or two later. The strong movement and the restless, somewhat extroverted, artistic hand apparent on this capital – not on display but the replica can be seen on the Cathedral bell tower – is also present in the de Judicibus angel which leaves no doubt that the two were made by the same sculptor. The aforementioned stylistic characteristics enable us to attribute another work to this unnamed master, that is, the statue of St Michael in the atrium of the Episcopal Palace at Šibenik (Fig. 6). If we take a closer look at the head of St Michael and his full round cheeks but also at the way his thick and pulled-up hair is depicted, we can easily recognize the hand of the same sculptor who made the de Judicibus angel. St Michael’s thin waist and his tense limbs which are bent as if made of rubber together with the tautened smooth surface of his armour have resulted in the unusual appearance of a body which seems to be hovering. The impression that the limbs are not in harmony with each other and that they were mechanically attached to the torso is achieved mostly by the right leg which is bent at the knee and depicted in profile. It is obvious that the unnamed master wanted to depict the traditional iconographic type of St Michael as a frontally placed heavenly soldier, which he could have seen in the monumental relief of St Michael set in the town walls next to the land gate, in a new, livelier and more dynamic, way. However, the execution clearly demonstrates that this ambition to achieve a more convincing and dramatic representation of the battle greatly exceeded the sculptor’s creative abilities. Despite everything, his clumsy attempt displays the same youthful and confident passion, unspoiled by routine and seen in the de Judicibus angel, for a more modern approach to the pictorial expression and for bringing a breath of fresh air into conventional iconographic schemes. Based on all the above, I believe that we can agree with the suggestion that, apart from the already identified Master of St Peter, the circle of Bonino di Jacopo da Milano nurtured another unnamed master. Although his oeuvre is not large, the works of this master are nevertheless significant and symptomatic of a new moment in the local sculpture of the early fifteenth century. This moment corresponds to the time when, at the very end of the 1430s, Dalmatian sculpture finally attempted to break free from the visual patterns and aesthetic formulae which were deeply rooted in the Trecento and which were transmitted by Bonino da Milano throughout the Dalmatian coast. Nevertheless, because he was limited by and tied to the old models as well as being dependent on his teacher, this young and ambitious assistant of Bonino marks the end of the old era rather than the beginning of the new one which would be announced in around ten years’ time by the arrival of yet another sculptor from Lombardy – Pietro di Martino da Milano.

