DOCSLIB.ORG

Mining Authoritativeness in Art Historical Photo Archives. Semantic Web Applications for Connoisseurship

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Mining Authoritativeness in Art Historical Photo Archives. Semantic Web Applications for Connoisseurship Alma Mater Studiorum · Università di Bologna DOTTORATO DI RICERCA IN Culture Letterarie e Filologiche Ciclo XXXI Settore Concorsuale: 11/A4 (primario); 01/B1 (secondario) Settore Scientifico Disciplinare: M-STO/08 Mining Authoritativeness in Art Historical Photo Archives. Semantic Web Applications for Connoisseurship Presentata da: Marilena Daquino Coordinatore Dottorato: Supervisore: Prof. Luciano Formisano Prof.ssa Francesca Tomasi Esame finale anno 2019 Abstract The purpose of this work is threefold: (i) to facilitate knowledge discovery in art historical photo archives, (ii) to support users’ decision-making process when evaluating contradictory artwork attributions, and (iii) to provide policies for information quality improvement in art historical photo archives. The ap- proach is to leverage Semantic Web technologies in order to aggregate, assess, and recommend the most documented authorship attributions. In particular, findings of this work offer art historians an aid forre- trieving relevant sources, assessing textual authoritativeness (i.e. internal grounds) of sources of attribution, and evaluating cognitive authoritativeness of cited scholars. At the same time, the retrieval process allows art historical data providers to define a low-cost data integration process to update and enrich their collection data. The contributions of this thesis are the following: (1) a methodology for representing question- able information by means of ontologies; (2) a conceptual framework of Information Quality measures addressing dimensions of textual and cognitive authoritativeness characterising art historical data, (3) a number of policies for metadata quality improvement in art historical photo archives as derived from the application of the framework, (4) a ranking model leveraging the conceptual framework, (5) a semantic crawler, called mAuth, that harvests authorship attributions in the Web of Data, and (6) an API and a Web Application to serve information to applications and final users for consuming data. Despite findings are limited to a restricted number of photo archives and datasets, the research impacts on a broader number of stakeholders, such as archives, museums, and libraries, which can reuse the conceptual framework for assessing questionable information, mutatis mutandi, to other near fields in the Humanities. Keywords: Knowledge Discovery, Linked Data, Art History, Photography, Authoritativeness, Informa- tion Quality i ii Acknowledgements This work comes at the end of hard times. Personal events and work experiences affected significantly the result - sometimes in unpleasant ways, but mostly in unexpected, joyful, and exciting ways! First, I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor Francesca Tomasi for the continuous support of my Ph.D study and related research. She supported me when I doubted of my skills, she made me understand what I am able to do, and to feel comfortable with my limits. She gave me all the strength I needed to focus on my objectives and free my creativity. She was with me when I was ill, when I felt alone, and she made me feel at home when I felt I had no home to go back. For such reasons, I want to thank her for being a friend, not an advisor only. Secondly, I would like to thank Francesca Mambelli from the Federico Zeri Foundation. I cannot imagine this thesis without her doubts and insightful questions. She helped me to understand what an incredible work is under the hood of cultural heritage management and how fascinating it could be. In the last few years I met an incredible amount of brilliant people thanks to my job. By attending events organised by the Semantic Web community and by discussing with PHAROS members I got precious feedback and I learnt, almost from scratch, all I needed to write this thesis. I want to thank all of them for supporting me in the evaluation of this work and for contributing to the knowledge I gained, which is priceless. Among them, a special thanks goes to my two reviewers, Enrico Daga (KMI) and Costanza Caraffa (KHI), whose comments helped me to frame questions related to so different communities - which are (hopefully) highlighted in this work. In particular, thanks to Enrico for his patience when explaining me how not to write a PhD thesis and how not to be concerned (too much) of it. Workshops, conferences, and summer