LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE: A NEW ALLEGORY OF ARTISTS' TRAINING ALBERTINA, INV. NO. 2763

BY CATHERINE KING Explicit in the earliest treatises on art is the idea that image-making is a noble calling. Taking this view the Florentine Cennini in the late fourteenth century in his 'Libro dell'Arte' described

come alcuni vengono all'arte, cht per animo gentile e chi per guadagno 1 : Non san^a cagione d'animo gentile alcuni si muovono di venire a questa arte, piacendoli per amore naturale. Lo 'ntelleto al disegno si diletta solo, chi da loro medesimi la natura α cid git trae, san^a nulla guida di maestro, per gentile^a di animo ... Alcuni sono, che per povertä e necessitä del vivere seguitano, si per guadagno e anche per I'amor dell'arte; ma, sopra tutti quellt, da commendare e quellt che per amore e per gentilie^a all'arte predetta vengono

abstemious life siccome avessi a studiare in teologia ο filosofia ο altre scien^.

2 .

Cennini went on to advise novice painters to avoid the pleasures of sensuality, adopting an In 'Delia Pittura', written about 1435, Cennini's fellow countryman Alberti developed the theme after he had explained the dignity of painting, though in this case stressing the canny idea that in the long run, hard work and a desire to excel offered better routes to riches and fame than the profit motive. UAvaritia fu sempre inimica della virtu; raro potra adquistare nome

animo alcune che sia dato al guadagnio. Vidi io molti quasi nel primo fiore d'inparare subito caduti al guadagnio, indi acquistrare tie richest ne lode, quali certo se avessero acresciuto suo ingegnio con studio, facile sarebbono saliti in molta lode et ivi arebonno acquistato richest et piacere assai

4 . In the opening sentence of autobiography in his 'Commentari', composed about 1450 in Florence, Ghiberti also linked purity of enthusiasm for his art with the pursuit of the principles underlying it. Ε io, ο excel-

lentissimo, non ό a ubbidire la pecunia diedt lo studio per I'arte la quale da mia pueritia ο sempre seguita con grande studio et disciplina. Conciö sia cosa ch'io abbta sempre i primi precetti ο cercato di investigare in che modo la natura procede in essa ... et in che modo la teorica dell'arte statuaria et della pictura si

I want to thank Tony Coulson, Duncan Flatman, and Erika Langmuir for their help in composing and completing this paper, which I dedicate to Michael Baxandall and Ernst Gombrich. All translations are mine. ') C. CENNINI, II Libro dell' Arte, Florence 1943, p. 21, transl. in Ε. Ηοι,τ, A Documentary History of Art, I, New York 1957, p. 138: 'Some enter the Profession through loftiness of Spirit, and some for Profit'. 2 ) CENNINI, ibid., and HOLT, ibid., pp. 138— 139: 'It is not without the impulse of a lofty spirit that some are moved to enter this profession [a questa arte] attractive to them through natural enthusiasm [amore naturale]. Their intellect will take delight in drawing, provided their nature attracts them to it of themselves, without any master's guidance, out of loftiness of spirit . . . There are those who pursue it, because of poverty and domestic need, for profit and enthusiasm for the profession [l'amor dell'arte] too; but above all these are to be extolled the ones who enter the profession through a sense of enthusiasm and exaltation.' 3 ) CENNINI, ibid., p. 34 and HOLT, ibid., p. 141: 'As if they were studying theology, or philosophy, or other theories'. 4 ) L. B. ALBERTI, Della Pittura, Florence 1950, p. 81. L. B. ALBERTI, On Painting and on Sculpture, transl. C. Grayson, London 1972, p. 67: 'Avarice was always the enemy of renown and virtue. A mind intent on gain will rarely obtain the reward of fame with posterity. I have seen many in the very flower of learning descend to gain and thereafter obtain neither riches nor distinction, who if they had improved their talent with application, would early have risen to fame and there received both wealth and the satisfaction of renown'. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

78 C A T H E R I N E K I N G

dovesse condurre

5 . Similarly Leonardo disparaged the pursuit of wealth, in his career advice: Adunque

tu pittore guarda, che la cupiditä del guadagnio non superi in te I'onore dell'arte, che il guadagno dell'onore e molto maggiore che I'onore delle riche^e 6

. Leonardo then explained that the way to gain this renown was to work hard at drawing and at a meticulously exact preparatory routine for producing compositions. Fame in art, for Leonardo too, like Ghiberti, is associated with thoroughness and theorizing. The pervasiveness of these ideas on art education and the alacrity with which they were brought forward as explanations for action is indicated in the terms of the justification for painting in the Sala of the Maggior Consiglio in the Doge's palace in Venice which Titian gave in a petition to the Consiglio dei Dieci on May 31, 1513. Titian wrote that he had placed himself

ad imparar larte dela pictura non tanto per cupidita del guadagno, quanta per veder de acquistar qualche

poco di fama . . . It was for this reason that he had assumpto de venir a depen^er nel Ma^or Conseio

et poner ogni mio in^egno et spirito fina haver vita, principiando, se cussi parera all Sublimita Vostra dal teller nel qual e quella bataglia da la banda verso de ρίαχα che e la piu d i f f i c i l e et che homo alcuno, fina questo di non ha voluto tuore tanta impresa 1 .

These writers then oppose mercenary motives to those of love of art itself (Cennini, Alberti, Ghiberti) or to love of fame (Leonardo, Titian). All link fame and excellence with the dignity of the profession and qualities like its theoretical bases, its rationality, and inventiveness which stress its non-craft-like principles. These notions concerning the aims and education of the artist were quite commonplace by the early sixteenth century in writing and speech. However they were not given visual expression until the second half of the sixteenth century in a group of pedagogical allegories made by the founders of the earliest artistic academies in Florence (1563) and Rome (1577) and their followers in Italy and Northern Europe 8 . It is with the meaning and sources of one of these new visual allegories of artistic education that I am concerned. This allegory is a large drawing in the collection of the Albertina and has the distinction of combining several of the key themes connected with the change in the intellectual status of art (Figs. 1, 3, 4) 9 . It expresses the unity of the arts of painting, sculpture and architecture under the umbrella of design, and it demonstrated the scientific and antiquarian interests which were 5 ) Italian in J. VON SCHLOSSER, Lorenzo Ghibertis Denkwürdigkeiten: I Commentarij, Berlin 1912, p. 45. Transl. in Ηοι.τ, Documentary History (cit. η. 1), p. 156: Ί , ο most excellent reader, did not have to obey [a desire for] money, but gave myself to the study of art which since my childhood I have always pursued with great zeal and devotion. In order to master the basic principles [of art] I have sought to investigate the way nature functions in art . . . and in what way the theory of sculpture and painting should be established'. 6 ) J. A. and I. A. RICHTHR, The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci, I, Oxford 1939, No. 502, p. 309. The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, transl. E. MACCURDY, II, London 1954, p. 239: 'Do you, therefore, Ο Painter, take care lest the greed for gain prove a stronger incentive than renown in art, for to gain this renown is a far greater thing than is the renown of riches'. 7 ) G. LORENZI, Monumenti per servire alia storia del Palazzo Ducale di Venezia, Part I, Venice 1868, p. 157. 'To learn the art of painting not so much for desire of gain as with a view to acquiring a degree of fame'. 'Taken the task of coming to paint in the Maggior Consiglio and committing all my inventiveness and spirit to the last gasp, beginning - as long as this is pleasing to Our Sublimity — with the canvas showing the battle, on the side towards the piazza, which is the most difficult and the enterprise which until now none wanted to take upon himself to complete'. 8 ) N. PEVSNER, Academies of Art, Past and Present, Cambridge 1940, pp.44 — 49, 60. — L'Accademia Nazionale di San Luca, Rome 1974, p. 10. A. STIX and A. SPITZMÜI.LER, Beschreibender Katalog der Handzeichnungen in der Staatlichen graphischen Sammlung Albertina, VI, Die Schulen von Ferrara, Bologna, Parma und Modena, der Lombardei... Vienna 1941, p. 42, no. 443, Inv. η. 2763, 331 x 214 mm. Chalk, pen, bistre wash. Lower left-hand corner somewhat washed out and worn. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE 79 the badges of the aspiring professionals who belonged to the first artistic academies. Above all, it represents a further idea which complemented the notion that artists were no mere craftworkers: the credo that excellence, fame and honour could only be attained if monetary reward and wordly pleasures were rejected in favour of the sheer love of art itself. Thus the allegory draws together themes from the preliminary texts stressing that art is neither mercenary nor menial. It is set apart from the taint of trade and craft. It is vocation perverted and sullied by carnal vanities. The importance of these ideas, represented so concisely in the allegory, for European concepts of art and artist right up to present day could hardly be over-estimated: the Albertina drawing then, is a seminal configuration. It has never been convincingly explicated, nor has its full significance been assessed. The allegory is described by the Stix-Spitzmüller catalogue of the Albertina — with a traditional attribution to the Milanese artist Lomazzo: „Vor einer mächtigen Halle mit Durchblick ins Freie sitzt auf einem Throne ein alter Mann mit Strahlen-Krone und Fackel in der rechten Hand, auf Treppen steigen drei Knaben zu ihm empor. Der oberste kniet, der nächste trägt ein Brett (?) und wird von Amor mit dem Pfeil verwundet, der unterste hat einen Stelzfuß und trägt den linken Arm in der Binde. Am Fuße der Treppe befinden sich allegorische Figuren, darunter Merkur, Venus mit Amor, Minerva, ein Totengerippe mit Sense, eine Darstellung des Alters in Gestalt einer alten Frau. Über dem Throne sind Fama und Victoria dargestellt. In der Halle gehen Bildhauer, Maler und Architekten ihren Beschäftigungen nach. Der Durchblick zeigt einen Stadtplatz, rechts einen Palast mit Baugerüsten 10 ." The description offers no identification of the enthroned man and it fudges itemizing the figures at the base: the woman with the kerchief to her face behind the skeleton, and the man with the thyrsus, the cornucopia and the shield (or musical instrument) at lower left; and the two women on the right — one of which holds a bag that the crippled boy moves to grasp, and the other about whom snakes are writhing. In addition it identifies the object held by the naked child, whom another pierces with an arrow, as a 'plank', when in fact it is a curved yoke. One reading of this drawing has been offered by Lynch with reference to Lomazzo's writings on art. The enthroned figure is interpreted as Saturn and the drawing supposedly shows the journey of the idea of painting born of the celestial Venus towards fame and victory. At left defeated death represents the temporal obstacles of the painter while the woman above it is a 'memento mori'. A step above death stands Bacchus, symbol of divine inspiration who puts wings on the youthful talent which Venus is attaching to its back. At base right a crippled 'child of Saturn' grabs at the bag of money held out by avarice, and behinds her stands envy. The youth kneeling at the top of the steps is a votary of Saturn who is born of the union of the standing figures below him: Mercury and Bellona. The child who carried a yoke (not a plank as described by the Albertina catalogue) and is struck by Cupid's arrow represents that union. In a footnote to an article on Lomazzo's artistic treatise, Ackerman suggested that the Albertina drawing showed not Saturn, but Disegno, who guides those who accept the yoke towards fame and glory. He described the two figures on either side of the stairs at the top as Mercury and Minerva contending, respectively, with despair and death, and with indecision as the painter progresses 11 . 1 0 ) STIX-SPITZMÜLLER, ibid. n ) J. B. LYNCH, Lomazzo's Allegory of Painting, in: Gazette des Beaux Arts, CX, 1968, pp. 324 e. s; G. M. ACKERMAN, Lomazzo's Treatise on Painting, in: Art Bull., XLIX, 1967, p. 318, n. 6. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

