Inventing engraving in Vasari's Florence

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Notes

1. On the earliest engravings see especially Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 38–55. See also Parshall and Schoch, Origins of European Printmaking; Stijnman, Engraving and Etching.

2. For the composition of the vite see especially Rubin, Giorgio Vasari, 106–147.

3. The principal competing evaluations of Vasari's attitude towards prints are Landau, “Vasari, Prints, and Prejudice,” and Gregory, Vasari and the Renaissance, 1–14, 45–46.

4. For the place of engraving within Mantegna's career see especially Lightbown, Andrea Mantegna; Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers,” 56–66; Christiansen, “The Case for Mantegna”; Lincoln, Invention of the Italian Renaissance; and Fletcher, “A Closer Look.” Born near Padua and trained in that city, Mantegna spent the entirety of his mature career in the employ of the signori of Mantua, and I accordingly use the shorthand of “Mantuan” for the artist and his works throughout this essay.

5. Vasari, Le vite, vol. 3, 554.

6. Warnke, Court Artist; Welch, “Painting as Performance,” 22–23.

7. Gregory, Vasari and the Renaissance, 9. Borghini was one of Vasari's most frequent correspondents and may be thought of as a major collaborator on the second edition of the vite.

8. Vasari, Le vite, vol. 1, 165–168. On Vasari's revisions see especially Rubin, Giorgio Vasari, 187–230, and Gregory, Vasari and the Renaissance, 9–29.

9. Vasari, Le vite, vol. 5, 3.

10. Ibid., vol. 5, 3–7. On Raimondi see especially Pon, Raphael, Dürer, and Marcantonio.

11. Vasari, Le vite, vol. 5, 2–3.

12. Boase, Giorgio Vasari, and Rubin, Giorgio Vasari.

13. For the intellectual associations of Mantegna's prints see especially Emison, “The Raucousness”; Emison, “Prolegomena to the Study.”

14. On print culture see Ivins, Prints and Visual Communication; Eisenstein, Printing Press, vol. 1, 1–31; Eisenstein, Divine Art, Infernal Machine; but see the revisions proposed by Johns, Nature of the Book, 28–40.

15. Jacobsen, “Meaning of Mantegna's Battle”; Emison, “The Raucousness”; Campbell, Cabinet of Eros, 163–68. See Strabo, Geography, 14.2.7.

16. “Zoan” is the distinctive Venetian form of “Giovanni.” This has led to substantial confusion and uncertainty regarding the artist's name and has suggested to some scholars that prints once attributed to Zoan are in fact the work of Giovanni Antonio da Bresica: see Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers.”

17. Lightbown, Andrea Mantegna, 234; Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers,” 56–66; Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 71; Christiansen, “Case for Mantegna,” 604–612.

18. Kristeller, Andrea Mantegna, 530–531; Hind, Early Italian Engraving; Landau, “Mantegna as Printmaker.”

19. Lightbown, Andrea Mantegna, 236–237; Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers,” 58. This position is also supported in Lincoln, Invention of the Italian Renaissance, 38–39. Suzanne Boorsch has suggested that Mantegna “was supposed to be in charge of all artistic matters in Mantuan territory.” Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers,” 58. On Mantegna and the status of the court artist see Warnke, Court Artist, and especially Campbell, “Introduction.”

20. Lightbown, Andrea Mantega, 109.

21. Rebecchini and Furlotti, Art of Mantua, 36–91.

22. See especially Lincoln, Invention of the Italian Renaissance, 37–39; Lincoln, “Invention and Authorship.” The clash between Albrecht Dürer and Marcantonio Raimondi on account of the latter's unauthorized use of the famous “AD” monogram is certainly the best known example: See Pon, Raphael, Dürer, and Marcantonio, esp. 137–142.

23. Roberts, “Tricks of the Trade.”

24. On Zoan see Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers.”

25. Further, Mantegna and the artisans with whom he worked were probably typical too in utilizing both sides of his plates to maximize their investment. On these plates see especially Signorini, “New Findings.”

26. See especially the competing positions represented in Martineau, Andrea Mantegna.

27. Canova, “Gian Marco Incisore.”

28. Campbell, Cabinet of Eros, 157–162.

29. Lightbown, Andrea Mantegna, 237.

30. On the importance of collaboration and the difficulties it presents for art historians see especially Radke, “Lorenzo Ghiberti: Master Collaborator.”

31. For this collaboration see Boorsch, “Mantegna and His Printmakers,” 56–66.

32. Gregory, Vasari and the Renaissance, 9–12.

33. Cennino Cennini understood the relationship between techniques used in both metalwork and painting and described a host of punches, burnishers, and other tools. Many of these were adapted, shortly thereafter, for engraving on copper plates for printing: Cennini, Craftsman's Handbook, 82–85, 127–131.

