Darting Strokes & Wild Lines. The Drawings of Battista Naldini (1535-1591) by Marco Quabba ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9302-851X Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy June 2017 Art History School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne Declaration This is to certify that: i. This thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD. ii. Due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used. iii. The thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables, list of illustrations, bibliography, image captions, and appendices. Marco Isaac Quabba 2 Abstract Darting Strokes & Wild Lines. The Drawings of Battista Naldini (1535-1591) This thesis investigates Mannerism, contorted bodies, imitation, and drawings. Like many Florentine draughtsmen of his generation, Battista Naldini copied extensively, undertaking an intense study of the most famous antique and contemporary visual sources. He was the curious product of two divergent mannerist traditions, those represented by Jacopo da Pontormo and Giorgio Vasari. Around 650 of his drawings survive, and they reveal that he adhered to a broad theory of imitation. This thesis contributes to the reappraisal of Mannerism and artistic imitation. It revisits common terminologies used in drawing studies, categories such as primo pensiero, bozzo, schizzo, and modello, and deconstructs the cherished assumptions of traditional connoisseurship. My approach to drawings is motivated by the desire to reconstruct sixteenth-century artistic practice. It is inspired by David Rosand’s phenomenological investigation of graphic acts and Leatrice Mendelsohn’s fascinating research into how sculpture fuelled the imagination of Mannerists. I chart the creative dimension of Naldini’s imitation, examining the angular jolt of his strokes in their quest to emulate Pontormo’s sketches, ponder on his close scrutiny of Albrecht Dürer’s engraved lines, analyse how he extracted idealised female bodies from bronze sculptures by Bandinelli, and reflect on the devotional function of his Michelangelesque adaptations. 3 Acknowledgements I owe an enormous debt to my supervisors, Associate Professor Robert Gaston and Professor Jaynie Anderson, for their encouragement, patience, and unwavering commitment to this research project. I have fond memories of Robert Gaston’s undergraduate class on Italian art at La Trobe University more than 10 years ago. He gave us students an impressive list of 47 essay questions, encouraging investigations into Botticelli’s ‘humanism’, Leonardo’s ‘genius’, or critical assessments of entrenched art historical opinions. One question concentrated on drawing the body, and invited reflection on the ‘supposed immediacy and intimacy of contact with the object drawn’. It ended with the modest reservation: ‘Or is this a myth propagated by historians of drawing?’ This cautious scepticism lingered in my memory over the years together with important questions posed by David Rosand in 2002: ‘Is there a discourse beyond the catalogue raisonné? If so, how is it to be continued? One of the most basic assumptions of traditional connoisseurship and appreciation is that drawings offer us the most intimate documents of artistic creativity and personality, but what exactly do we expect them to reveal?’1 Ultimately, I was compelled to find a possible solution for Mannerism and imitation. I am grateful to Robert for first suggesting Battista Naldini as a potential study, and to Jaynie Anderson for lending her connoisseurial expertise and knowledge of Giovanni Morelli. I am grateful to the University of Melbourne for supporting my research with an Australian Postgraduate Award. I was also fortunate to benefit from an introductory course in Palaeography and Archival studies provided by the excellent staff and fellows of the Medici Archive Project in 2011, where Alessio Assonitis, Maurizio Arfaioli, Nicoletta Baldini, Elena Brizio, and Julia Viscoso were especially helpful. I am most grateful to the Gandioli Fumagalli Foundation and the Samuel H. Kress Foundation for supporting research in Milan and Florence. I also want to thank Jaynie Anderson, Shigetoshi Osano, and the University of Melbourne for supporting my attendance of the CIHA colloquium in Naruto, Japan (2013), dedicated to the theme of reproduction across Eastern and Western art. Here I presented a shortened version 1 Rosand, 2002, p. 3. 