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CATHERINE KING

The identification of envy and avarice, Mercury and fame by Lynch are I believe correct. The interpretation of Ackerman that Mercury is accompanied by Minerva and that Disegno presides over all seems plausible. However the fullest consistent reading of this drawing emerges if it is regarded within the context of other allegories of art made during the second half of the sixteenth century and in the light of a poem by Ketel, rather than solely in terms of a supposed connection with Lomazzo. This poem which the Netherlandish painter Ketel appended to a drawing he made of the Tree of Art was transcribed by Van Mander. In the section of his biography of Ketel in which he dealt with work produced in Amsterdam between 1589 and 1595, van Mander related that Ketel made,

als voor eerst eene Teekening verbeeidende door eenen Boom der Künste, de 3 hoofd-oogmerken, waaröm alle Künsten geleerd worden: Geld, Eer en Kunstliefde; noch eene Geluk verwekt Nijd, met bijgestelde Verden in dichtmaat, 'Drie dingen %ijri er, die den Eeerling meest bewegen; / Geld, Eer en Liefd tot Kunst en eedle Wetenschap; / Die Gierigheid komt hem, die Geld %oekt, altoos tegen, / Zij dreigt en %et den voet hem dwars op elken stap; / Die roem of Eer bejaagt %al wel wat verder treeden, / Want ijdele Eer^ucht leidt wel tot der Künsten Boom, / Doch wijl dees op 't gewicht van vruchten is te Vreden,

/

En tot het klimmen ζelfs veel te angstig of te loom, / Zal hij slechts onder aan de onrijpe vrucht afplukken; / Maar wiende Eiefde voert het edel Kunstpad op, / Dien %al %ijn arbeid ook gewis op 't eind gelukken, / Wen hij, door Naarstigheid geschraagd, raakt in den top, / Geduld reiht hem de vrucht, daar Geld en Eer hem wachten, / En bij %ijne afkomst al %ijri arbeid doen verächten xl .

In a second verse, Ketel had described the way fame was plagued by hate, envy and sly calumny, though truth would, he affirmed, win in the end. This little allegory has not survived. Ketel's poem explains some aspects of the Albertina drawing. The boy at base right of the composition for example is not disabled because he is a 'child of Saturn' but to show that the talents of a pupil who is out for money and meets avarice are crippled so that he cannot ascend further. The group above him shows not the marriage of Mercury and Bellona but the way love urges the pupil to climb the stairs to true achievement and its reward. Pierced by the arrow of Amor the child shoulders the yoke which stands either for patience (if one consults Vasari's programme for his Arretine house — 1542/ 48 — and Ripa's 'Iconologia' — 1593) or hard work (if one refers to Federico Zuccaro's pictographic biography —c. 1590 —of his brother Taddeo where a woman labelled Labor holds a yoke in her arms) 13 . Kneeling at the top of the steps is the young apprentice who has reached the threshold of the hall of three arts of design through his love and diligence. The theme of the poem and drawing by Ketel with their contrast between wordly rewards 12 )

K.

VAN MANDER

, Het leven der Schilders (first published in 1604), Amsterdam 1764, II, pp. 61 —62. Ά drawing which represented by means of a Tree of Art the three major inducements through which all the arts are learnt — money, honour and love of art —and also the way success arouses envy, along with the following lines of verse which he attached to it: 'Three things there are that most spur the pupil: money; honour; love of art and noble science. He who seeks for money always meets avarice who is a menace to him and trips him up at every step. He who seeks after renown or honour can certainly climb a little higher for wordly ambition certainly does lead to the Tree of Arts. But since he is satisfied at the mere sight of the fruit, and too fearful or too sluggish to climb further himself he only picks the unripe fruit at the foot of the tree. But one whom love urges up the noble path of art will certainly succeed at this work in the end. When, supported by diligence, he attains the summit, patience offers him the result, where money and honour await him and at fruition this will cause him to belittle all his toil.' My gratitude to the Dutch Section, Department of Printed Books, British Library for checking my translation and especially to Dr. Lotte Hellinga, Assistant Keeper, British Library for solving the meaning of the last two lines. 13 ) L.

CHENEY

, The Paintings of the Casa Vasari, Michigan 1978, 1, p. 244; C.

RIPA

, Iconologia (first published 1593), Padua 1611, p. 387;

D. HEIKAMP

, Vicende di Federico Zuccari, in: Rivista d'Arte, XXXII, 1957, p. 202, fig. 7.

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L A T E S I X T E E N T H - C E N T U R Y C A R E E R S ' A D V I C E 81 and the purer satisfications of seeking high standards in art is of considerable antiquity — perhaps stemming ultimately from the discussion by Seneca in 'De Beneficiis' (II. 33) of the motives of the painter Phidias 14 . And it retained currency well into the seventeenth century. It was for example the conceit on which the painter Samuel von Hoogstraeten formed his large painted perspectival box showing money, glory and art herself as three-fold inducements to the young artist, dated about 1678 15 . Since the Albertina drawing shows two of the enticements Ketel had outlined it bears brief consideration that the group of figures base left were intended to suggest the third spur to the student: the love of wordly honour. Personifications of honour did after all sometimes carry a cornucopia 16 . Yet the presence of the Bacchic thyrsus in the hand of the standing male at left as well as the cornucopia, and the fact that Ripa described these attributes as those of 'Allegrezza', suggests that the lower left-hand group is to be understood rather in terms of the ascent to virtue which was represented by Federico Zuccaro and his colleagues and pupils in the second half of the sixteenth century 17 . These artistic allegories exhorted the young artist to reject the easy road of pleasure and instead take the painful path which ascends through virtue to true honour and fame. It will be obvious that these allegories are closely related to the theme of the Ketel poem. Indeed the meaning of the Albertina drawing derives from an interrelated cluster of ideas about the education of the artist at this period. I shall however argue that the group base left was intended to signify the favourite notion of Zuccaro and his circle: that wordly pleasures (represented by the man with the Bacchic wand and the cornucopia) ultimately lead to pain, sorrow and death (rendered by the woman clutching the kerchief to her mouth behind the man and by the personification of death below) and that they should be rejected by the wise young artist. Because this group of allegories offer identification not only of the lower left hand group, but also explanations for the presence of Mercury, the woman Lynch named Bellona but I prefer along with Ackerman to term Minerva, fame and 'Victory', and a convincing context in which the Albertina drawing came to be made, it is worth looking at them in some detail. The theme of the laborious ascent to virtue and the avoidance of the easy path of vice had been pursued in ancient literature in a variety of contexts including Hesiod's 'Works and Days', the choice of Hercules, the dream of Scipio, and the Pythagorean Ύ ' as simile of human life 18 . In 'Works and Days' Hesiod introduced the image, offering true happiness and excellence only to those who chose the narrow and difficult path rather than the broad and attractive one 19 . However the version told by Xenophon as an educational fable of the decision which Hercules 14 ) SENECA, De Beneficiis, Bk. II, Ch. X X X I I I , in: Seneca's Moral Essays, ed. J. W. Basore, London and Cambridge, Mass., 1935, III, pp. 1 1 7 - 1 1 8 . 15 ) N. MACI.AREN, National Gallery Catalogues, The Dutch School, London 1960, pp. 1 9 3 - 1 9 5 , No. 3832. - S. VAN HOOGSTRAETEN, Inleyding tot de Hooge Schoole der Schilderkonst, Rotterdam 1678, p. 345 quotes the Seneca text, see n. 14 above. 16 ) RIPA, Iconologia (cit. n. 13), p. 219. 17 ) Ibid., p. 12. 18 ) These allegories of the choice of virtue are discussed in Τ. E. MOMMSEN, Petrarch and the story of the choice of Hercules, in: J. of the Warburg and Courtauld Inst., XVI, 1953, pp. 178 —192; E. PANOFSKY, Hercules am Scheidewege, Berlin and Leipzig 1930; W. HARMS, Hercules Viator am Bivio: Studien zur Bildlichkeit des Weges, Munich 1970; the legend of the tablet of Cebes is closely related to these allegories: J. T. FITZGERALD and L. Μ. WHITE, The Tabula of Cebes, Chicago 1983. " ) HESIOD, Works and Days, vv. 289 - 292, transl. H. G. Evelyn - White, in: The Homeric hymns and Homerica, London and New York 1914, pp. 2 5 - 2 6 . Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

82 CATHERINE K I N G

made between pleasure and virtue had greatest currency 20 . Xenophon praised Hercules choosing the hard path leading, through his titanic labours, to immortality, and pointed the moral that achievement, joy and fame were only possible to those who turned their backs on transient delights. Almost as well-known, was Silius Italicus' transposition of the story from the demi god Hercules to the warrior hero Scipio 21 . In a dream Scipio sees pleasure attended by drun kenness, luxury and disgrace, while virtue is accompanied by honour, praise, renown and glory. Fired with love of virtue (calet amore virtutis), Scipio vows to ascend to the temple of Jupiter and earn the laurel wreath of victory through hardship. These exemplars were highly sympathetic to Christian culture. Their important was summed up in the legend that Pythagoras had taken the letter Ύ ' as image of human life: a story which, typically, Ripa in the late sixteenth century quoted in the context of a discussion of his personification of free will. Ripa explained that Libero Arbitrio carried a sceptre topped by a Ύ ' , because la vita humana haveva due vie, come la

sopradetta lettera e divisa in due rami, del quale il destro e come la via della virtu, che da principio e angusta, e erta: ma nella sommita e spatiosa, e agiata, e il ramo sinistra e come la strada del vitio, la quale e larga, e commoda; ma finisce in angustia e precipitii 12 .