schools have been fantastic places for networking. At SSSW2016 I met few of the people that keep positively affecting my career and that are now some of my best friends. There I met for the first time the KMI crew, who managed to make me move (twice) to the exotic Milton Keynes. A special thanks goes to Mathieu d’A., Alessandro Adamou, Enrico Daga (again), and Enrico Motta, for supporting and guiding me during my visiting period. The MK experience was unique, not only in working terms. The impressive number of good people that concentrate insucha small place is unspeakable. I cannot list all of them, but I can mention the ones that still walk with me despite the long distance: Ilaria, my beloved grumpy friend, that never makes me feel alone; Pinelopi, with whom I shared fears, ideas and lots of hugs during our cigarette breaks; Martin, who took care of me as only a brother would do; Tina, for pushing me all the time to challenge myself and make the best of situations; Angelo iii and Andrea, for their friendship and kindness when helping me coding; Manu and Giorgio for their good advices, and the silly moments together (that are hard to distinguish sometimes); and (in random order) Carla, Davide, Paco, Anna, Anita, Francesco, Thivian, Vasa, Patrizia, Jaisha, Julian, Matteo, and all the others, for all the fun we had together. Another group of people influenced my career, that is, the AlmaDL division at the University of Bologna, where I spent three years as research assistant. I want to thank Raffaele, Marialaura, Roberta, Piero, Jen- nifer, Fabrizio, and Antonio, with whom I moved my first steps in research. And of course I thank pro- fessors, colleagues and the admin team at the Department of Classic Philology and Italian Studies that continuously help me, including: Federico Condello, Paola Italia, Aldo Gangemi, Ivan Heibi, Alessan- dra Di Tella, Beatrice Nava, Morena, Laura, Virna, Valeria, and Antonella; Valentina Presutti, Mehewish Alam, Valentina Carriero, Andrea Nuzzolese (STLab - CNR); Fabio Vitali, and Angelo Di Iorio (DISI). Lastly, thanks to Silvio Peroni, my panino-buddy and a good advisor since I started this adventure. I have been living in Bologna for almost fourteen years. Plenty of people crossed my path. Some moved away, some stayed for longer, and some keep bringing joy in my life every day. Among them are Giulia, my beautiful dreamer; Martina, as adventurous as cloudy; Maria Rosaria, the tiny crazy traveller; Andrea, the brilliant grumpy friend (who will raise his eyebrows when reading it); Daniel, the worst proofreader ever, but a thoughtful friend; Matteo and his family (Nadia, Vanni, Fazia, and Danilo), who were like a second family to me; Raffaele (again), for the litres of beer we poured while chit-chatting in all thepubs and restaurants of Bologna; Roberta, possibly the craziest flatmate I have ever had, with the biggest heart I could expect. And of course, I must mention my hometown. Domodossola became famous thanks to The Fortune wheel TV program, where it was first used to spell words that start with D. Now everybody ask me “Does itexist for real?”. Spoiler alert: it does, it is beautiful, and amazing people live there. My pieces of heart Simone and Federico; Gabriele (Teddy), smart and sensitive; Veronika, a friend and the best sister-in-law I could ask for. My siblings Miriam and Marco, my biggest treasure. My mother, who deserves all the best in this world. My cousins Lorella, Beppe, Alessia, my uncles and aunts, with whom I shared the best moments. And my beautiful niece Marika, who makes us smile again. Lastly, I want to remember my grandparents, that keep looking down on us, and my father, who taught me to love science, photography, arts, and to be curious. I owe him everything. This work is dedicated to him. iv To whom will not read this thesis, but that gave me all the love I needed to make it happen. v vi Introduction Art historical photo archives have always been places for art historical research. Scholars, photographers, art dealers, antiquarians, and others, used to create, arrange, and study photographic collections depicting artworks in order to pursue their activities. Plenty of connoisseurs, i.e. experts that ascribe artworks to artists on the basis of their knowledge in the field of fine arts, used to attend photo archives and torecord on the back of photographs their hypotheses. The latter include expertises on the authorship of artworks, provenance information of artworks, and bibliographic references. The wealth preserved in photo archives bears witness to the diversity of scientific methods that characterised connoisseurship in