4 of my eighth chapter and received invaluable feedback from Stephen Bann and Jonathan Hay. The staff of several libraries and archives offered support throughout the project: Baillieu Library of the University of Melbourne; State Library of Victoria; Caulfield Library, Monash University; Dalton McCaughey Library; Biblioteca d’Arte of the Castello Sforzesco, Milan; Archivio di Stato di Firenze; the Sala Manoscritti of the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze; Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florence; the State Archives of Prato and Pistoia. I extend my gratitude to the institutions where I conducted most of my research on drawings: the wonderful staff at the Biblioteca Comunale degli Intronati di Siena (BCI); Gabinetto dei disegni, Castello Sforzesco, Milan; Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan; the Department of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum, London; Staatliche Graphische Sammlung, Munich; Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon; Département des Arts graphiques, Musée du Louvre; and a special thanks to the entire staff of the Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi (GDSU) for their generous support during my prolonged stay; and the Australian Institute of Art History, University of Melbourne, were I wrote much of the manuscript. Others deserve special mention: Milena Pagni at the BCI kindly shared her knowledge of watermarks and made my examination of Naldini’s sketchbook possible. I am grateful to Elizabeth Pilliod for sharing invaluable insights into Pontormo and Naldini, and graciously informing me of her discovery of Naldini’s half-brother. Carmen Bambach offered me a brief glimpse of her remarkable understanding of Pontormo’s drawings as I struggled through questionable attributions. Lisa Goldenberg Stoppato catalogued Naldini’s drawings in the GDSU more than thirty years ago and generously shared her observations with me. I am indebted to many others who helped along the way: Andrew Baird, Celina Bastos, Giulio Bora, Donatella Boschi, Stefano de Bosio, Miles Chappell, Angelo Lo Conte, Maria Rita d’Amato, Carla D’Arista, Maria Elena de Luca, Marzia Faietti, Frank Filippone, Mauro Vincenzo Fontana, Cristiana Garofalo, Adam Goatley, Józef Grabski, Felicity Harley-McGowan, Ariana Henderson, Diana Hiller, Deborah Howard, Giorgio Marini, David Marshall, Alessia Meglio, Christina Milz, John 5 Paoletti, Daniele Pescarmona, Annamaria Petrioli Tofani, Alan Tuxford, Massimo Pivetti, Renzo Pepi, Roberta Pozzato, Cara Rachele, Callum Robert Reid, Elizabeth Reid, Paolo Rosa, Francesca Rossi, Agnieszka Smołucha-Sładkowska, Elena Tondini, Don Osvaldo Valota, Paul Vout, Joanna Wolańska, Richard Woodfield, and Milosz Wozny. It is standard for academic acknowledgements to place family members last, even when this convention fails to genuinely communicate gratitude. I had the good fortune to grow up in an artistic home with my father painting in his studio almost every day. He was my first teacher of art, and nurtured my early appreciation for drawing. I am extremely grateful for the enduring support of my wonderful family: Angelo, Julie, and Tim Quabba, Janette, Joey, and Frankie-Quinn Pelayo, and Tony Pooley. Last, but not least, to my partner Rainer Schack I give my heartfelt thanks for motivating this project to its end with strong, positive encouragement. 6 Table of Contents Declaration 2 Abstract 3 Acknowledgements 4 List of Illustrations 10 Chapter 1 38 Pratico e fiero dipintore. The Scholarly Reception of Battista Naldini The Critical Fortune of Battista Naldini 50 Chapter 2 57 Reading Lines My Approach to Drawings 61 The Size of Naldini’s graphic oeuvre 63 Classification and the Catalogue Raisonné 65 Chapter 3 67 Deconstructing the Cherished Assumptions of Traditional Connoisseurship [A] - Drawings are the most Immediate and Intimate of all the Visual Arts 72 [B] - Drawings Reveal Personality 74 [C & D] - Effortlessness in Drawing is a Sign of Originality and genius. Labour and effort mask Personality. 80 [E] - The Personality of a Draughtsman Cannot be Imitated 83 Cinquecento Context 88 Ars & Ingenium 88 Sprezzatura, fatica e stento 91 Diligence 93 Evaluations of the Sketch in Cinquecento Florence 97 Vasari’s Libro de’ disegni 108 Chapter 4 117 Marks of Invention Primo Pensiero 125 Schizzo – The Gushing Squirt of Inventive Passion 128 Macchia – Invention and the Illegible Stain 137 Bozzo 140 Modello & Bozzetto 142 7 Chapter 5 148 Battista Naldini’s Early Drawings & Tuition Naldini’s Apprenticeship 150 Pen drawings 159 Late Drawings for the San Lorenzo Choir 165 Naldini as Teacher 171 Chapter 6 173 Imitation Zeuxis and the Beautiful Maidens 176 Borghini on Imitation 178 Armenini on Imitation 181 Naldini’s Study of Multiple Sources 186 River Gods 196 Chapter 7 202 Naldini’s use of Sculpture Baccio Bandinelli 207 Leda & Venus 209 Chapter 8 217 Battista Naldini’s response to Albrecht Dürer Chapter 9 227 Reading Naldini’s religious images in Counter-Reformation Florence The Minerbetti Lamentation 233 Sources, Composition, and Narrative 238 Emotion in maniera painting 246 Raffaello Borghini and the Male Nude in Religious Painting