The idea was first associated with the artist by the Florentine architect Filarete in his treatise on architecture in the 1460s. There he described the desirable decoration of the artist's house in the imaginary city of Sforzinda as bearing a portrait of himself and a representation of 'virtu' along with 'volunta, ragione, fama, memoria' and 'ingegnio' 2 3 . 'Virtu' is described and illustrated by Filarete as an armed and winged figure with nimbed head whose everlasting victory is denoted by the pyramidal shaped diamond it stands on, the palm of victory and fruitful date tree it holds on to and the winged features of fame which float overhead. From the pyramid flows a stream of honey. Filarete also outlined a representation of vice in terms of a wheel with the seven spokes of the seven vices, and a naked satyr playing dice and indulging in food and wine. From vice issued a river of mud. As well as designing two separate personifications of Virtue and Vice, Filarete described how they could be joined: Virtue being shown at the apex of a mountain to which only one narrow path led, and below the mountain a cave in which Vice should skulk ignominiously 24 . To express his ambition, he called himself Antonio Averlino 'il Filarete' — the transliteration of the Greek words for 'a lover of virtue'. Elsewhere in his treatise he described the house of vice and virtue in Sforzinda and explored the paradox that the choice of pain (that is of the hard work of climbing the path to virtue) brought joy and success as its reward; while the initial choice of pleasure following the broad path of wordly ease led eventually to sadness. In his allegorical building there were two doors, I'una mano diritta e I'altra a mano manca, le quali

que I la da mano diritta sarä chiamata porta Areti e que I la da mano sinistra sarä chiamata porta Cachia; e come s'entra in quella da mano diritta, sarä una scala alta braccia sette, e que I la da mano sinistra sarä magiore porta, e como se entra dentro si trova una iscesa ripente come una scala, ma non vi sia scaloni nessuno.

^ XENOPHON, transl. Sarah Fielding, Memoirs of Socrates, Bath, 1762, pp.92 —101. 2 1 ) SII.IUS ITALICUS, transl. J. D. Duff, Punica, London and New York 1934, II, Bk. X V , 1 2 - 1 3 7 ; v. 130, p.334

for 'calet amore virtutis'.

RIPA, Iconologia (cit. n. 13), pp. 316 —317: 'human life has two routes, just as the aforesaid letter divides into

two branches, of which the one on the right is like the path of virtue since at the beginning it is steep and sloping but as its summit is spacious and comfortable, and the lefthand branch is like the road of vice, which is broad and smooth but leads only to a defile and chasms'. 23

) Transl. in: J. R. SPENCER, Filarete's Treatise on Architecture, New Haven and London 1965, I, p. 259.

24 ) Ibid., pp. 2 4 5 - 2 4 7 .

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LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE

83

Et di sopra da esse porta saranno scritte queste parole: a porta Areti, cioe a quella da man destra git sarä scritto 'fatica con gaudio'; e nell'altra dalla mano sinistra gli sard scritto 'piacere con tristi^ia', la quale si

chiama porta CachicP. Filarete went on to explain that Bacchus, Venus and Priapus stood at the door of vice and invented further inscriptions for the sculptures of Virtue and Vice which were to adorn the respective doors 26 . Over Virtue were the words Questo e la via ad andare acquistare la virtu con fatica — 'This is the way to attain virtue through hard work'. Over Vice was the exhortation Qui entrate, brigata, che goderete e poi con dispiacere il piagnerete — 'Who enters here will be in good company and enjoy themselves, yet soon will lament in misery'. These same inscriptions were to appear with Virtue and Vice on the facade of the architect's own house in Sforzinda 27 . These ideas were not given visual form in relation to the artist outside a treatise until the early sixteenth century, when Ottaviano Zuccaro painted a mural in his house in Sant' Angelo in Vado representing the arts and the words unica parandi honoris via — 'there is only one way of attaining honour' 28 . Soon after 1573 when the artists Diana Ghisi and her husband Francesco da Volterra rented a house in Rome they got Raffaellino da Reggio to paint the facade with a mural showing, according to Baglione, "Virtü' taking Hercules and 'Genio' by the hand and leading them up the temple of'Eternitä'" Lulworth and the British Museum (Fig. 5) 2 9 30 . Something of the scheme (which derived from the stories of Hercules and Scipio choosing the path of virtue) is known from drawings at Lille, . Baglione's description is satisfactory for the figures (Hercules with his club, Virtü as Minerva along with a soldierly figure who is to be thought of as Scipio or a youthful hero) but his identification of the temple of misleading. In fact there are two temples on the hill in the Lulworth drawing and they are not the temple of 'Eternitä' but the temples of virtue and honour. Raffaellino's mural referred to the moralization of the building by Marcellus in Rome of two temples to virtue and honour as described by Valerius Maximus. These temples were joined in such a way that the shrine of honour could be entered by the door of virtue: an anecdote exemplifying the notion that honour is the reward of virtue. As Boccaccio had explained: ut apparere neminem nisi per virtutem honorem consequi posse — 'so that it would be clear that one cannot attain honour except through virtue 31 .' The currency of the association of the allegory of the ascent to virtue with the artist at this time is attested in the plan to use similar imagery for Titian's funeral in 1576 according to the 25 ) FILARETE, Trattato di Architettura, ed. A. M. Finoli and L. Grassi, Milan 1972, II, p. 535: 'the one to the right

hand and the other to the left, and that at the right hand shall be called the Porta Areti [of Virtue] and that at the left hand shall be called Porta Cachia [of Vice] and the entrance for that on the right hand shall consist of a stair which is seven braccia high and that on the left shall have the larger doorway and on entering one will find a sloping shute like a stairway without any treads. And above the doors will be written these words: at the Porta Areti, that is the one at

the right hand side, shall be inscribed fatica con gaudio [hard work with joy] and on the other at the left hand side shall be written piacere con tristi^ia [pleasure with sadness] that is to say on the door called Porta Cachia.' Ibid., p. 535; for the presence of Priapus, Bacchus and Venus at the door of Vice, see SPENCER, Filarete's Treatise

(cit. n. 23), p. 253.

27 ) SPENCER, Filarete's Treatise (cit. n. 23), p. 259. 28 ) K. HERMANN — FIORE, Die Fresken Federico Zuccaris in seinem Römischen Künstlerhaus, in Rom. Jb. der

Bibliotheca Hertziana, XVIII, 1979, pp. 3 5 - 1 1 2 , especially p. 39. 29

) ]. A. GERE, P. POUNCEY and R. WOOD, Italian Drawings in the British Museum: Artists working in Rome c. 1 5 5 0 - 1 6 4 0 , London 1983, pp. 1 4 7 - 1 4 8 . G. BAGLIONE, Le Vite de' Pittori, Scultori, et Architetti, Rome 1649, p. 26: net me%p evvi la Virtü che tien per mano Hercote, e 7 Genio, e vanno verso it Terapio dell'Eternitä. 3 0 ) G E R E , POUNCEY a n d WOOD, ibid., p. 1 4 7 .

31

) G. BOCCACCIO, Genealogiae, Venice 1494, fol. 25r, Ch. XI. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

84

C A T H E R I N E K I N G

account of Ridolfi 32 . The Lulworth drawing records the imprese Evexit ad aethera virtus — 'Virtue ascends to the heavens', as having been placed on the facade of the house of Diana Ghisi and Franceso da Volterra in Rome 33 . The representation in honour of Titian had the words per ardua virtus — 'virtue through hard work' — as in Filarete's earlier suggested inscription, with the device of 'a steep mountain with a lofty summit piercing the heavens like a pyramid'. The device accompanied a personification of 'fatica' or hardwork who was 'a beautiful young woman of robust appearance but poorly dressed to show that only those who are poor but strong can produce the fruits of virtue and withstand the rigours of diligent study' along with the motto sic itum ad gloriam — 'thus one may attain honour'. Next to 'fatica' in the funeral apparatus was a personification of honour himself crowned with palm and leaning on a shield on which was 'the temple of Marcellus' with the letters virtute praevia — 'with virtue leading the way' — and the motto certaminis trophea — 'the trophies of victory' 34 . At the same time as Raffaellino was producing his mural, Federico Zuccaro (son of Ottaviano and teacher of Raffaellino) was pursuing a variation on the theme for the cartouches in the frame of his 'Calumny' following the 'Calumny of Apelles': an image which reached a wide audience through the engraving made by Cornells Cort in 1572 35 . In the drawing the base of. the frame shows Minerva as Virtus, but this time with Mercury gesticulating with his staff and urging a young man to take the steep path to the summit of a mountain crowned by a tree and two adjoining temples (Fig. 6) 36 . The blandishments of vice which he spurns are represented by animals. Flanking the cartouche Zuccaro drew a man embracing an ox and another breaking a yoke. Federico's son Ottaviano provided a gloss on these elements in the intricate frame of the 'Calumny'. The 'desire for virtue', wrote Ottaviano, is signified by the images of Aeneas carrying the golden bough of oak which protected him when he descended to hell: utt Giovane con un ramo

d'oro in mano, figurata per Enea, quando si finge che andasse all' Inferno per il ramo d'oro, che denoto il desiderio della Virtu ... Dipinse appresso nell'ovato da basso il medesimo Giovane con detto ramo in mano, che desiderando salir il monte della Virtü vien travagliato da molti vitii, che l'impediscono, come dall' ignoran^a, lascivia, lussuria, e simili,figurati per il lupo, asino, e porco cigniale, che gli traversano la strada, et impediscono il viaggio, e dall'altra parte del medesimo ovato dipinse il monte della Virtü, con il Tempio dell' istessa Virtü alia cima di esso, et a piedi di quello una strade piana dove stavano molti dan^ando, e pigliandosi vari piaceri, il fin de'quali era poi di cadere in un gran precipitio. Ε perche la via della Virtü e molto d i f f i c i l e per tanto finse, che molti che salivano detto monte, quando erano al me^o, ο verso la cima di esso, traboccavano al basso, figurando nel medesimo ovato una Nave in alto Mare combattuta da ferocissimi venti, per denotare quanto sia d i f f i c i l e a i Giovani di passar la lor gioventu virtuosamente. Ε perche non si puo giungere al Tempio della Virtü sen^a gran fatiga, pero da una parte di detto ovato figurd un Giovane,

32

) C. RIDOLFI, Le Meraviglie dell'Arte, Padua 1835, I, Ch. XI, p . 2 7 5 e . s. 3 3 ) G E R E , POUNCEY a n d W O O D , I t a l i a n D r a w i n g s ( c i t . n . 2 9 ) , p . 1 4 7 . RIDOI.FI, Meraviglie (cit. n. 32), pp. 275 — 282. Ridolfi does not actually identify honour but described him with

attributes

(coronato di palme, maniglie if oro, asta, scudo)

which accord with Ripa's description of honour, see

R I P A ,

Iconologia (cit. n. 13), p. 219. The total scheme showed A p o l l o and Mnemosyne (the parents of the Muses), 'disegno', sculpture, architecture, symmetry, hard work and honour.