The casket of St Simeon the God-Receiver is the most representative work in the applied arts of the Croatian Trecento and, at the same time, one which displays great iconographic complexity. Although it was the subject of two monographs and a large number of individual articles, a whole set of questions remains open and awaits plausible interpretations. Particularly great problems are connected to the interpretation of a number of scenes which were understood differently by different scholars. At the same time, it can be noted that the discussion about the casket’s complex iconographic programme lacks a study which would address it as a unique a coherent whole in which every single scene is viewed as its irreplaceable constituent part. This article aims to demonstrate that the casket’s iconographic programme, especially that of the eight panels on its main body, was selected and arranged according to a carefully developed programme the creators of which were five noblemen of Zadar to whom Queen Elizabeth, the wife of the powerful King Louis I the Great of Hungary (1342-1382), entrusted not only the silver for the making of the casket but other important details connected to the commission such as the choice of the artist and, even more importantly, the selection of the scenes through which the casket communicated with its spectators. There is no doubt that the queen had her own demands with regard to what was depicted as can be seen in the opulent dedicatory inscription which records that she was the patron of the casket but also in the donation scene where she appears together with her daughters. It can also be said with certainty that she gave instructions for the somewhat unusual panel which depicts her standing by the catafalque of her father, Ban Stephen of Bosnia (+1354) who is being sent off to the next world by St Simeon the Righteous. It should mentioned that Ban Stephen was considered a heretic – a Bogomil – which means that being a Catholic queen, his daughter attempted to rectify the past with this panel. All these scenes are at the back of the casket. The queen undoubtedly also had a say in the selection of scenes which were depicted on the front. Those relate to the life of St Simeon which, considering that we know of only one event in his life, was done in a very skilful way: the central panel shows the saint receiving the Christ Child in the scene of the Presentation in the Temple while the panels to its left and right depict the translation of the saint’s relics which have not been identified as such in the scholarly literature. The translation consists of three scenes which are always present in the cases of translation: the finding of the body (inventio corporis), the transport of the body to a new place (translatio corporis) and, finally, the placing of the body to a new site where it would remain in the future (colocatio corporis). These three scenes were interpreted by the noblemen of Zadar in an idiosyncratic way in order to affirm the medieval Zadar and its nobility on the casket itself. The scene of the inventio corporis depicts the rectors of Zadar intervening at the last moment before a group of monks from the outskirts of town get hold of the body and place it in their monastery. In the scene of the colocatio corporis, the body of St Simeon is being carried into the Church of St Mary Major in the presence of King Louis and the grateful citizens who are led by the Bishop Nicholas Matafar. This scene depicts the return of the saint’s body from Venice where, according to the author of this article, it had been taken during the local uprising against the Venetian rule (1346-1358). At the same time, the visual message of the two scenes which flank the central one was to show that the exclusive ownership of the relics belonged to the citizens of Zadar. The conflict with the monks which erupted on a local level is being resolved by the local authorities, that is, the rectors of Zadar. When the problem becomes ‘bilateral’, that is, when it involves Venice, the dispute is settled (to the benefit of the citizens of Zadar) by their sovereign, the king of Hungary and Croatia.The visual interpretation of the translation depicted on the casket relies greatly on the scenes from the cycle of the translation of the body of St Mark from the façade of St Mark’s basilica at Venice (the discovery and exhumation of the body, the transport of the body on a ship, the placing of the body in a new shrine). The author of the article, therefore, frequently compares the scenes on the Zadar casket to those from Venice.

The Teatrino del Mondo of Aldo Rossi, a performance space set on a barge that could be reached by boat (1979-80), became an iconic metaphor for the first Venetian Biennale of Architecture. At the Venetian Biennale of Architecture 2018, this metaphorical representation was engaged by Caribbean contemporary poets Lasana M. Sekou and Charles Matz II and visual artists Cozbi Sanchez Cabrera and Jean-Ulrick Désert. In exploring ties that link the vessels of Caribbean contemporary literature and art to Venice, witness is the audacity of their opera, created while confronting intensifying natural disasters such as earthquakes and hurricanes, and recalling horrifying unnatural conditions of Slavery and war. The artists participated in collateral events in which poetry or visual art intersected marvellously with Venetian idioms.

Manfrin’s gallery in Venice has been one of the most famous private collections assembled in the Venetian Republic at the end of the eighteenth century, becoming a must-to-see for visitors and artists during the following century. Recent literature addressed mainly his painting collection, shedding light on its history and dispersal, while less attention has been paid to his library and print cabinet, both formed and increased from the last years of Settecento onwards. New documentary sources allow us to explore more in detail the taste for ancient and modern prints and the contents of the library, which was physically incorporated into the last room of the painting gallery and whose importance for the presence of art history publications, illustrated books and volumes of prints, was pointed out in the guides of contemporary writers and critics such as Giannantonio Moschini and Francesco Zanotto. This essay covers a lacuna in the studies on Venetian collecting during the period comprised between the fall of the Republic and the establishment of the Austrian government, providing a preliminary survey of what was until now a missing chapter in the reconstruction of the cultural ‘tradition’ that Girolamo Manfrin and his son Pietro tempted to obtain in the Venetian society of the time.

The present paper takes the cue from an anonymous letter sent in 1844 to the camerlengo Tommaso Riario Sforza to denounce the poor conservative conditions in which Veronese’s Rape of Europe, in the Pinacoteca Capitolina in Rome, was placed. Considered one of the gems of the Roman collections, as the contemporary sources attest, especially due to the scarcity of works by Venetian masters in Rome, the large canvas was important above all as a model for young artists to exercise on colouring. Following this complaint, the painting will be taken over by the under-inspector Filippo Agricola, who will make the design for a new frame and will entrust the restoration to Giovanni Regis.