34. Levenson et al., Early Italian Engravings, 1–9; Kubiak, “Maso Finiguerra”; Whitaker, “Maso Finiguerra and Early Florentine Printmaking.”

35. Whitaker, “Maso Finiguerra, Baccio Baldini.”

36. Landau, “Vasari, Prints and Prejudice,” 3–10.

37. Levenson, Early Italian Engravings, 528–549; Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 65–66; Zucker, Illustrated Bartsch, part 1, 1–4; and Zucker, “Fine Manner.”

38. See esp. Dempsey, Early Renaissance, 119–205.

39. On these engravings see also Archer, “Dating of a Florentine,” and Roberts, “Francesco Rosselli.”

40. Zucker, Illustrated Bartsch, part 1, 1–7. The presence of Schongauer's engravings in Quattrocento Florence is attested by the youthful Michelangelo's painted copy of the Temptation of Saint Anthony.

41. Landau, “Printmaking in the Age of Lorenzo” and Roberts, “Francesco Rosselli.”

42. Landau, “Printmaking in the Age of Lorenzo”; Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 108–112.

43. Zucker, Illustrated Bartsch, part 2, 75–78.

44. Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 73; Boorsch, “Case for Francesco Rosselli.”

45. Rosselli retained his engraved plates throughout his life, passing them on to his son Alessandro at the time of his death. See Del Badia, “La bottega di Alessandro di Francesco Rosselli” and Zucker, Illustrated Bartsch, part 2, 3.

46. Roberts, “Francesco Rosselli,” 4–17.

47. Skelton, Geographia; Procaccioli, Cristoforo Landino; Roberts, Printing a Mediterranean World, 90–92.

48. Boorsch, “Case for Francesco Rosselli.”

49. Dreyer, “Botticelli's Series.”

50. Roberts, Printing a Mediterranean World, 96–97.

51. See, for example, Padua Bibilioteca Civica, C. I. 163, f. 161v.

52. Lincoln, “Mantegna's Culture of Line,” and Lincoln, Invention of the Italian Renaissance.

53. Sighinolfi, “I mappamondi,” and Skelton, Cosmographia: Bologna, vi–vii.

54. Skelton, Cosmographia: Rome.

55. On the status of trade techniques as secrets in the medieval and early modern world, see esp. Long, Openness, Secrecy, Authorship. See also Butters, Triumph of Vulcan.

56. See Pon, Raphael, Dürer, and Marcantonio, 43–47, 73–77.

57. Cole, Ambitious Form.

58. See e.g. Goffen, Renaissance Rivals; Ilchman, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese; Jones, Lost Battles.

59. Strabo, Geography, 14.2.7.

60. See Luciano, Antico.

61. Smith, Body of the Artisan, 8.

62. While later sixteenth- and seventeenth-century practitioners like Hendrik Goltzius would take the connection between the burin and the draftsman's hand as a theme for inventive images, such rumination was grounded in a notion of creation that juxtaposed artisanal trickery with nature. On the other hand, evidence of drypoint techniques in “Mantegna's” engravings suggests that at least some intervention was made using a process substantially closer to drawing on these plates.

63. See e.g. Boucher, Earth and Fire, and Butters, Triumph of Vulcan.

64. Cole, Ambitious Form.

65. Werrett, Fireworks, 13–16.

66. Cole, Cellini.

67. Gnudi and Smith, Vannoccio Biringuccio, 363, 374–75; and Werrett, Fireworks, 47–72.

68. On the materiality of pigments see Klein and Spary, Materials and Expertise.

69. See especially Pon, Raphael, Dürer, and Marcantonio, 1–14, 41–42.

70. Landau and Parshall, Renaissance Print, 16–19. There exists a large technical literature on maker's marks – especially in catalogs of ceramics, woodwork, and metalwork. For the suggestion of its relationship to materiality and print see esp. Koerner, Moment of Self-Portraiture, 222–223.

71. See Smith, Body of the Artisan, 59–61.

72. See esp. Joost-Gaugier, “Ptolemy and Strabo.”

73. See Celenza, “Parallel Lives.”

74. Pliny, Natural History, 35; and see McHam, Pliny and the Artistic Culture.

75. Landau, “Vasari, Prints and Prejudice,” 3–10; and Gregory, Vasari and the Renaissance Print, 45–46.

76. Pliny, Natural History, 35.

77. On the legend of Berthold see Tittmann, “Der Mythos” and Werret, Fireworks, 28–30.

78. Schaefer, “Invention of Gunpowder,” and on the program generally see Allegri and Cecchi, Palazzo Vecchio.

79. Bacon, New Atlantis, 82.