Re-thinking Renaissance Objects

Inspired by research undertaken for the new Medieval &
Renaissance Galleries at the Victoria and Albert Museum,
Re-thinking Renaissance Objects explores and often
challenges some of the key issues and current debates relating to
Renaissance art and culture.

• Puts forward original research, including evidence provided by
  an in-depth study arising from the Medieval & Renaissance
  Gallery project

• Contributions are unusual in their combination of a variety of
  approaches, but with each paper starting with an examination of the
  objects themselves

• New theories emerge from several papers, some of which
  challenge current thinking

Auteur

Peta Motture is Senior Curator of Sculpture at the Victoria
and Albert Museum, and was previously Chief Curator of the Medieval
& Renaissance Galleries. She has published widely on
medieval and later sculpture, specializing primarily in the Italian
Renaissance. Motture has co-curated several exhibitions and is
curator of the Robert H. Smith Renaissance Sculpture Programme at
the V&A.

Dr Michelle O'Malley is Reader in Art History at the
University of Sussex, where she has also held the position of
Director of Research in the School of Humanities. Previously, she
was Head of Education for Exhibitions at the Royal Academy of Arts,
London. Dr. O'Malley is the author of The Business of Art:
Contracts and the Commissioning Process in Renaissance Italy
(2005) and The Material Renaissance (co-edited with Evelyn
Welch, 2007).

Résumé
Inspired by research undertaken for the new Medieval & Renaissance Galleries at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Re-thinking Renaissance Objects explores and often challenges some of the key issues and current debates relating to Renaissance art and culture.

• Puts forward original research, including evidence provided by an in-depth study arising from the Medieval & Renaissance Gallery project
• Contributions are unusual in their combination of a variety of approaches, but with each paper starting with an examination of the objects themselves

• New theories emerge from several papers, some of which challenge current thinking

Contenu

Notes on contributors ix

Introduction

Peta Motture and Michelle O'Malley 1

1 Finding fame: painting and the making of careers in
Renaissance Italy

Michelle O'Malley 9

2 Set in stone: monumental altar frames in Renaissance
Florence

Meghan Callahan & Donal Cooper 33

3 Veit Stoss and the origins of collecting of small-scale
sculpture before 1500

Norbert Jopek 56

4 New light on a Venetian lantern at the V&A

Nick Humphrey & Martino Ferrari Bravo 71

5 Rethinking the Petrucci Pavement

Elizabeth Miller & Alun Graves 94

6 Dancing, love and the 'beautiful game': a new
interpretation of a group of fi fteenth-century
'gaming' boxes

Paula Nuttall 119

7 Sharing and status: the design and function of a
sixteenth-century Spanish spice stand in the Victoria and Albert
Museum

Kirstin Kennedy 142

8 Scattered knives and dismembered song: cutlery, music and the
rituals of dining

Flora Dennis 156

Bibliography 185

Index 212