THE CARMELITE ALTARPIECE (CIRCA 1290–1550) THE SELF-IDENTIFICATION OF AN ORDER Christa Gardner von Teuffel Introduction and I am acutely aware that this initial attempt at defini- The altarpiece is one of the most essential means tion or identification contains much that is hypothetical of the self-representation and self-definition of any or sparsely documented. religious order. The Carmelites, who arrived in West- How should a Carmelite altarpiece be recognised, ____ ern Europe after the establishment of the Franciscans, if provenance from a Carmelite church alone is insuf- 1 Sassetta, Miracle of the Eucharist Dominicans and Augustinians, with whom they had to ficient? Sassetta’s (Fig. 1), a predel- (detail of the Arte della Lana altarpiece Miracle of the Eucharist from Siena). County Durham, Barnard compete, were soon confronted by this challenge. Even la-scene from the triptych commissioned by the Sienese Castle, The Bowes Museum in the case of an order as open to visual expression as wool guild ca. 1423, depicts just such a church interior that of the Franciscans, the identification of a ‘Fran- officiated by Carmelites.1 Do the two prophets Elijah ciscan’ altarpiece is problematic, and the same is also and Elisha from the triptych’s pinnacles demonstrate true for the Dominicans and Augustinians. The very Carmelite involvement? Contemporaneously, according existence of what might properly be termed a Carmel- to the documents, Masaccio, who was advised by the ite altarpiece remains to be established. Thus, I have resident prior, emphasized the location of Ser Giuliano begun by assessing the visual evidence, asking what, if di Colino’s polyptych in the Pisan Carmine by inserting anything, is specifically Carmelite. This kind of enquiry two unidentified Carmelite saints in the lateral frame- has, to my knowledge, never previously been attempted, work.2 Did they adequately project a Carmelite message? 1 Machtelt Israëls, “Stefano di Giovanni detto il Sassetta”, in: 2 Christa Gardner von Teuffel, “Masaccio and the Pisa Altarpiece: A New Da Jacopo , exh. cat. Siena 2010, Approach”, in: , XIX (1977), pp. 23–68: 28, 53, della Quercia a Donatello: le arti a Siena nel primo Rinascimento Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen ed. by Max Seidel, Florence 2010, pp. 222–231, no. C17 d. reprinted and annotated in: , eadem From Duccio’s Maestà to Raphael’s Transfigura- | 3 To start answering these questions, the Order’s studied the Carmelite painter Fra Filippo Lippi.6 In much smaller than those of the two leading mendicant church-building initially occurred in Paris,12 Oxford,13 main characteristics concerning cult, titular saint, 2006 Machtelt Israëls investigated Sassetta and local orders. Nantes,14 Barcelona,15 Naples,16 and Vienna17 but only feasts, founders and saints, as well as its habit and his- cult.7 Subsequently I traced the transformation of the Arriving after their main competitors, the Fran- exceptionally concerned altarpieces. Communal help toricity will be related to altarpieces. Building on these Duecento into the ciscan, Dominican, and Augustinian friars, generally is for example well documented in Siena and Vicen- examples an overview of Carmelite altarpieces, their in the BrancacciMadonna delchapel Popolo at the FlorentineMadonna Carmine.del Carme-8 meant less prominent locations and less wealthy pa- za.18 Elsewhere, as in Florence,19 Venice,20 Bruges,21 programme, patronage, and artists until circa 1550 Thereafterlo only a few studies on individual Carmelite tronage. Hurried transformation from an eremitical to Barcelona,22 and Frankfurt am Main,23 confraternities will be sketched. Retables originating south and north retables have been published, by Joseph Hammond, a mendicant order and necessary urbanization exac- and guilds contributed substantially to the decor. The of the Alps will be investigated, but devotional images, Joanne Allen and others.9 erbated the Carmelites’ struggle for survival. Delayed Carmelites, as might be expected, tended to attract manuscript illumination and seals will largely be ig- acceptance of and the late admission of small testamentary bequests from local citizens and nored. A brief comment on the literature and difficul- Difficulties of Assessment women furthercura restricted animarum expansion. Enthusiastic pa- some bigger donations in particular from foreigners, ties of assessing the Order’s altarpieces will precede The number of lost altarpieces is, obviously, un- pal support was slow in coming, and the local cler- especially travelling merchants in busy trading centres the main part. known, and the difficulties in assessing surviving or gy accepted them only reluctantly. Commonly their like Frankfurt and Bruges.24 recorded Carmelite altarpieces are enormous. In the churches were built and furbished at least a generation The Carmelite Constitutions contained no regula- Literature mid-thirteenth century the Order gradually migrated later than those of the other mendicants. Apart from