3 S ) J . C. J . BIERENS DE HAAN, L'CEuvre grave de Cornells Cort, graveur Hollandais, 1533 — 1578, The Hague 1948,

no. 219, pp. 2 0 1 - 2 0 3 . Ibid., fig. 56, p. 203 (Hamburg, Kunsthalle, Inv. no. 21516.)

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85

che abbraccia il bove, e dall'altra mo che rompe un giogo, che tutti due denotano la fatiga per la quale si acquista la Virti?

1 .

From the same period dates a drawing by Raffaellino or by Zuccaro which is a variant on this theme (Fig. 7). The youth is exhorted even more vehemently by Mercury and Minerva to begin the stiff climb and the temptations of pleasure are signified by Venus and Bacchus 38 . Zuccaro's most elaborate essai on the theme was made to decorate the vault of the entrance hall of his own house in Rome, in the 1590s. The scheme showed the Labours of Hercules and in the centre the choice of Hercules (Fig. 2) 39 . In the foreground lies Hercules being urged to climb the mountain behind him by a winged woman. The hero has his arm resting on the Erymanthian boar and the attributes of lion-skin and club. In the distance are lovers and musicians. Above Hercules two men are beginning the ascent. The upper one carries the bough which identifies him as Aeneas. The lower youth is menaced by leopard, lion and wolf. These appear to refer to the beasts encountered by Dante in the 'Inferno' and which were interpreted by commentators respectively as lust, pride and avarice 40 . At the summit of the hill are the temples of virtue and honour, of which we possess a close-up in the form of a drawing (Fig. 8) 41 . To the left Zuccaro shows the fate of those too impatient for honour and fame. They take short

cuts, grab at fruto pestifero (pestilent fruit) and non piu sapere quod parte sapere ('no longer can

know what carries knowledge'). In contrast the successful attain the palm tree of 'virtus' and enter the vestibule of the temple of 'virtus' with the guidance of Minerva. Thence they reach the temple of honour and finally that of fame before which a woman flourishes the staff of Mercury, and Apollo in the foreground is flanked by Muses, geometers, astronomers, artists, philosophers and musicians: the haven of true knowledge. Just as the idea of the artist ascending to virtue through hard work had derived from Filarete, so had Zuccaro's notion of what greeted the heroic youth at the end of the climb: for in Filarete's description, the summit of the house

3 7 ) O T T A V I A N O Z U C C A R O , Idea de' concetti politici, morali, e christiani di diversi celebri Autori, Bologna 1 6 2 8 , quoted in H E I K A M P , Zuccari (cit. n.

1 3 ) .

'Besides he depicted in the oval at the base how the same youth who, desiring to climb the mount of virtue is attacked by many vices that impede him, like ignorance, lasciviousness, luxury and similar things, represented by a wolf, an ass, and a wild boar that thwart him on the road and hamper his journey, and in the other section of the same oval he depicted the mount of virtue with the temple of that virtue at its summit and at the foot of it a smooth road, where there are many dancing and partaking of various pleasures but whose destiny is to fall over the edge of a great precipe. And because the road of virtue is very difficult, he invented the imagery that many who climbed the mountain were shown, when they were already half way up or even near the top, as falling down to the bottom, and he also showed in the same oval a ship on the high seas battling with furious winds to represent how difficult it is for the young to pass their youth virtuosamente. And because one cannot reach the temple of virtue without very hard work on one side of the said oval he showed a youth who embraces an ox and on the other side one who breaks a yoke, that together signify the hard work with which one attains virtue.' 38 ) R.

H A R P R A T H , Katalog der Ausstellung 1977 der Graphischen Sammlung München, Italienische Zeichnungen des 16. Jahrhunderts, Munich 1977, no. 72, Inv. no. 1292 (Photo neg. no. 7937/1). 3 9 ) H E R M A N N — F I O R E , Fresken (cit. n. 28), pp. 72 —81. Ibid., p. 48. 41 ) Formerly Janos Scholz collection, now Pierpont-Morgan, New York; see Italian Drawings from the Collection of Janos Scholz, Art's Council Exhibition, n.p.p. 1968, no. 114, fig. 10, where the drawing is described as a possible pendant to Zuccaro's composition of the 'Garden of worldly delights' and perhaps originally intended as decoration for his Florentine house following the discussion in: D.

H E I K A M P , Federico Zuccari a Firenze 1575 — 1579, Part II, in: Paragone, XVIII, 207, 1967, p. 28 and figs. 20 - 21, 22b. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

86 C A T H E R I N E K I N G of Virtue held in the Muses too, and the practitioners of all sciences 42 . Zuccaro appended a Latin exhortation to the vault decoration in his house: Laboriosus arduam haeros per viam virtutis

hospes aureum culmen subi valle e caduca diffuge orci gurges est,

'Climb up, stranger, to the golden summit by the arduous path of virtue like the laborious hero. Shun the transient valley which is the raging torrent of hell'. Further inscriptions in Italian clarify the exemplar: intendere potraij

che non giamaijsen^a fatica si possijsperarejHonore ricchesga tie virtu—'

you may realize that one cannot ever hope for honour, riches nor virtue without hard work' 43 . The allegories of Zuccaro and his circle were conceived at the period when the Florentine Accademia del Disegno had just been founded and when its counterpart in Rome was floated and finally achieved. Their ambitious message found enthusiasts amongst the transalpine artists who were beginning to flock to Rome. Otto van Veen for example travelled to Italy in 1572 and remained there as pupil of Zuccaro until 1580. Soon after, about 1585 while working for the Archbishop of Cologne he produced a painted allegory which he entitled 'Typus inconsultae iuventutis' — 'an exemplar of ill-advised youth'. Otto van Veen showed the tyro as having fallen to the ground on the road of life under the assault of Venus and Cupid (sensuality), Bacchus (drink), 'immoderata Ceres' (gluttony) and a satyr (all three ?). The inscription on the engraving, made of the painting, by Perret (and dedicated to the Spanish architect Herrera before his death in 1597) explains that the woman base right is poverty who is the companion of those who entice youth to the pleasures to the flesh. Minerva rescues the young man and is about to put him on the hard path which leads to the temples of virtue and honour — represented background left. Overhead are the wreathes (reminding one of the triple wreathes of the Accademia del Disegno in Florence) which the inscription stated are the honours promised as due to one who is assiduous (Fig. 9)

u .

The Roman allegories also made a strong impression on Bartolomaeus Spranger, the Antwerp artist who worked in Italy between 1565 and 1575 and belonged to the circle of Zuccaro from 1566 onwards. In 1592 in Prague he made an allegory of art as an exemplum for his adolescent relative Georg Spranger. Spranger shows the moment when the artist has reached the summit of the steep hill and the temple of Minerva (Fig. 10). Cloaked with the skin of the hard-working ox the young man receives from Minerva the honour of the laurel wreath, and immortality in the shape of a palm. Fame flies overhead. Personifications of wealth, painting, sculpture and architecture follow him up the hill. The enemies of promise —envy eating its heart out, the donkey-eared ignorance, and sloth — have been chained to Minerva's shield. As the poem ap pended to the design in 1628, when it was engraved, put it: Mercurio ductore, opibus ditatur abunde

I Quem labor et Studium ingenuas conducit ad artes / Famaque eum super Aetherea et Mortalia tollit.

the noble arts and fame raises above the heavens and mortality' 45 . — 'With Mercury as his guide he is showered abundantly with riches whom labour and study lead to 42 ) SPENCER, Filarete's Treatise (cit. n. 23), p. 250. My thanks to Paola Baxter and Aldo Ierubino for advice on translating the Zuccaro inscription. 4 3 ) HERMANN — F I O R E , F r e s k e n (cit. n. 2 8 ) , p p . 4 5 , 4 6 . For the Perret engraving see I. VELDMAN and D. DE HOOP SCHEFFER, Hollstein's Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, ca. 1450 — 1700, Amsterdam 1976, X V I I , p. 50, no. 35 and the comments on it and the previous painting in F. M. HABERDITZI., Die Lehrer des Rubens, in: Jb. der kunsthist. Slg. des allerh. Kaiserhauses, X V I I , 1907, pp.209 - 211, fig.39. 45 ) A. BARTSCH, Le Peintre Graveur, III, Leipzig 1854, p. 285, no. 67: the drawing for the engraving in the Dresden Kupferstichkabinett is described in A. NIEDERSTEIN, Das graphische Werk des Bartholomaeus Spranger, in: Rep. für Kunstwissenschaft, III, 1931, p. 29. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

L A T E S I X T E E N T H - C E N T U R Y C A R E E R S ' A D V I C E

87 The theme is given another ingenious twist in an anonymous drawing now in the Musee Fabre at Montpellier dated 1613 (Fig. 11). In it the idea of the '"via virtutis' is conveyed by showing personifications of painting and sculpture imitating a large statue of Hercules victorious over the dragon of the Hesperides. Mercury exhorts painting to emulate the choice of Hercules with the vehement gesture used in the allegories by Zuccaro and in the Albertina drawing. Minerva — probably here representing wisdom — lights the sculptor's labours with a candle, emphasizing the importance of Rome for the young artist by having the legend 'SPQR' on the pennon tipping her spear. Love of art and of virtue is indicated in the Amor aiming its arrow at painting while the sculptor rests his foot on death and time behind him with a scythe urges haste. The symbols of attainment which are the proper reward of virtue appear above in the form of a hand holding the laurel wreath of honour and the tip of the trumpet of fame. At their feet are placed attributes suggestive of the proper scope of a young artist's training: the study of mensuration and of antique example 46 . In describing 'virtu heroica' as Hercules with the dragon, lion skin and club, Ripa explained, dicesi, che si trovasse in una solitudine, dove seco

deliberando qual sorte di via dovesse prender, δ que I la della virtu, overo que I la de i piaceri, e havendo molto bene sopra di cid considerate, si elesse la via della virtü quantuncunque ardua, e di grandissima difficulta 4,1 .

