THE ART OF SELF-FASHIONING AND THE BUSINESS OF ART: ELEONORA GONZAGA'S PATRONAGE OF PAINTING, ARCHITECTURE, AND MAIOLICA IN THE DUCHY OF URBINO

My MA thesis analyzes the patronage and collecting (of art, architecture, and ceramics) of Eleonora Gonzaga (1493-1550), Duchess of Urbino. It takes the form of case studies on particular works that she commissioned: maiolica ceramics, the marital pendant portraits commissioned from Titian, and the Villa Imperiale complex of architecture and painting in Pesaro. I first examine the layout and arrangement of the Villa, designed by Eleonora and executed by Girolamo Genga, to understand the impact of its careful organization on the viewer. In addition, I analyze the imagery in the frescoes by Genga, Raffaellino del Colle, Francesco Menzocchi, and Agnolo Bronzino in the Sala della Calunnia and Sala dei Fiumi, and their physical and conceptual relationship to one another. Next, discussing the materiality of maiolica, I assess the visual, material, and cultural consumption in Marchegian court culture by examining the sensuous and sensual aspects of the dining experience. These maiolica pieces can be understood to have served as political tools during banquets, communicating not only ducal power and rule within the duchy, but also foregrounding Eleonora’s political and marital authority. Evidence from contracts, account books, and Eleonora’s correspondence is used to evaluate the economic and political agency of Eleonora in the context of her marriage with Francesco Maria I (1490-1538) and her relationships with other key political figures in the period. In doing so, complex issues of power and patronage, Mediterranean trade and exchange during the Renaissance, and the materiality of objects are explored. Broader themes considered include the business of art, trade, and material consumption in Italy during the sixteenth century, especially in relation to the economics of the maiolica ceramic industry. The intricacies of the history of the international art market are also of interest, such as the ways in which patronage of some of the most internationally renowned Italian artists at this time—including Titian, Dosso Dossi, Nicola da Urbino, and Francesco Xanto Avelli—communicated Eleonora Gonzaga’s socioeconomic, cultural, and political power. Lastly, the relationship of Eleonora’s cultural patronage to the model offered by her mother, the Marchioness Isabella d’Este (1474-1539), is explored; Isabella, in contrast to her daughter, has been the object of serious study in English-language scholarship. This study endeavors to address the lacuna in the scholarship concerning Eleonora, who was a sophisticated patron of art and a savvy curator of her public persona at court in her own right.