Lucca and the Art of Luxury

Stunning five week online course organised by the London Art History Society on the city of Lucca in Italy, its silk manufacturing and trading and the merchants patronage of the arts.

Led by Geoff Nuttall it was wonderful to spend so much time, 10 hours in all, looking at quite a specific subject. I knew very little before the course about the silk trade in the 14th and 15th centuries and will now be spotting the cities textiles in paintings and annoying fellow gallery goers by shouting LUCCA!

In the first week we looked at the origins of the trade and how the silk was made leading to week two on how the merchants set up colonies throughout Northern Europe and Italy bringing not only their textiles but also their banking skills. I’d not realised how active they were in England and want to have a walk round the city looking at the places they worshipped and operated.

The later weeks were devoted to looking at specific families, both at their trading but also their commissioning of works of art for themselves and their clients. Geoff put forward the argument, that unlike other Italian patrons of the time, the Lucca merchants had a deep understanding of how artists and craftsmen worked and took a very active role in the works they commissioned.

Week 3 looked at the Trenta and Buonvisi families spending some time looking at the tomb of Lorenzo Trenta in Lucca, shown here, whose whole chapel encompassed an intricate iconographic narrative. Week 4 was the Rapondi family and in particular their commissioning and production of books for the French Royal family. Finally we looked at Paolo Guinigi, Lord of Lucca, who got a bad press from Vasari, but was a voracious collector of luxury goods. We looked in detail at his possible commission of a tomb for his second wife Ilaria of Carretto much loved by Ruskin.

There really was too much on these talks to record here but it’s added a whole new layer to my knowledge of the 14th and 15th centuries to build on and find out more about.

 

 

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