the last two centuries. According to Carlo Ginzburg [Ginzburg, 1979] the epistemo- logical model in the Humanities that emerged in the nineteenth century stems from connoisseurship. To this extent, characteristics of connoisseurs’ methodologies are of great interest to other fields in the Hu- manities. However, most of connoisseurs’ methodologies are not reproducible, and authoritativeness of scholars and sources is a key element when validating attributions. This work is mainly devoted to understand how connoisseurs’ methodologies sedimented in photo archives, to what extent we can formalize a definition of authoritativeness on the basis of second-hand knowledge providers, and to what extent such a definition can be leveraged in information technologies. In particular, a formal definition of authoritativeness would contribute to advancements of two research areas, namely: Connoisseurship, by developing more reliable recommending systems for scholars, and Library and Infor- mation Science, by defining new strategies for metadata quality improvement based on the aforementioned recommending systems.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • THE BERNARD and MARY BERENSON COLLECTION of EUROPEAN PAINTINGS at I TATTI Carl Brandon Strehlke and Machtelt Brüggen Israëls
    THE BERNARD AND MARY BERENSON COLLECTION OF EUROPEAN PAINTINGS AT I TATTI Carl Brandon Strehlke and Machtelt Brüggen Israëls GENERAL INDEX by Bonnie J. Blackburn Page numbers in italics indicate Albrighi, Luigi, 14, 34, 79, 143–44 Altichiero, 588 Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum catalogue entries. (Fig. 12.1) Alunno, Niccolò, 34, 59, 87–92, 618 Angelico (Fra), Virgin of Humility Alcanyiç, Miquel, and Starnina altarpiece for San Francesco, Cagli (no. SK-A-3011), 100 A Ascension (New York, (Milan, Brera, no. 504), 87, 91 Bellini, Giovanni, Virgin and Child Abbocatelli, Pentesilea di Guglielmo Metropolitan Museum altarpiece for San Nicolò, Foligno (nos. 3379 and A3287), 118 n. 4 degli, 574 of Art, no. 1876.10; New (Paris, Louvre, no. 53), 87 Bulgarini, Bartolomeo, Virgin of Abbott, Senda, 14, 43 nn. 17 and 41, 44 York, Hispanic Society of Annunciation for Confraternità Humility (no. A 4002), 193, 194 n. 60, 427, 674 n. 6 America, no. A2031), 527 dell’Annunziata, Perugia (Figs. 22.1, 22.2), 195–96 Abercorn, Duke of, 525 n. 3 Alessandro da Caravaggio, 203 (Perugia, Galleria Nazionale Cima da Conegliano (?), Virgin Aberdeen, Art Gallery Alesso di Benozzo and Gherardo dell’Umbria, no. 169), 92 and Child (no. SK–A 1219), Vecchietta, portable triptych del Fora Crucifixion (Claremont, Pomona 208 n. 14 (no. 4571), 607 Annunciation (App. 1), 536, 539 College Museum of Art, Giovanni di Paolo, Crucifixion Abraham, Bishop of Suzdal, 419 n. 2, 735 no. P 61.1.9), 92 n. 11 (no. SK-C-1596), 331 Accarigi family, 244 Alexander VI Borgia, Pope, 509, 576 Crucifixion (Foligno, Palazzo Gossaert, Jan, drawing of Hercules Acciaioli, Lorenzo, Bishop of Arezzo, Alexeivich, Alexei, Grand Duke of Arcivescovile), 90 Kills Eurythion (no.
    [Show full text]
  • Michelangelo Buonarotti
    MICHELANGELO BUONAROTTI Portrait of Michelangelo by Daniele da Volterra COMPILED BY HOWIE BAUM Portrait of Michelangelo at the time when he was painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. by Marcello Venusti Hi, my name is Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, but you can call me Michelangelo for short. MICHAELANGO’S BIRTH AND YOUTH Michelangelo was born to Leonardo di Buonarrota and Francesca di Neri del Miniato di Siena, a middle- class family of bankers in the small village of Caprese, in Tuscany, Italy. He was the 2nd of five brothers. For several generations, his Father’s family had been small-scale bankers in Florence, Italy but the bank failed, and his father, Ludovico di Leonardo Buonarroti Simoni, briefly took a government post in Caprese. Michelangelo was born in this beautiful stone home, in March 6,1475 (546 years ago) and it is now a museum about him. Once Michelangelo became famous because of his beautiful sculptures, paintings, and poetry, the town of Caprese was named Caprese Michelangelo, which it is still named today. HIS GROWING UP YEARS BETWEEN 6 AND 13 His mother's unfortunate and prolonged illness forced his father to place his son in the care of his nanny. The nanny's husband was a stonecutter, working in his own father's marble quarry. In 1481, when Michelangelo was six years old, his mother died yet he continued to live with the pair until he was 13 years old. As a child, he was always surrounded by chisels and stone. He joked that this was why he loved to sculpt in marble.
