128 pages, paperback, 260 x 300 mm, 80 colour illustrations
PRICE: £25.00
ISBN: 9781 903470916
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Accompanying an exhibition at The Courtauld Gallery, this catalogue explores one of the most important and historically neglected art forms of Renaissance Florence: cassoni – pairs of chests that were lavishly decorated with precious metals and elaborate paintings and were often the most expensive of a whole suite of decorative objects commissioned to celebrate marriage alliances between powerful families.
Cassoni were displayed in the husband’s chamber and were used to store precious items such as clothes and textiles. The painted panels set into them told tales and history from ancient Greece, Rome and Palestine, as well as from Florentine literature and more recent history. These beautifully told and highly crafted pictorial narratives were intended to entertain as well as to instruct the household and its visitors.
The catalogue reflects the extensive iconographic range of cassone painting. Its focus, however, is around two of The Courtauld’s great treasures: the pair of chests ordered in 1472 by the Florentine Lorenzo Morelli to celebrate his marriage with Vaggia Nerli. These are the only pair of cassoni to be still displayed with their painted backboards (spalliere). The unusual survival of both the chests and their commissioning documents enables a full examination of this remarkable commission.
The remarkable collection of eighteenth-century Sèvres porcelain acquired by the Marquesses of Hertford and Sir Richard Wallace between c. 1802 and c. 1875 now forms a distinguished part of The Wallace Collection.It is here catalogued as a set of three volumes - Volume One: Vases, Volume Two: Tea wares, useful wares, biscuit figures and plaques, Volume Three: References, appendices and index. More
The Wallace Collection has the finest collection of eighteenth-century furniture outside France. Numbering over five hundred pieces, it includes furniture by the greatest Parisian cabinet makers, beginning with André-Charles Boulle and continuing through the major craftsmen of the reigns of Louis XV and Louis XVI. More
WINNER of The Art Newspaper / AXA Exhibition Catalogue Award 2007. Francesco Xanto Avelli da Rovigo was an intriguing artist who painted some of the most beautiful and fascinating ceramics produced in Renaissance Italy. With surfaces entirely painted with scenes from classical literature, Roman history or the Bible, his dishes were much sought after by the educated elite of his time, and continue to fascinate ceramics enthusiasts today... More