Virtues and Greatness; Analysing references to virtue in requests to patrons in 16th-century North Western Europe

Dijkdrent, Mats
(2024) The art of asking; Strategies of patronage solicitation through the ages in music, literature, visual arts, and intellectual c — Location: Utrecht (15.November.2024)

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Abstract
Conversations between artists and patrons were unfortunately rarely recorded in the 15th and 16th century. However, sometimes a third party, such as a chapter, monastery, guild, or city council was involved and invited the potential patron to spend their money on a future artistic project. As these collective institutions archived their deliberations concerning patronage projects much better, they provide a unique insight into the strategies, arguments and methods deployed when approaching a patron. While basing myself on this corpus, I propose to examine how virtues and promises of moral superiority are evoked when asking a potential benefactor for a substantial financial contribution. Besides showing how an appeal on the presumed duties of a patron (in this case being virtuous) could be a very effective method to create a sense of urgency, this approach offers new insights into how the discourse on patronage related virtues evolved to suit the needs of the artists. Although several virtues are mentioned in these texts, magnificence (magnificentia) presents an especially interesting case. Researchers have abundantly shown that magnificentia in renaissance Italy was interpreted as a virtue concerning the decorum of great expenditure. However, during my research, I have found that magnificentia was interpreted quite differently in urban centres north of the Alps. By shifting the meaning of magnificentia from governing money to concerning (moral) greatness, institutions opened up the contexts in which this virtue could be used considerably. Following the etymology of the word, which went back to magnum facere, institutions frame the patron not only as the doer of great things, but also as the maker of the artwork. Close reading reveals that during the 16th century magnificentia gained aesthetical connotations, promising the patron besides moral greatness also beauty. Interestingly enough, when those same institutions ask a patron to stop their financial aid, they appealed to same virtues they used when asking for money.
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Dijkdrent, M. (2024). Virtues and Greatness; Analysing references to virtue in requests to patrons in 16th-century North Western Europe. The art of asking; Strategies of patronage solicitation through the ages in music, literature, visual arts, and intellectual c, Utrecht. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/240166