    [Show full text]
  • 182 MICHAELANGELO's Shadow: GUILIANO BUGIARDINI
    MICHAeLANGeLO’S SHADOW: GUILIANO BUGIARDINI NORMAN E. LAND THOUGH he wrote of a host of painters, sculptors and architects in his Lives of the Artists (Florence, 1568), Giorgio Vasari focused on the best masters of the Italian Renaissance, among them Giotto, Donatello, Leonardo da Vinci and, above all, the hero of his book, Michelangelo. Still, he gave considerable atten- tion to a number of other, less formidable artists, one of whom is the Florentine painter, Giuliano di Piero di Simone Bugiardini (1475–1554).1 Although there is an on-going and objective assessment of Bugiardini’s life and works, scholars have not fully appreciated the figure of the artist in Vasari’s Lives.2 For Vasari, Bugiar- dini was a minor painter who did not play a leading role in the complex story of the progress of Renaissance art from its beginnings in the fourteenth century to its perfection in the sixteenth. Nevertheless, Bugiardini is an important figure in the Lives, for Vasari uses him to throw certain features of Michelangelo’s character and personality into relief. Bugiardini is also significant because, for Vasari, he was an example of a particular kind of artistic personality. He was a simple man who was long on self-confidence but short on self-knowledge. Vasari’s figure of Bugiardini reflects an actual person who was a friend and at times a close associate of Michelangelo and is often mentioned in documents re- lated to him. For example, as early as April 1508, a famous letter alludes to what was to become a professional relationship between Bugiardini and Michelangelo.
    [Show full text]
  • In the Art of Sandro Botticelli And
    CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE ANTIQUITY AND THE SISTINE SOJOURN (1481-1482) IN THE ART OF SANDRO BOTTICELLI AND DOMENICO GHIRLANDAIO Volume 1 A thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Art by Max Calvin Marmor May, 1982 ~ • I The Thesis of Max Calvin Marmor is approved: anne L. Trabold, Ph.D. California State University, Northridge i i This thesis is dedicated to the immortal words of Ibn Abad Sina "Seek not gold in shallow vessels!" (Contra Alchemia, Praefatio) iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thanks are due my thesis committee for allowing a maverick to go his own way. Without their contributions, this experience would not have been what it has been. More could be said on this score but, to quote the Devil (whose advice I should have followed from the outset): "Mach es kurz! Am Juengsten Tag ist's nur ein F--z!" So I'll "make it short." I owe special thanks to Dr. Birgitta Wohl, who initially persuaded me that higher education is worthwhile; who expressed unfailing interest in my ideas and progress; and who, throughout, has provided a unique living example of wide learning and humanistic scholarship. Finally, this thesis could not have been written without the ever prompt, ever courteous services of the CSUN Library Inter-Library Loan Department. Thanks to Charlotte (in her many roles}, to Misha and their myriad elves, who, for an unconscionably long time, made every day Christmas! iv CONTENTS Page LIST 01'' FIGURES . vii ABSTRACT . ix Chapter INTRODUCTION: CONTEXT AND CRISIS IN THE REVIVAL OF ANTIQUITY.
