Second-hand Magnificence; Transmitting Magnificence Back-and-Forth between Individuals and Objects in Sixteenth-Century Antwerp
(2023) RSA — Location: San Juan (9.March.2023)
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- Abstract
- The common view in present-day research into renaissance Aristotelian virtues is that calling a work of art or architecture magnificent was the result of a confluence of the high quality and fittingness of the work and the virtuosity of the patron. This paper explores several written sources which regard magnificence as a quality originating in either a person or an object that can be transmitted to a second party and back again. This conceptualisation of magnificence transcends the principle of fittingness of the patron and opens up strategies and possibilities such as claiming magnificence and authority not through virtuous behaviour but by means of magnificent objects. This notion is explored through a close reading of written sources, produced and circulated in Antwerp in the sixteenth century, such as Erasmus’ correspondences, Joachim Tydich’s laudation of Antwerp’s greatest citizens in 1573, and Daniel Rogerius poem on Antwerp of 1574. These sources discuss magnificence in a variety of ways, challenging the known strategies to claim magnificence.
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Dijkdrent, M. (2023). Second-hand Magnificence; Transmitting Magnificence Back-and-Forth between Individuals and Objects in Sixteenth-Century Antwerp. RSA, San Juan. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/30449