A survey of these allegories suggests that the group base-left in the Albertina drawing could well represent wordly delights and their consequences. The Bacchus-like figure recalls the Bacchus in the Munich drawing of the 'via virtutis' attributed to Zuccaro or Raffaellino, while the composition by Otto van Veen also showed the libidinous god. Significantly, Filarete had described Bacchus, Priapus and Venus standing at the door of Vice. No allegories present the naked woman with the handkerchief to her mouth, but it is possible that she is the 'tristizia' which, as Filarete had put it, accompanies 'piacere'. Death and time appear in the Montpellier allegory and are found in earlier design of the choice of Hercules. In the 'Navis Stultifera' of Sebastian Brant 'voluptas' is a naked woman holding a flower with a death behind her, while the broad path of vice in Christoff Murer's engraving of the choice of Hercules is labelled as 'via mortis', in contrast with the promise of immortality held out by the 'via vitae' 48 . The survey stresses that it is much more likely that Mercury is accompanied in the Albertina drawing by Minerva — as the Stix-Spitzmüller catalogue and Ackerman agreed, and not, as Lynch argued, by Bellona. In Zuccaro's 'Calumny' cartouche, Mercury and Minerva guided the hero to the safe path as they also did in the Munich drawing associated with this oval in the frame of the 'Calumny'. In the drawing Zuccaro created in connection with the vault allegory he made for the entrance of his house, he showed Minerva guarding the way into the temple of virtue and displayed the caduceus in the arms of one of the women grouped with the arts and sciences before the temple of honour. Spranger's graphic exhortation to his relative had Mercury leading the youth safely to 'labor' and 'studium' so as to receive from Minerva seated in the temple of virtue the reward of fame, riches and immortality. In the Montpellier drawing Mercury was shown urging painting to emulate Hercules' virtuous labour and Minerva illuminated the sculptor's work. Musee Fabre, Montpellier, dated 1613 'German School', no. 1145, Gernsheim 5896.

47

) RIPA, Iconologia (cit. n. 13), p. 537. 'It is said that when he was a young man Hercules found himself in a lonely place where he meditated upon which path he should follow whether that of virtue or of pleasure and having thought about it very carefully he chose the path of virtue however painful and difficult it might be.' «") PANOFSKY, Hercules (cit. n. 18), fig. 30, XVIII: Brant 1497; fig. 46, pi. XXV: Murer 1622. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

88

CATHERINE KING

Mercury and Minerva had long-standing associations with art: painting and scuplture being thought of as astrologically under the aegis of Mercury and Minerva being considered as inventrix of architecture 49 . But they were also very dignified mentors for the artist to take —learned protectors of scholars who could be seen for example awarding the laurel crown to a writer like Valeriano on the frontispiece of the 1575 Basel edition of the 'Hieroglyphica', as well as assisting the young artist to attain excellence. Mercury's role in the artistic allegories relate to his function as leader of souls from the underworld and on the ascent through the celestial spheres. His association is also with the quality of 'intelligenzia'. That is the part he played in Federico Zuccaro's pictorial biography of his brother Taddeo: echoing the characterization of Mercury in contemporary mythological discussions like that of Valeriano as possessing 'readiness in understanding, quick wit, and heightened sensibility' 50 . And it was as lover of learning that Mercury had been described by Martianus Cappella in the favourite text 'The Marriage of Mercury and Philology'. Mercury was considered the brother of Minerva, whose prime asso ciation as Italian Athene was with wisdom 51 . But she was also identified with virtue itself and as combatant against vice. It was with these dual powers that Federico Zuccaro described her when he portrayed her in the centre of his 'Porta Virtutis' — the allegory he displayed in 1581 in Rome to rebut his critics. Thus he wrote: 'Si sta poi Minerva, ο vogliasi dir ballade, figurata per

la dea de le scientie et de la Virtü ne I'antiporto del suo giardino, con le sue insegne, la quale imperiosa, et immobile riceve i colpi de la maledicentia nel suo scudo, et Ii strali si veggiono ritornar a dietro col ferro nel petto de proprii feritori' s2

. In the Albertina allegory then, Mercury leads the youth away from temptations, and Minerva guards him against them. In Zuccaro's 'Porta Virtutis' Minerva was protrayed as defending the artist against the detractors and as special enemy of envy. There 'Invidia' writhes beneath Pallas' spear and suckles her vipers which twist all about her 53 . In Spranger's 1592 'exemplum' Minerva had chained envy to her throne. Since the woman behind avarice in the Albertina composition has the attributes of snakes, it seems plausible to identify her as envy, in agreement with Lynch. The resonances of such a juxtaposition are explored in Vasari's account of the most important precedent for such a juxtaposition in relation to the artist: the sculpture of Minerva and Envy for Michelangelo's catafalque at San Lorenzo in

49 ) Mercury's government of painters and sculptors, merchants and teachers as well as writers, mathematicians and those interested in the sciences was quite often illustrated in the series of Children of the Planets (A.

Planetenkinderbilder und Sternbilder, Straßburg 1916) and derived from the account of the prowess of Mercury in

painting and sculpture as reported for example by Martianus Capeila, transl. in: W. H.

Minerva is listed as inventrix of architecture by RIPA, Iconologia (cit. n. 13), p. 62. STAHI.,

R.

J O H N S O N , H A U B E R ,

and E. L.

BÜRGE, Martianus Capella and the Seven Liberal Arts, II, New York, 1977, 'The Marriage of Philosophy and Mercury',

pp. 18 — 19: 'he has a wonderful magic in painting and as sculptor in bronze or marble he brings life into the features'.

5 0 )

P.

V A L E R I A N O , Hieroglyphica, Basel 1575, fol.429v: colligimus in sacris per Mercurium intellectum agentem, et celerem

animi sensuumque mo tum signijicatum fuisse.

5 1 ) S T A H L - J O H N S O N - B U R G E ,

Martianus Capella (cit. n.

4 9 ) .

better of it when he realised she was his sister Minerva's fostersister (p. 6). His eventual choice was Philology and she was lifted up to him by 'Labor and his companion: a brilliant boy, who was not the son of the pleasure-loving Venus,

but was nevertheless called by philosophers, Amor' (p. 49).

Mercury ardently desired to marry wisdom, but thought 52 ) D.

H E I K A M P ,

Ancora su Federico Zuccari, in: Rivista d'Arte, XXXIII, 1958, pp. 50 — 51: 'There stands Minerva, that is to say Pallas, represented by the goddess of sciences and of virtue in the antiportico of her garden, with her insignia. Immobile and imperiously she receives the blows of slander on her shield and the arrows bounce backwards with the barbs to the breast of the bowmen themselves'. 53

) Ibid., p. 51: Pallas transfigge il crnr de la invidia, la quale si va aecerbamente storcendo et pascendo di suoi viperi et veneni,

da quali e circondata.

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LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE

89

Florence of 1564, made by Lazzaro Calamec. Dirimpetto a questa, dalla banda della sagrestia vecchia,

era uriultra simile figura, stata fatta giudiyiosamente per la Dea Minerva, ο vero ΐ Arte. Perciocche si pud dire, con veritä, che dopo la bontä de'costumi e della vita, la quale dee tener sempre appresso i migliori primo luogo, ΐ Arte poi sia stata quella che ha data a quest'uomo non solo onore e faculta, ma anco tanta gloria, che si pud dire, lui aver in vita goduto que'frutti che a pena dopo morte sogliono dalla fama trarne, mediante I'egregie opere loro, git uomini illustri e valorosi; e, quello che e piu, aver intanto superata l'invidia, che sen^a alcuna contradi^ione, per consenso comune, ha il grado e nome della principale e maggiore eccellen^a ottenuto; e per questa cagione aveva sotto i piedi questa figura, l'invidia; la quale era una vecchia, secca e distrutta, con occhi viperini, ed insomma con viso e fatte^e che tutte spiravano tossico e veleno; ed, oltre cid, era cinta di serpi, ed aveva una vipera in mano 54 .

The identification of the naked woman seated on the steps in the centre of the Albertina allegory as Venus with Amor by both Lynch and the Stix-Spitzmüller catalogue must however be incorrect. For this woman has been given the attributes of many breasts and is therefore Diana as Natura: a designation Benvenuto Cellini gave in his description of the seal in this form which he submitted (unsuccessfully) the Accademia del Disegno in Florence in 1563 for their new device: 'Natura which was represented with many breasts by the ancients to signify that she nursed everything as sole and principal handmaiden of God'. In Benvenuto's seal design she is represented as cult statue 55 . In an anonymous engraving after Marten van Heemskerck's series on the theme of labour, dated 1572, Natura labelled as such appears naked, and suckling a naked child. Above her is a huge globe covered with the attributes of the arts and crafts. The Latin verses explain her significance in terms rather suggestive of the imagery in the Albertina

allegory: Ales ut aprimisprodicit in aere nidis / iam iam plumantes certo modulaminefoetus / Hortaturque

sequi, brevibusque insurgere pennis; / Sic genus humanum rerum Natura novatrix / Mollibus a cunis, gravidaque parentis ab alvo, / Ducit ad aerumnas at duros cauta labores 56

. The engraving shows a

woman with many breasts like the cult statue of Diana. A closer comparison to the Albertina woman with her four breasts is the Natura illustrated by Otto van Veen in his 'Emblemata' (Antwerp 1607). In these illustrations of moralized extracts from Horace's poetry, Diana appears

in a variety of roles. Beside the legend naturam perfecit Minerva — 'Minerva perfects Na- 54 ) G.

V A S A R I , ed. G.