    [Show full text]
  • Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects
    Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects Giorgio Vasari Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects Table of Contents Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects.......................................................................1 Giorgio Vasari..........................................................................................................................................2 LIFE OF FILIPPO LIPPI, CALLED FILIPPINO...................................................................................9 BERNARDINO PINTURICCHIO........................................................................................................13 LIFE OF BERNARDINO PINTURICCHIO.........................................................................................14 FRANCESCO FRANCIA.....................................................................................................................17 LIFE OF FRANCESCO FRANCIA......................................................................................................18 PIETRO PERUGINO............................................................................................................................22 LIFE OF PIETRO PERUGINO.............................................................................................................23 VITTORE SCARPACCIA (CARPACCIO), AND OTHER VENETIAN AND LOMBARD PAINTERS...........................................................................................................................................31
    [Show full text]
  • Gallery Late Gothic & Renaissance Art in Italy, 1350-1550
    Gallery Late Gothic & Renaissance Art in Italy, 1350-1550 The art exhibited in this gallery originates from the leading artistic centers of Italy. The country was divided into a number of independently governed cities and states, an arrangement that favored a strong regional development of language, art, and culture. Art continued to be produced primarily in the service of the Catholic Church; however, patronage began to shift to wealthy families and individuals. Many of the early gold-ground paintings in this gallery are fragments, once part of larger altarpieces known as triptychs or polyptychs. Towards the end of the 15th century, these separate panels began to be joined into unified compositions. Episodes from the Bible, the Golden Legend (a 13th•century manual on the lives of the saints and Christian faith), and the Apocryphal texts provided artists with a rich array of subjects and events to document. Along with the important religious and social changes marking this period, the physical nature of painting underwent a major transformation. The use of oils and canvas supports eventually became widespread, largely replacing the egg tempera and gold-ground technique on wooden panels. Linked to these advances was the development of the printing press, leading to the broad dissemination of religious and political ideas, and greater accessibility to texts and images. The Docent Collections Handbook 2007 Edition Giovanni del Biondo Italian, active 1356, died 1399, active in Florence Madonna and Child with Saints Peter, Paul, John the Baptist, John the Evangelist, and Two Angels, c. 1385-90 Tempera on panel Bequest of John Ringling, 1936, SN 6.a The Madonna and infant Jesus are surrounded by saints in a sacra conversazione, or sacred conversation.
    [Show full text]
  • Personaggi Nella Storia Della Valdelsa
    Rino Salvestrini Personaggi nella storia della Valdelsa Barberino Valdelsa, Casole d'Elsa, Castelfiorentino, Certaldo, Colle di Valdelsa, Gambassi Terme, Montaione, Monteriggioni, Montespertoli, Poggibonsi, Radicondoli, San Gimignano, Sovicille e Tavarnelle Val di Pesa. Giovanni Boccaccio Arnolfo di Cambio Premessa A – G 1 2 Rino Salvestrini Personaggi nella storia della Valdelsa Barberino Valdelsa, Casole d'Elsa, Castelfiorentino, Certaldo, Colle di Valdelsa, Gambassi Terme, Montaione, Monteriggioni, Montespertoli, Poggibonsi, Radicondoli, San Gimignano, Sovicille e Tavarnelle Val di Pesa. Amedeo Bassi Miryam Ferretti Premessa A –G 3 Vita mortuorum in memoria posita est vivorum (La vita dei morti sta nella memoria dei vivi) (Cicerone) Dedico questo libro alla mia moglie Dianora, perché, come sempre, mi ha aiutato, e al mio figliolo Francesco, storico di professione, perché non sia troppo severo nel giudicarlo. 4 Premessa Ho già parlato di alcuni personaggi valdelsani nel mio La Valdelsa nel tempo, ma in seguito mi è piaciuta l'idea di riunire il maggior numero possibile di persone che hanno un posto nella storia della valle e a volte anche oltre, per un processo conoscitivo complessivo, oltre i localismi o campanilismi. Devo dire che su certi personaggi sono stati scritti libri e libri, tanto è famoso il loro nome, ma qui io ho sintetizzato al massimo per dar spazio ad altri, certamente minori, certamente meno noti, però sempre molto interessanti. Inoltre anche se certi personaggi "minori" sono conosciuti nel loro paese, dove possono anche avere l'intestazione di una via, però sono quasi del tutto ignorati negli altri Comuni. Certamente le righe per ogni personaggio potevano essere più numerose, ma s'intenda questo lavoro soltanto una ricerca d'inventario, incompleta, ma sempre molto nutrita.