tions regarding church furnishing; only building con- No overview of Carmelite altarpieces on a Euro- from the Holy Land mainly to European sea-ports a papal initiative in Avignon,11 aristocratic support for struction was to be controlled.25 An altarpiece always pean scale before Trent has ever been done.3 In 1977 and regional centres, scattering over a vast area.10 From I opened the discussion on the patronage of the Or- that time on the Carmelites were known as Fratres 4 , ed. by Adrian Staring, Rome 1989. For a 19 Giuseppe Bacchi, “La Compagnia di S. Maria delle Laudi e di S. Agne- der with an analysis of Masaccio’s Pisan polyptych. beatae Mariae de Monte Carmeli and their Marian Reflections on the Nature of the Order succinct synthesis see Frances Andrews, se nel Carmine di Firenze”, in: , II (1930–1931), Joanna Cannon followed in 1987 with a fundamental title was officially confirmed in 1324. Already by the The Other Friars: The Carmelite, Augus- Rivista storica carmelitana , Woodbridge 2006, pp. 7–68; pp. 137–151, III (1931–1932), pp. 12–39, 97–122; Blake Wilson, tinian, Sack and Pied Friars in the Middle Ages et al. Music contribution on Pietro Lorenzetti’s high altarpiece for mid-sixteenth century, however, the suppression and further Smet 1975 (note 3) , Oxford 1992; John 11 . and Merchants: The Laudesi Companies of Republican Florence Anne-Marie Hayez, “Jean XXII et Avignon: une cité épiscopale régie Henderson, , Oxford 1994; Nerida the Carmine in Siena, which was complemented by destruction of Carmelite houses had begun, drastical- Piety and Charity in Late Medieval Florence 5 par un pape”, in: , ed. by Michelle Fournié/Daniel le Newbigin, , Florence Henk van Os and Creighton Gilbert. Megan Holmes ly affecting their documentation, as their number was Jean XXII et le Midi Feste d’Oltrarno: Plays in Churches in Fifteenth-Century Florence Blévec, Toulouse 2012, pp. 131–158: 140. 1996, I, pp. 45–155, II, pp. 283f.; Gardner von Teuffel (note 8), pp. 45–51; 12 Paul Biver/Marie-Louise Biver, Miklós Boskovits, “Maestà monumentali su tavola tra XIII e XIV secolo: Abbayes, monastères et couvents de Paris: des e , Paris 1970, pp. 383–416. According to Richard funzione e posizione nello spazio sacro”, in: , XCIX (2011), origines à la fin du XVIII siècle Arte Cristiana , London 2005, pp. 1–71, 615–619: 6, 6 Megan Holmes, , New Haven/Lon- Copsey, contemporary literary sources such as Felip Ribot should be inter- pp. 13–30: 18–20; Christine Sciacca, “The Laudario of Sant’Agnese”, in: tion: Italian Altarpieces in Their Settings Fra Filippo Lippi: The Carmelite Painter 27; Dillian Gordon, , I, London 2003, don 1999. preted with caution ( , “Introduction”, in: Felip Ribot, O. Carm., , exh. The Fifteenth Century: Italian Paintings idem The Ten Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination. 1300–1350 pp. 201–223. 7 Machtelt Israëls, “Altars on the Street: The Wool Guild, the Carmelites , ed. and translated by , cat. Los Angeles/Toronto 2012–2013, ed. by , Los Angeles 2012, Books on the Way of Life and Great Deeds of the Carmelites idem eadem 3 For a pioneering investigation of the Order’s iconography after Trent and the Feast of Corpus Domini in Siena (1356–1456)”, in: Faversham 22007, pp. xiii f.). pp. 217–281. Renaissance Stud- see Cécile Emond, , , XX (2006), pp. 180–200; (note 1). 13 Jotischky (note 5), pp. 19, 34–36. 20 Hammond (note 9). L’iconographie carmélitaine dans les anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux ies eadem Brussels 1961. Joachim Smet, 8 Christa Gardner von Teuffel, “The Significance of the ‘Madonna del 14 A fifteenth-century missal from Nantes now at Princeton illustrates the 21 Reinhard Strohm, , rev. ed. Oxford 1990 The Carmelites: A History of the Brothers of Our Lady Music in Late Medieval Bruges , I: , author’s edition, Popolo’ in the Brancacci Chapel: Re-Framing Assumptions”, in: patronage of the Dukes of Monfort, for which see Yves Durand, (11985), pp. 67–70. of Mount Carmel Ca. 1200 a. D. until the Council of Trent The Brancacci Les Grands 1975, rev. ed. Darien, Ill., 1988, chapter VIII, and III, 2: , conference proceedings, Florence 2003, ed. by , Rome 1997, pp. 107– 22 See note 15. The Catholic Refor- Chapel: Form, Function and Setting Carmes de Nantes, 1318–1790: un couvent dans la ville , Darien, Ill., 1982, chapters XVIII and XIX, initiated a Nicholas A. Eckstein, Florence 2007, pp. 37–51. 109; Diane E. Booton, “The Carmelite missal of Nantes (Garrett 40)”, 2004, 23 Egon Wamers, “Die Geschichte des Karmeliterklosters im Mittelalter: mation 1600–1750 general survey. Only the much later Italian edition ( , 9 Joseph Hammond, “Negotiating Carmelite Identity: The ‘Scuola dei URL: http://www.princeton.edu/rbsc/fellowships/2004-05/booton.html 1246–1500”, in: idem I Carmelitani: storia Das Karmeliterkloster in Frankfurt am Main: Geschichte und , Rome 1989–1996) reproduces some Carmelite images. Santi Alberto e Eliseo’ at Santa Maria dei Carmini in Venice”, in: (accessed on 7.6.2014); , , ed.