M I L A N E S I , Le vite de piü eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettoti, Florence 1973, V I I , pp. 301—302. G. VASARI, transl. G. DE VERE, Lives of the most eminent painters, sculptors and architects, London 1976, IX, p. 129. 'On the side towards the old sacristy, was another similar figure made with much judgement to represent Minerva, or rather, Art; for the reason that it may be said with truth that after excellence of character and life, which must always hold the first place among the good, it was Art that gave to this man not only honour and profit, but also so much glory, that he may be said to have enjoyed in his lifetime such fruits as able and illustrious men have great difficulty in wresting even after death from the grasp of Fame, by means of their finest works; and, what is more, that he so vanquished envy, that by common consent, without any contradiction, he has obtained the rank and fame of the best and highest excellence. And for this reason this figure had beneath her feet Envy, who was an old woman lean and withered, with the eyes of a viper; in short, with features that all breathed out vendom and poison, beside which she was girt with serpents, and had a viper in her hand.' 5 5 ) P.

C A L A M A N D R E I , Scritti e inediti Celliniani, Florence 1971, p. 145: Natura, che fu dagli Antiqui con molte poppe figurata, per significare, cbe ella nutrisce ogni cosa, come sola, e principale ministra di Dio. This design is illustrated in fig. XVI. 56 ) R.

G R O S S H A N S , Maerten van Heemskerck. Berlin 1 9 8 2 , Fig.

2 4 5 and p.

2 4 7 .

'Just as the parent bird brings forth her fledglings so insistently and repeatedly from the nest and urges them to follow her and to fly out on their stubby wings, similarly does Natura, the mother of all things, bring forth the human species from the soft cradle and the pregnant womb of the parent and urges them out to toil and hard labour.' Grosshans compares the sentiment to that expressed by K A R E L VAN M A N D E R in his long poem on the education of the young artist (Das Lehrgedicht, ed. R. Hoecker, The Hague 1916, p. 19). Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

90 CATHERINE KING ture' — Natura introduces a young man with a helmet, sword and spear, to Minerva. Otto van Veen also represented Nature as authoress of less commendable desires. Illustrating the motto Amor Virtutis, Natura is shown as capable of making people desire wealth. Yet elsewhere she appears as the best guide of all (Natura moderatrix optima) and the desires of various sorts which she balances so judiciously are represented as putti with wings and with bows and arrows 57 . Does Natura in the Albertina allegory remove the wings of the young talent she has nursed as it heeds the enticements of pleasure? Does she attach them as the child obeys the urging of Mercury who looks at it and points upwards ? The way the wings of the child echo those of Mercury on helmet and caduceus suggest an optimistic reading. There are a few visual parallels for the peculiar emphasis on the temptations of avarice for the young artist found in the Ketel poem and the Albertina allegory. The idea was represented by the great engraver Hendrik Goltzius who designed his own emblem standing for his initials Eer [Honor] boven Ge// 58 : to stand for Ή ' before 'G'. A drawing dated 1612 illustrates Ars assiduously imitating a woman holding a whip and spurs who is Diligentia. A wreathed cherub signifying honour is supported by Mercury's staff and is poised over heaps of money and jewels. A simpler version of the 'logo' is dated 1600. The idea of love of art providing zeal for the young artist is illustrated by Stradanus along with painting, and Pegasus as inspiration in a drawing he dated 1564 59 . It appears in the elaborate allegory of 1615 at Montpellier but this time with the arrow which is shown in the Albertina allegory as urging the pupil up the hard path of virtue. In the Sala terrena of his house Federico Zuccaro showed celestial love vanishing Eros 60 : one of the great commonplaces of the era, and a concept which is implicit in the Albertina allegory. Protected by Mercury and Minerva from the temptations of pleasure and avarice, and the maledictions of envy, the young talent is inspired by love to take up the yoke of labour and ascend the steps to the figure with wings adorned with eyes and blowing a trumpet whom Lynch and the Stix-Spitzmüller catalogue correctly identify as fame. Both go on to identify fame's companion proferring the laurel wreath and carrying a branch as 'victory' while Ackerman terms her 'Glory'. However the import of the 'via virtutis' tradition to which the Albertina allegory belongs, is that the artist is rewarded through 'virtue' with fame and honour. The laurel wreaths in van Veen's allegory of 'ill-advised youth' were named as the honour due to one who is assiduous. It should be virtue who gives the honour in the Albertina allegory (with fame flying below her) and in fact her appearance accords quite well with Ripa's description of'virtu'. She is described as carrying an oak branch because the oak resists the insults of the elements unmoved just as virtue does {la quercia resiste alii insulti delle tempeste immobile, cost la virtu resta

immobile, a tutte le oppositioni de contrarii avvenimentif 1 .

What then is the significance of the seated bearded man with nimbed head, who carries a torch and who holds out his hand to the young boy kneeling on the upper treads of the 'scala 57 ) OTTO VAN VEEN, Emblemata Horatiana, Antwerp 1607, pp.23, 27, 43, 81. 58 ) The most complex logo of his initials by Goltzius was sold by Sotheby Park-Bernet, 22 October 1970 signed 'HG 1612'. The simpler 1600 version is illustrated in Ε. K. J. REZNIKEK, Die Zeichnungen von Hendrik Goltzius, Utrecht 1961, pp. 315-316, figs.354-355. 59 ) G. THIEM, Studien zu Jan van der Straet, in: Mitt, des Kunsthist. Instituts in Florenz, VIII, 1957 — 1959, fig. 5, p. 107. 6 0 ) HERMANN-FIORE, F r e s k e n ( c i t . n . 2 8 ) , fig. 1 6 . 61 ) RIPA, Iconologia (cit. n. 13), p. 542. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE 91 virtutis'? Lynch identified him as Saturn. The Stix-Spitzmüller catalogue did not venture an identification. It is likely (as Ackerman thought and as Winner agreed) that he is Disegno presiding over the three arts of painting, sculpture and architecture, whose practitioners flank him and into whose precincts the young artist seeks entry 62 . Modes of representing Disegno and its three arts were in flux at this period. Vasari, in 1565, for the Porta del Prato festival ornament for the marriage of Joanna of Austria in Florence presented Disegno as a naked figure with three heads holding the different tools of architecture, painting and sculpture 63 . Ripa, in 1593, followed this de signation. Others showed Disegno as a young man or woman with the implements of drawing (Stradanus in c. 1590; Federico Zuccaro about the same time) 64 . Earlier Vasari's friend Borghini had offered a representation of Disegno as a man who sustains his three daughters united in harmony like the three graces, in a lecture of 1564 to the Florentine 'Accademia del Disegno' 65 . But Disegno was also sometimes shown as an old man with a beard: in the invention of 1576 in Venice for Titian's catafalque, he was described as vecchio con barba

lunga, da semplice panno ricoperto, poiche fa di mestieri, per arrivare all'apprensione di quelle, Irnga

esperien^a. Mostrerä disegnare sopra una cartella, e sarä ΐinscri^ione, Nil sine me pulcrunf*. He was also shown bearded and with instruments for drawing in the vault which Federico Zuccaro designed for his house in Rome in the Sala del Disegno in the 1590s 67 . Here Disegno is surrounded by women personifying Painting, Sculpture and Architecture with their attributes. No versions show Disegno with a torch. However Federico Zuccaro placed his Disegno before a refulgence of light and added the following inscriptions suggesting why the maker of the Albertina should have associated torch and light with Disegno: Una lux in tribus refulgens / Lux intellectus et vita operationum / Scintilla Divinitati/^. The imagery was current, for Armenini in 'De Veri precetti della Pittura' (Ravenna 1587) called Disegno un vivo lume di bello ingegno — 'like a living flame of beautiful inventiveness', and in his 1563 Academy seal composition, Cellini had represented Diana-Natura as 'l'arte del disegno' herself with rays of light issuing from her head 69 . 62 ) HERMANN-FIORE, Fresken (cit. n. 28), pp. 72 —81 for discussion of Zuccaro's disegno vault. Winner supported the identification of the central figure in the Albertina allegory as Disegno by Ackerman in a footnote to his article: M. WINNER, Poussins Selbstbildnis im Louvre als kunsttheoretische Allegorie, in: Rom. Jb. für Kunstgeschichte, XX, 1983, p. 431, n. 40. 63 ) VASARI-MILANESI, Vite (cit. n. 54), VIII, p. 528. M ) Jan van der Straet, called Stradanus, drew a woman labelled 'designi' in a composition connected with his self portrait in an engraving by Wiericx: Attraverso il Cinquecento Neerlandese, Disegno; della Collezione Frits Lugt, Institut Neerlandais, Paris, Florence and Basel, 1980, pi. 60, No. 135, Inv. no. 3748, p. 200. Federico Zuccaro showed a man labelled 'disegno' with drawing instruments in his biography of Taddeo, see HEIKAMP, Vicende (cit. n. 13), pp. 209 —210, No. 16, fig. 18. The personification could agree with the gender of the noun 'Disegno', or be a woman, as Τ arte del disegno'. 65 ) A. LORENZONI, Carteggio artistico inedito di Dom. Vincenzo Borghini, Florence 1912, I. pp. 154— 163. 66 ) RIDOI.FI, Meraviglie (cit. n. 32), p. 276: 'old with a long beard dressed in simple clothing because one must have long experience in a skill to understand it well, and he shall demonstrate drawing on a sheet of paper and there shall be the inscription "No beauty without me" '. 6 7 ) HERMANN-FIORE, Fresken (cit. n. 28), pp. 72 —81. 68 ) Ibid., p. 78. 'One light reflected in three / the light of the intellect and the life-force of all actions / the spark of divinity'. 69 ) G. B. ARMENINI, De' Veri Precetti della Pittura, Ravenna 1587, p. 37. Cellini, in: CALAMANDREI, Scritti (cit. n. 55), pi. XVI. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