    [Show full text]
  • MKCHELANGELO~S §JH[ADOW~ Gnjlkano BUGKARDKNK
    MKCHELANGELO~S §JH[ADOW~ GnJLKANO BUGKARDKNK NORMAN E. LAND THOUGH HE WROTE of a host of painters, sculptors and architects in his Lives if the Artists (Florence, 1568), Giorgio Vasari focused on the best masters of the Italian Renaissance, among them Giotto, Donatello, Leonardo da Vinci and, above all, the hero of his book, Michelangelo. Still, he gave considerable attention to a number of other, less formidable artists, one of whom is the Florentine painter, Giuliano di Piero di Simone Bugiardini (1475-1554).1 Although there is an on-going and objective assessment of Bugiardini's life and works, scholars have not fully appreciated the figure of the artist in Vasari's Lives. 2 For Vasari, Bugiardini was a minor painter who did not play a leading role in the complex story of the progress of Renaissance art from its beginnings in the fourteenth century to its perfection in the sixteenth. Nevertheless, Bugiardini is an important figure in the Lives, for Vasari uses him to throw certain features of Michelangelo's character and personality into relief. Bugiardini is also significant because, for Vasari, he was an example of a particular kind of artistic personality. He was a simple man who was long on self-confidence but short on self-knowledge. Vasari's figure of Bugiardini reflects an actual person who was a friend and at times a close associate of Michelangelo and is often mentioned in documents related to him. For example, as early as April 1508, a famous letter alludes to what was to become a professional relationship between Bugiardini and Michelangelo.
    [Show full text]
  • The Florentine Painters of the Renaissance
    Portrait of a Lady. From the Painting, possibly by Verrocchio, in the Poldi Museum at Milan. THE FLORENTINE PAINTERS OF THE RENAISSANCE WITH AN INDEX TO THEIR WORKS BY BERNHARD BERENSON AUTHOR OF “VENETIAN PAINTERS OF THE RENAISSANCE,” “LORENZO LOTTO,” “CENTRAL ITALIAN PAINTERS OF THE RENAISSANCE” THIRD EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON The Knickerbocker Press COPYRIGHT, 1896 BY G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS Entered at Stationers’ Hall, London COPYRIGHT, 1909 BY G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS (For revised edition) Made in the United States of America iiiPREFACE TO THIRD EDITION Years have passed since the second edition of this book. But as most of this time has been taken up with the writing of my “Drawings of the Florentine Painters,” it has, in a sense, been spent in preparing me to make this new edition. Indeed, it is to that bigger work that I must refer the student who may wish to have the reasons for some of my attributions. There, for instance, he will find the intricate Carli question treated quite as fully as it deserves. Jacopo del Sellajo is inserted here for the first time. Ample accounts of this frequently entertaining tenth-rate painter may be found in articles by Hans Makowsky, Mary Logan, and Herbert Horne. The most important event of the last ten years, in the study of Italian art, has been the rediscovery of an all but forgotten great master,iv Pietro Cavallini. The study of his fresco at S. Cecilia in Rome, and of the other works that readily group themselves with it, has illuminated with an unhoped-for light the problem of Giotto’s origin and development.
    [Show full text]
  • Michelangelo, Selected Poems
    ART HUMANITIES: PRIMARY SOURCE READER Section 4: Michelangelo Art Humanities Primary Source Reading 15 Michelangelo, Selected Poems The passages that follow attest to Michelangelo as a personification of what we now call a “Renaissance Man.” Though he is best known for his sculpture, painting, and architecture, Michelangelo was also a prolific poet, composing over three hundred pieces during his lifetime, sometimes even jotting down lines of verse in the margins of his drawings. Though an edition of 105 of his poems was abortively prepared between 1542 and 1546, the first printed version of his written work appeared in 1623 in a volume edited by his grandnephew Michelangelo the Younger. The latter Michelangelo drew from the edition prepared earlier, as well as family manuscripts, while altering the nature of the poems by completing some,and changing the language and content of others to conform with Counter-Reformation ideas about faith and love. This was the only available version of the artist’s poetry until 1863, and, therefore, it shaped scholarly understanding of Michelangelo through the first part of the 19th century. The artist dealt with such broad themes as love and death, and, as in the selections here, the nature of artistic creativity. At the same time, the following poems provide us with a type of written self-portrait, which may be read alongside the images he created of himself in the guise of St. Bartholomew in the Last Judgment, and the figure of Nicodemus in the Florence Pietà. As the following examples suggest, Michelangelo’s insights on himself were frequently in strong contrast to Vasari’s effusively laudatory commentary on the artist’s life and works.
