Tátrai Vilmos szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 95. (Budapest, 2001)

SZÉPE, HELENA KATALIN: Civic and artistic identity in illuminated Venetian documents

CIVIC AND ARTISTIC IDENTITY IN ILLUMINATED VENETIAN DOCUMENTS A portrait by Giovanni Battista Moroni in the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, has the confusing later inscription in the upper right corner, which identifies the sitter as Jacopo Contarini, podestà, or Venetian governor, of Padua, of 1575 (fig. 42). As scholars have pointed out, there never was a Jacopo Contarini who held that position, but a Jacopo Foscarini was podestà of Padua in 1575.' Is this then actually a portrait of Jacopo Foscarini? Although one may never be certain whether Moroni represented a Foscarini or a Contarini, a clue that encourages one to think that the man wished to be identified as a Venetian officer-elect is the red book that juts out at an angle to the right. This article examines the nature of such books, the miniatures inside them, and their role in the construction of Venetian patrician identity. Books were common props employed by artists in the Renaissance that help identify saintly subjects or what sitters wanted to project about themselves. Folio-size books simply bound in vellum, probably containing accounts or business records affirm the profession of a merchant, as in the portrait in the Museum, which has been attributed to Lorenzo Lotto.

2 Magnificent, large books typically accompany fathers of the church or the Evangelist Mark, emphasizing their authority and importance in transmission of the Word. The most popular book props in private Renaissance portraiture are '

petrarchinï

, or libri da mano - small, hand-held octavo-size books, which allude to the interior life and literary culture of the sitter. Like private devotional books of hours, this was a prop available for portraiture of women as well as men, as is shown by two portraits by Bernardino Licinio also in the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts.

3 I wish to thank Andrea Czére and Teréz Gerszi for inviting me to speak on this subject at the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest in June of 2000. Orsolya Karsay, György Domokos and Gábor Farkas were extremely generous guides to researching manuscripts in Budapest. 1 have benefitted far more from the advice and support of Lilian Armstrong, Nicolas Barker, David Chambers, Giordana Mariani Canova, and Federica Toniolo than this article can convey. Many thanks also to Piero Lucchi and Claudia Salmini. My research on this subject has been generously supported by grants from the American Council of Learned Societies, the Getty Grant Program, the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, the Huntington Library, and the University of South Florida Research Council. 1 Tátrai, V., entry in Treasures of Venice. Paintings from the Museum of Fine Arts Budapest, cd. Keyes, G., Barkóczi, I., Satkowski, J. Minneapolis 1995, 190-191; Garas. K., Italian Renaissance Portraits, 3rd revised edition. Budapest 1981. cat. 34. 2 Garas, op.cit. cat. 31. 3 On the Licinio paintings, see Tátrai, op.cit. 184-185; Garas, op.cit. cats. 35-37. The lihro da mano is further explored in Szépe, H., The Book as Companion, the Author as Friend. Aldine octavos illuminated by Benedetto Bordon, Word and Image 11:1 (January-March 1995) 77-99.