92

CATHERINE KING

In the Albertina allegory, Disegno is enthroned in a loggia in which sculptors are studying a flayed body, and measuring and copying an ancient sculpture of a woman. To the right a painter is at work, while young draughtsmen draw an antique torso at a table. In a room to the far right architects pore over their plans and instruments, while outside in a piazza they complete the cornice of a palace. The development of an iconography for personifying Disegno dates from the 1550s 70 and the decade in Florence of the founding of the Accademia del Disegno (1563), of the illustrated edition of Vasari's Lives (1568) with personifications of art prefacing the biographies, and of the Academy's funeral apparatus for Michelangelo in 1564. It was also in this milieu that the earliest representations of the activities of painting, sculpture and archi tecture demonstrating together the new academic precepts, were created: illustrations offering interesting analogues to the Albertina allegory. The prototypes were the two engravings of Baccio Bandinelli's academy, made in 1531 and about 1550, and showing how painters and sculptors could train by drawing after the antique and studying skeletal anatomy 71 . Marten van Heemskerck had also created an academic illustration in his panel of Saint Luke portraying the Virgin and Child, made about 1550, and showing the sculptor at work in the background and the learned painter in the foreground with his books on anatomical dissection and his scientific instruments as scholarly doctor, as well as evangelist 72 . But it is with the canvas designed by Vasari and Borghini in 1565 for the Florentine marriage festival apparatus to show the 'Accademia del Disegno' to the new Medici princess as she entered the city, that the Albertina allegory has its affinity. A contemporary described this canvas for the Porta del Prato by Alessandro Allori immediately after his description of the canvas representing the great poets of Florence:

Ed a rincontro di questo, da man sinistra posto, non men forse, agl' ingegni fiorenti, di quello proprio, si vedeva la statua del Disegno, padre alia pittura, scultura, ed architettura, il, quale se non nato, si come ne' passati scritti si pud vedere, possian dire che in Fioren^a al tutto rinato, e come in proprio nido nutrito e cresciuto sia. Era per questo figurata una statua tutta nuda con tre teste eguali, per le tre arti che egli abbraccta, tenendo indifferentemente in mano di ciascuna qualche instrumenta: e nella tela, che sotto gli stava, si vedeva dipinto un grandissimo cortile, per ornamento di cui in diverse guise posta era una gran quantitä di statue e di quadri di pittura antichi e moderni, i quali da diversi maestri si vedevano in diversi modi disegnare e ritrarre: in una parte del quale, facendosi una anotomia, pareva che molti stessero mirando, e ritraendo similmente, molto intenti; altri poi la fabbrica, e le regole dell' architettura considerando, pareva che minutamente volessero misurare certe cose, mentre che il divino Michelagnolo TSuonarroti, principe e monarca di tutti, con i tre cerchietti in mano (sua antica impresa) accennando ad Andrea del Sarto, a Lionardo da Vinci, al Puntormo, al Rosso, a Perin del Vaga ed α Franceso Salviati, e ad Antonio da San Gallo ed al Rustico, che gli eron con gran reverenya intorno, mostrava con somma leti^ia la pomposa entrata della nobil signora. Faceva quasi il medesimo effetto I' antico Cimabue verso cert' altri, e da un' altra parte posto: di cui pareva che Giotto si ridesse, avendogli, come ben disse Dante, tolto il campo della pittura che tener si credeva; ed aveva seco, oltre a Gaddi, Buffalmacco e Beno^o, con molt' altri di quella eta. In altra parte

70 ) Cellini's description of the fountain he schemed for Franjois I before 1545 with four figures personifying: (1) philosophy, (2) 'all the arts of design, that is Sculpture, Painting and Architecture', (3) music and (4) liberality, seems to be the earliest attempt to represent 'disegno' in a single figure; B.

CELLINI

, transl. G. Bull, Autobiography, London 1956, p. 271. 71 ) A.

BARTSCH

, Le Peintre Graveur, XIV, Leipzig 1867, pp.314 —315, no.418 for Bandinelli's academy engraved by Agostino Veneziano and XV, pp. 305 — 306, no. 49 for his later version engraved by Enea Vico. See

PEVSNER,

Academies (cit. n. 8), pp. 39 — 42, figs. 5 — 6 for the discussion of these two demonstrations.

72 ) I. VELDMAN

, Marten van Heemskerck and Dutch Humanism in the sixteenth century, Maarsen

1977,

pp. 115 —

121. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS' ADVICE 93

poi ed in altra guisa posti, si vedevano tutti giubilanti ragionarsi quellt che tanto augumento all' arte diedero, ed a cm tanto debbono questi novelli maestri; il gran Donatello cioe e Filippo di ser Brunellesco, e Lorenzo Ghiberti, e Fra Filippo, e I' eccellente Masaccio, e Desiderio, e ΐ Verrocchio ... Ora, nel basamento di tutte queste sei grandissime a bellissime tele si vedeva dipinto una gra^iosa schier a di fanciulletti, che ciascuno nella sua professione, alia soprapposta tela accomodata, esercitandosi, pareva, oltre all' ornamento, che molto accuratamente mostrassero con quali principi alia perfe^ione de' sopra dipinti uomini si pervenisse 7i .

In a letter to Allori, Vincenzo Borghini provides some additional information about the canvas planned to show the activities of artists, in parallel with those of poets, philosophers and warriors on the Porta del Prato. He retails the idea that the inscription ACADEMIA PICTORUM

STA TUARIORUM ARCHITECTORUM A USPICIIS MAGNI COS MI MEDICES FLOR.

ET SEN. DUCIS FUND A Τ A ANNO MDLXIII was to have been appended. ('The academy of painters, sculptors and architects founded in 1563 under the auspices of Cosimo de Medici the Magnificent, duke of Florence and Siena'.) He also outlined the composition: che se questa

stanza fusse tirata in buona prospettiva con qualche prato ο loggia, come quella de' poeti,farebbe bei vedere, e vi sarebbe campo da poter mettere queste statue e pitture ch' io dico, con farvi certe figure che le guardassero

ο ritraessero ο disegnassero. Just before this Vincenzo suggests the shape of the location, ma grande

stanza, a vostra fantasia scompartita, ο con colonne ο con pilastri, come meglio vi tornasse

74 . In the same letter he had suggested that the main scene in the foreground would show 'a great hall articulated either with pilasters or with columns'. 7 3 ) V A S A R I - M I J . A N E S I , Vite (cit. n.

5 4 ) , VIII, pp.

5 2 8 - 5 2 9 .

- Transl. in V A S A R I , transl. de Vere, Lives (cit. n.

5 4 ) , X , pp. 46 —47: Opposite to this, placed on the left hand, and perhaps not less peculiar to the Florentine genius than the last-named, was seen the statue of Design, the father of painting, sculpture and architecture, who, if not born in Florence, as may be seen in the past writings, may be said to have been born again there, and nourished and grown as in his own nest. He was figured by a statue wholly nude, with three similar heads for the three arts that he embraces, each holding in the hand some instrument, but without any distinction; and in the canvas that was beneath him was seen painted a vast courtyard for the adornment of which were placed in various manners a great quantity of statues and of pictures in painting, both ancient and modern, which could be seen in process of being designed and copied by divers masters in divers ways. In one part was being prepared an anatomical study and many could be seen observing it, and likewise drawing, very intently. Others, again, considering the fabric and rules of architecture, appeared to be seeking to measure certain things with great minuteness, the while that the divine Michelagnolo Buonarotti, prince and monarch of them all, with the three circlets in his hand (his ancient device), making signs to Andrea del Sarto, Leonardo da Vinci, Pontormo, Posso, Perino del Vaga, Francesco Salviati, Antonio da San Gallo, and Rustici, who were gathered with great reverence about him, was pointing out with supreme gladness the pompous entrance of the noble Lady. The ancient Cimabue, standing in another part, was doing as it were the same service to certain others, at whom Giotto appeared to be smiling, having taken from him, as Dante said so well, the field of painting which he thought to hold; and Giotto had with him, besides the Gaddi, Buffalmacco and Benozzo, with many others of that age. In another part, again, placed in another fashion and all rejoicing as they conversed, were seen those who conferred such benefits on art, and to whom these new masters owed so much; the great Donatello, Filippo di Ser Brunellesco, Lorenzo Ghiberti, Fra Filippo the excellent Masaccio, Desiderio, and Verrocchio, with many others, portrayed from life . . . Now in the base of all these six vast and most beautiful canvases was seen painted a gracious throng of children, each occupying himself in the profession appropriate to the canvas placed above, who, besides the adornment, were seen to be demonstrating with great accurancy with what beginnings one arrived at the perfection of the men painted above'. 74 ) M. WINNER, Die Quellen der Pictura — Allegorien in gemalten Bildergalerien des 17. Jahrhunderts zu Antwerpen, Cologne 1957, p. 107; also G.

B O T T A R I and S. Ticozzi, Raccolta di Lettere sulla pittura, scultura ed architettura, I, Milan 1822, pp. 223 — 224. — Vincenzo Borghini to Alessandro Allori: 'And I would like this room to be drawn out in good perspective with some meadow or loggia like that of the poets, which would be a lovely vista, and where there would be space to show the statues and paintings I described, along with some figures that could be represented as gazing at them, or depicting them, or drawing them'. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