    [Show full text]
  • The Berenson Collection: a Guide
    The Berenson Collection: A Guide Joseph Connors, Harvard University A DECADE IN THE MAKING, ten pounds in weight, and eight hundred pages in length, The Bernard and Mary Berenson Collection of European Paintings at I Tatti, edited by Carl Brandon Strehlke and Machtelt Brüggen Israëls (Florence, 2015) is finally out. That this is an exceptionally beautiful book with superb color illustrations and elegant layout and typography will be evident to anyone who takes it in hand. Forty-five authors, from the senior statesmen of Renaissance art to a new generation of scholars, wrote entries on 110 older paintings in addition to thirty-nine works by the Berensons’ contemporaries and related material, both real and fake.1 A bibliography of three thousand items is joined with research in the archives of dozens of museums, collectors, and dealers, not least those at I Tatti. Erudition on this scale in a single tome is rare. The book is an alp. The downside of weightiness is that the catalog risks sitting on the shelf, ad- mired by all but consulted only by specialists. This would be sad since it is sur- prisingly readable and has exciting material. My aim here is to offer a guide for the curious. The book took me a month to read, but it can be delved into with profit even for a spare half hour here and there or a summer’s afternoon. Visitors who are impressed with the general atmosphere of the house but confused by the dozens of unfamiliar artists’ names can use it to put order into their impressions.
    [Show full text]
  • Pontormo: Portrait of a Halberdier
    Pontormo PORTRAIT OF A HALBERDIER Pontormo PORTRAIT OF A HALBERDIER Elizabeth Cropper GETTY MUSEUM STUDIES ON ART Los ANGELE s Christopher Hudson, Publisher Frontispiece: Mark Greenberg, Managing Editor Pontormo (Jacopo Carucci) (Italian, 1494-1557). Self-Portrait Study, circa 1525. Red chalk. William Peterson, Editor London, The British Museum (i936.io.io.ior). Elizabeth Zozom, Production Coordinator Copyright © British Museum. Jeffrey Cohen, Designer Lou Meluso, Photographer All works of art are reproduced (and photographs provided) courtesy of the owners, unless otherwise © 1997 The J. Paul Getty Museum indicated. 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1000 Los Angeles, California 90049-1687 Typography by G&S Typesetters, Inc., Austin, Texas Library of Congress Printed in Hong Kong by Imago Cataloging-in-Publication Data Cropper, Elizabeth Pontormo : portrait of a halberdier / Elizabeth Cropper p. cm.—(Getty Museum studies on art) ISBN 0-89236-366-5 i. Pontormo, Jacopo Carucci, 1494-ca. 1556. Halberdier. 2. Pontormo, Jacopo Carucci, 1494-ca. 1556—Criticism and interpretation. 3. Portrait painting, Italian—Expertising. 4. Mannerism (Art)—Italy. 5. J. Paul Getty Museum. I. Title II. Series. ND1329.P64A66 1997 759.5—dc2i 97-19822 CIP CONTENTS Introduction i A Portrait of Duke Cosimo When He Was Young? 15 A Portrait of Francesco Guardi? 23 Afterword 99 Notes 112 Bibliography 122 Genealogy of the Guardi Family 128 Acknowledgments 132 Final page folds out, providing a reference color plate of Portrait of a Halberdier INTRODUCTION hen a great painting is the subject of intense study, interpretive possibili- wties proliferate as we change our point of view in the historical landscape, standing up close or taking a distant look.
    [Show full text]