Abstract Information on the life of the Venetian merchant Bartolomeo della Nave (1571/79?–1632) is scarce, but what is known is that he exhibited one of the most outstanding art collections in Venice in the early seventeenth century. This essay considers the places from which della Nave acquired some of his works, brings together visitor accounts of the collection, and examines della Nave’s innovative methods of displaying art in his home, which was frequented by visual artists, architects and writers. Itinerary accounts, visual quotations and poetic evocations chart the vivid afterlives of della Nave’s works – not only in Britain, where many of them travelled after his death, as has been well treated in the literature – but in Venice, where most of them originated.

The concept of the aquapelago, an assemblage of terrestrial and aquatic spaces generated by human activities, was first advanced in 2012 and has been subsequently developed with regard to what has been termed the ‘aquapelagic imaginary’ – the figures, symbols, myths and narratives generated by human engagement with such assemblages. Venice, a city premised on the integration of terrestrial and marine elements within an intermediate tidal lagoon, is a paradigmatic aquapelago and its artists have produced a substantial corpus of creative work reflecting various aspects of its Domini da Mar (maritime dominion). This article engages with one aspect of these engagements, the use of sirenas (mermaids), sea serpents, Neptune and associated motifs in visual and narrative culture from the Renaissance to the present. This subject is explored in a reverse chronological order. Commencing with a discussion of two striking contemporary sculptures, the article goes on to analyse modern renditions of Venetian folklore before moving back to explore a variety of Renaissance paintings and sculptures that feature mythic maritime motifs. Having followed this trajectory, the article shifts focus to examine the manner in which the prominence of the winged Lion of Saint Mark in Venetian iconography counteracts the aforementioned aquatic imagery, reflecting different perceptions of Venice as a social locale and as regional and international power at different historical junctures.

Nicolò Manucci (or Manuzzi) (ca 1638-1720) is a well-known figure among scholars: a Venetian adventurer, artilleryman and doctor in Early Modern India. He was a dynamic man, who frequented for a long time both the Mughal courts and the European agents of the seventeenth and early eighteenth century trade companies, leaving meaningful testimonies of his age, and thus becoming an important (and controversial) historical source on South Asia. In spite of the celebrity gained by his biography and his work, Manucci’s role as European patron of Indian artists has been undervalued so far, with scholars often preferring to define him as a mere collector of works of Indian miniatures. Through an historic and artistic examination of his work, of other coeval works of art and contemporary sources, the aim of this paper is to show that Manucci was actually an important patron of Indian painting, a paradigmatic precursor of figurative didactic works mainly illustrated by (unfortunately anonymous) Indian artists under his guidance, and at the same time mediated by his bias and his culture, following an interesting and original hybrid format that bridges European figurative culture and Indian art.

The tragic story of Marino Faliero, the Doge of Venice who was executed for high treason in 1355, came to the attention of writers and artists of various European countries during the early nineteenth century thanks to a number of historians who published insightful works on the history of the Venetian Republic. Among those who were fascinated by the irascible old warrior who tried to overthrow the oligarchy on becoming head of state was Lord Byron. In 1821, the English poet published the historical drama Marino Faliero, Doge of Venice on the tragic end of a hero whose personal grievances with the Venetian Senate intertwined with an ill-fated plebeian rebellion against the nobility. Byron’s popularity in Italy brought the story to the attention of Italian romantic literary circles, where it was not only appreciated as a tragedy of honour and revenge, but also for its ideological implications in the context of the Risorgimento. This study focuses on the three translators who produced the first complete Italian versions of Byron’s play published in the nineteenth century, namely Pasquale De Virgili, Giovan Battista Cereseto, and Andrea Maffei. Based on André Lefevere’s theory on rewriting, it analyses the ideological and poetological reasons behind the translations, how the translators’ intentions shaped the target texts, as well as the impact these translations had on Italian literature and the arts. The strategies adopted by the translators are also illustrated through a comparative textual analysis of a sample passage.