94 C A T H E R I N E K I N G The example of the Porta del Prato academy canvas was re-interpreted in an engraving by Cornells Cort after Jan van der Straet, or Stradanus, in 1578 (Fig. 12) 75 . Stradanus had worked closely with Vasari in Florence, in the 1560s, while Cort had engraved Zuccaro's Calumny in 1572 76 . This commemorative composition shows the putative activities comprising the new academy founded in 1577 in Rome and conveniently labelled by Stradanus. In a tall vaulted hall 'Pictura' paints a mural. 'Anatomia' studies a flayed figure and a skeleton. Engraving draws some flowers. Architecture uses compasses. Statuary creates a group of victorious Rome. Sculp ture carves a horse. As in the Albertina allegory young pupils mix with assured masters. One further example, signed by P. F. Alberti, was made on the theme in an engraving incised in the early decades of the seventeenth century 77 . A young artist is entering a room in which painting, sculpture and architecture are being taught and including the set-pieces of skeletal anatomy being studied, and dissection taking place. These are the compositions giving the context for the upper section of the Albertina allegory. The attribution and dating of the Albertina allegory is an intriguing puzzle. Iconographically its parallels derive from the period between the 1560s and the first decade of the seventeenth century. The presentation of 'Disegno' with his three daughters and their practioners in a great hall relates to the Porta del Prato canvas and its successors. The theme of the 'via virtutis' was explored from the 1570s onwards, though not in terms of the stairway. The emphasis on avarice as temptress and the motif of love urging the artist up the stiff climb suggests some connection with Ketel, who composed his allegory of the arts between 1589 and 1595, but probably did not visit Italy. The comparison with the treatment of Diana-Natura by Otto van Veen in the Horace 'Emblemata' of 1607 would perhaps pull the dating a little later. The morphological links are with Stradanus and Zuccaro. The costumes of men and boys recall both artists' images. The peculiar scaffolding is like that shown by Zuccaro in his illustration of Taddeo painting the Palazzo Mattel in Rome 78 . The sculpture-stand reminds one of Zuccaro's stand in the drawings of the Florentine academicians studying in the New Sacristy in San Lorenzo 79 . The parallel for the flayed figure is with the Stradanus academy engraving of 1578. The Albertina allegory offers a peculiar combination of insecure draughtmanship (the base is especially botched and incomplete) and unparalleled sophistication in orchestrating the theme of the 'via virtutis' with the demon stration of the precepts of the academy. It suggests the astuteness of composition and of ideas which belonged to someone like Zuccaro, and the execution of a pupil — conceivably one of the Netherlandish artists flocking to Rome at this time. Since Lomazzo went blind in 1571 he seems an unlikely candidate as author of the drawing. There were a variety of circumstances which could have prompted the making of the Albertina allegory. It is a large drawing and could have been made as a frontispiece to illustrate one of the increasing number of books being printed on art. Title-pages certainly sometimes employed similar imagery 80 . For instance a collection of portraits of artists published in 1610 by Hondius 7 5 ) B I E R E N S D E H A A N , C o r t ( c i t . η . 3 5 ) , p . 1 9 9 , n o . 2 1 8 . 76 ) Ibid., p. 201, no. 219; THIEM, Van der Straet (cit. n. 59). 77 ) P. F. Alberti was born in 1584 and died in 1638. His academy engraving is undated: see A. BARTSCH, Le Peintre Graveur, XVII, Leipzig 1870, p. 313, no. 1. 78 ) HEIKAMP, Vicende (cit. n.13), p. 213, fig. 22. 75 ) D. HEIKAMP, Federico Zuccari a Firenze, 1 5 7 5 - 1 5 7 9 , Part I, in: Paragone, XVIII, 205/25, 1967, p l s . 2 4 - 2 5 . 80 ) Ackerman and Lynch suggested that the Albertina allegory was a title-page (cfr. n. 11) but actually it would only suit a frontispiece. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

LATE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CAREERS* ADVICE

95 in the Hague ('Pictorium aliquot celebrium praecipue Germaniae inferiores effigies') shows fame, two hard-working putti labelled 'labor assiduus', the attributes of Mercury and large wreathes labelled 'fructus laborum'. The title-page of the 'Idea della Architettura' (Venice 1615) by Vincenzo Scamozzi presents vignettes of the choice of Hercules and of pupils learning in its architectural framework. The Albertina allegory could have been connected with the decoration of an artist's house or with the foundation of an academy 81 . It could have presented some private commemoration: as Spranger addressed the 'exemplum' to his young relative; or as Federico Zuccaro made the pictorial biography of his brother Taddeo using related concepts; or as Pieter Isaacsz placed the choice of Hercules in the engraved tribute in 1605 for his master Hans von Aachen.

82 It could have been connected with some public artistic commemoration since somewhat analogous imagery was deployed for funeral apparatus which artists planned to pay tribute to Michelangelo (1564), Titian (1576), and Agostino Carracci (1603) 83 . The Albertina allegory draws attention to the interesting cluster of visual images which artists began to make for themselves increasingly from around the middle of the sixteenth century onwards: for private use; or addressed to their colleagues; or sometimes (as with the title-pages) to demonstrate the prowess of art and its professional practices to a wider audience. The ideas expressed in these images were rooted in the earlier treatises by artists. Yet the elaboration of an iconography for the artist in terms of allegories like the Albertina drawing measures a further crucial change in the role of the artist. The allegory of the 'via virtutis' had been the privilege of rulers like the soldier Sigismond Malatesta for the tomb of whose warrior ancestors the sculptors at San Francesco in Rimini had made reliefs showing the triumph of Scipio and Minerva in her temple surrounded by the great warriors of the past 84 . It had been the correct theme for the Marchioness of Mantua Isabella d' Este to take for the decoration of her studiolo, in paintings commissioned from Mantegna and Correggio 85 . It had been a suitable subject for an eminent, young, scholarly cleric — Cardinal Bernardo Rossi, Bishop of Treviso —to commission from Lotto in 1505 86 . This allegory is a variant on the imagery which Filarete had personally in vented—as he rightly claimed —for vice and virtue in the 1460s 87 . On the right, vice is a satyr reclining in a lovely landscape with food and drink about him. But on the left a putto bends 81 ) HERMANN-FIORE, Fresken (cit. n. 28), pp. 37 — 42 discussed the decoration of artists' houses at this period as does E. MCGRATH, The Painted decoration of Ruben's house, in: J. of the Warburg and Courtauld Inst., XLI, 1978,

pp. 2 4 5 - 7 7 . 82

) A. BARTSCH, Le Peintre-Graveur, III, Leipzig 1854, p. 252, no. 105, for the engraved tribute to 'Johanni ab Ach'

by J. Saenredam after Pieter Isaacsz. The marvellous pictographic biography which Federico Zuccaro made of his dead

brother Taddeo is discussed and illustrated in HEIKAMP, Vicende (cit. n. 13), pp. 200 — 215. His reference (p. 200, n. 75)

to an untraced design once part of the series entitled 'Taddeo Zuccari tra il Vizio e la Virtü', suggests a possible connection with the Albertina allegory. 83

) For the Michelangelo funeral: VASARI-MILANESI, Vite (cit. n. 54), pp. 296 — 317. For the plans for Titian's funeral: RIDOI.FI, Meraviglie (cit. n. 32). For the Agostino Carracci funeral: A. BARTSCH, Le Peintre Graveur, XVIII, Leipzig 1 8 7 0 , p. 2 6 8 , no. 3 0 and pp. 3 0 6 - 3 1 3 , nos. 5 4 - 6 0 .

M

) For illustration of the tomb of the ancestors of Sigismondo: C. RICCI, II Tempio Malatestiano in Rimini, Milan

and Rome 1924, figs. 594-596. 85

) These paintings on the theme of moral and intellectual virtue are studied together by E. VERHEYEN, The Paintings

in the 'studiolo' of Isabella d'Este, at Mantua, New York 1971. M ) European Paintings: an illustrated summary catalogue, National Gallery of Art Washington, Washington 1975, p. 202, no. 267.

87 ) SPENCER, Filarete's Treatise (cit. n. 23), p. 246, η. 1 justifies the claim to the originality of the allegorical invention. Unauthenticated Download Date | 5/30/16 1:13 PM

96

CATHERINE KING

to pick up the attributes of the Liberal Arts which lie under a tree on which hangs the aegis of Minerva. He is ready to cross the thorny hedge to the left and to follow a child — this time winged — up the slope to intellectual achievement and its lofty reward. In describing the summit of the house of virtue Filarete had excluded the artist from the level of attainment represented by the chamber presided over by the Muses. Entry was possible only for masters of the seven Liberal Arts (Filarete called them the 'seven sciences'), for warriors and visitors to Sforzinda 88 . In elaborating on the decoration of the artist's house he explained apologetically that it was only allowable for the architect to have carved on his house-front the sculptures representing virtue and vice because it was he who had invented them 89 . From the evidence which survives it looks as if it was not until Ottaviano Zuccaro used the device mica parandi honoris via with representations of the arts for his house in Sant' Angelo in Vado, that an artist assumed the privilege of the via virtutis imagery in practice: the right to borrow the allegories artists were so skilled in creating for their betters and adapt them to the profession. The drawing which Federico Zuccaro made in connection with the decoration for the entrance hall of his house in Rome stakes the new claim graphically because it shows painting, sculpture, and architecture along with Apollo, the Muses and the Liberal Arts on the terrace of the temple of honour. But it is only the Albertina allegory which makes manifest the reasons why the artist had felt able to appropriate the imagery of the powerful warrior, the genteel marchioness and the scholarly cardinal: for it is the sole example to juxtapose the demonstration of the arithmetic, antiquarian and anatomical scope of the academy with the choice of virtue. Artists could apply the choice between vice and virtue to their career's advice because they could justify art as a noble calling, not a menial craft, and as the fit companion intellectually to the Liberal Arts 90 . The Albertina allegory sums up these seminal new ideas with unique economy. It certainly illustrates in the clearest possible terms the sentiment of the letter Federico Zuccaro had addressed to the academy in Florence about 1575 calling for reforms so that the young artists should be properly taught, according to the programme originally outlined by the founders, with anatomy lessons, and with instructions in architecture, perspectival construction and mathematics. In this letter he begged that such reforms would ensure that students caminarebbon per la via buona, et si agevoleria

lor la strada, per I' erta d i f f i c i l e del monte delta scien^a di nostra ArtP x .

88 ) Ibid., p. 250. 89 ) Ibid., p. 259: 'This was permitted to him, only because he had invented this figure of Virtue'. 50 ) Changes in the ideas about the way fame or glory might be earned, and who properly merited it, are discussed

in: P. BOITANI, Chaucer and the Imaginary World of Fame, Cambridge 1984; F. JOUKOVSKY, La Gloire dans la Poesie Fran^aise et Neolatine du XVI siede, Geneva 1969; and M. R. LIDA DE MALKIEL, La Idee de la Fama en la Edad Media Castellana, Mexico 1952, transl. S. ROUBAUD, Idee de la Gloire dans la Tradition Occidentale, Paris 1968. 91 ) PEVSNER, Academies (cit. η. 8), p. 52, 'might travel by the good road and have their path made easier up the difficult ascent of the mountain of the knowledge of our Art', and C. DEMPSEY, Some observations on the education of artists in Florence and Bologna, during the late sixteenth century, in: Art Bull., LXII, 1980, pp. 556 — 570. A. HUGHES,

'An Academy for doing' the Academia del Disegno, the Guilds and the Principate in sixteenth century Florence, in: Oxford Art Journal, 9, I, 1986, pp.3e.s.

Photographic Sources: Figs. 1, 3, 4: Vienna, Albertina. — Fig. 2: Rome Bibliotheca Hertziana. — Figs. 5, 6: after Hermann-

Fiore, Fresken (cit. n. 28). — Fig. 7: Hamburg, Kunsthalle. — Fig. 8: New York, Pierpont Morgan Museum. — Fig. 9: Madrid, Escorial. — Fig. 10: London, Warburg Institute. — Fig. 11: Montpellier, Musee Fabre. — Fig. 12: London, British Museum.

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