Women's Patronage and Gendered Cultural Networks in Early Modern Europe: Vittoria della Rovere, Grand Duchess of Tuscany / Edition 1

by Adelina Modesti

Overview

This book examines the sociocultural networks between the courts of early modern Italy and Europe, focusing on the Florentine Medici court, and the cultural patronage and international gendered networks developed by the Grand Duchess of Tuscany, Vittoria della Rovere.

Adelina Modesti uses Grand Duchess Vittoria as an exemplar of pan-European 'matronage' and proposes a new matrilineal model of patronage in the early modern period, one in which women become not only the mediators but also the architects of public taste and the transmitters of cultural capital. The book will be the first comprehensive monographic study of this important cultural figure.

This study will be of interest to scholars working in art history, gender studies, Renaissance studies and seventeenth-century Italy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781138712522
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	12/16/2019
Series:	Visual Culture in Early Modernity
Pages:	328
Product dimensions:	6.88(w) x 9.69(h) x (d)

About the Author

Adelina Modesti is a Honorary Associate in Art History in the Department of Archaeology and History at La Trobe University, Melbourne.

Table of Contents

Part 1 GENDERED NETWORKS

1. Vittoria della Rovere at the Medici Court: A Dynasty of Women.

2. "Le Signore Dame": Vittoria della Rovere and her female courtiers.

3. Gendered Social and Cultural Networks: Italy and Beyond.

Part 2 SELF-FASHIONING and DISPLAY

4. Visual Splendour at the Court of Vittoria della Rovere; the Role of Portraiture. Chapter 5 Material Magnificence between the Courts of France and Florence: Vittoria della Rovere’s French Luxury Imports

6. Sartorial Elegance at the Medici Court: Fashioning the Grand Ducal Family

Part 3 CULTURAL PATRONAGE

7. A Discerning Eye: Vittoria della Rovere’s Art Patronage

8. The female virtuosa at the Grand Duchess’s court: Vittoria della Rovere’s patronage of female artists and other creative women.

9. Architectural Patronage, Interior Design and Decoration

Part 4 PIETY and SPIRITUAL PHILANTHROPY

10. Performing piety: Vittoria della Rovere and the theatre of religious devotion.

11."Sua infocata devotione": Vittoria della Rovere and the Reliquary Chapel of Santa Maria Maddalena de’Pazzi Nobile Fiorentina

12. Vittoria della Rovere’s Spiritual Philanthropy

Editorial Reviews

"Meticulously researched ... This thought-provoking examination of Vittoria della Rovere’s cultural and gendered patronage is a welcome addition to the ongoing discussions of the Medici women and the Medici family and to the flourishing scholarly discourse on women leaders, their patronage networks, their patronage, and, most importantly, their matronage."

—Renaissance Quarterly

"...A cogent, well-structured monograph. ... What'stood out for this reader was Modesti’s ability to weave personal agency within group and familial structures. In addition to its considerable content, this volume exemplifies an approach that eschews the Romantic and post-Romantic fixation on the (typically male) individual to consider the many structures within which actions take place and highlight how people acted within them."

—Early Modern Women

"Meticulously researched ... This thought-provoking examination of Vittoria della Rovere’s cultural and gendered patronage is a welcome addition to the ongoing discussions of the Medici women and the Medici family and to the flourishing scholarly discourse on women leaders, their patronage networks, their patronage, and, most importantly, their matronage."

—Renaissance Quarterly

"...A cogent, well-structured monograph. ... What'stood out for this reader was Modesti’s ability to weave personal agency within group and familial structures. In addition to its considerable content, this volume exemplifies an approach that eschews the Romantic and post-Romantic fixation on the (typically male) individual to consider the many structures within which actions take place and highlight how people acted within them."

—Early Modern Women

From the Publisher