A PORTRAIT OF ISABELLA D’ESTE

🔘:  “Shall I tell you a secret? If you think that my margravine really looked like this, then Isabella has achieved just what she wanted. As a media professional, she knows very well how to show herself from her best side. This portrait commissioned by Isabella from Titian at the age of 60 shows her just how she wants to be remembered.“

Isabella leaves nothing to chance: in 1522, she already has the following inscription in Latin, the language of humanism, put up on the garden wall of her studiolo in the Palazzo Ducale in Mantua where it can be seen by everyone: 

ISABELLA D‘ ESTE, GRANDDAUGHTER AND NIECE OF THE KINGS OF ARAGON, DAUGHTER AND SISTER OF THE DUKES OF FERRARA, WIFE AND MOTHER OF THE MARGRAVES OF MANTUA.

🔘: “But I know her very well, and I know that there is much more to her than that.”

• Born in 1474 in Ferrara, Margravine of Mantua since 1490, died in 1539 in Mantua
• Mother of eight children, ruler, networker, art collector
• First lady, fashion icon and trendsetter

RULER
Isabella navigates the diplomatic arena with effortless ease in the interests of her Margravate of Mantua and her home town of Ferrara and avoids becoming involved in the intrigues of the period

NETWORKER
Isabella maintains correspondence and negotiates with kings, emperors and popes:
• Louis XII and Francois I, Kings of France
• Maximilian I and Charles V, Holy Roman Emperors
• Alexander VI, Julius II, Leo X, Clemens VII, Popes in Rome

SUCCESSES
• 1530: Isabella succeeds in having Mantua elevated to a Dutchy by Charles V
• 1527: Isabella obtains the appointment as cardinal for her second son Ercole
• 1536: Ferrante I, Isabella’s third son is appointed Viceroy of Sicily by Charles V
• Mantua becomes one of the major centres of humanism in Northern Italy

HUMANISTIC BACKGROUND
• Isabella can converse fluently in Latin
• she maintains contacts to outstanding figures of humanism
• writes more than 28,000 letters
• Is very familiar with the literature of her time
• Is a connoisseur of music, poetry and art
• networks with the best artists and philosophers of her time

PATRONESS OF THE ARTS
Isabella networks with the best artists of her time:
• Leonardo da Vinci makes a sketch of Isabella at about the age of 25
• Gian Cristoforo Romano casts a medaillion of Isabella in 1498
• Isabella gives away replicas to persons she particularly admires

• Andrea Mantegna is court artist of the Gonzaga in Mantua
• Andrea Mantegna provides paintings for Isabella’s studiolo
• Titian paints the portrait shown above at Isabella’s wish 

ART COLLECTOR
• Isabella is the first woman to possess a studiolo, which she even designs herself
• She has the most extensive art collection of her time 

🔘: “If you would like to know how she achieved all this, I‘ll be glad to go into a bit more detail.”

🔘: “On 14 May 1474 there is great rejoicing in Ferrara. The first child of Ercole I. d’Este and Leonora von Aragon has just been born. It is a girl, and she has been christened Isabella. Isabella receives a particularly thorough education at the court of Ferrara with its aristocratic traditions and openness to all forms of culture. Due to her royal birth – after all, her mother is the daughter of the King of Naples – Isabella is of course a splendid match. When she is only six years old, she is betrothed to Francesco Gonzaga, son of the margrave of Mantua, who is eight years older than her.”

🔘: “To prepare her for her future role as margravine, Isabella receives tuition in Latin, Greek and Roman history, reads classical literature and studies astrology. Her father, a passionate music lover, ensures that she is given a first-class musical education. She plays the flute and the lute, captivates listeners with her beautiful soprano voice, clear as a bell, and learns the cultivated courtly dances of the period. Isabella is very much aware of her responsibilities as a future ruler. She is also appropriately instructed by her mother about how to govern in a solicitous and prudent manner. With this portfolio, she is, at the age of 16, ideally equipped both for the representative and also the political tasks awaiting her.”

🔘: “Her fiancé, Francesco II Gonzaga (1466, ruled 1484-1519) is one of the most celebrated condottieri of his time, a commander of mercenary soldiers who is very well paid for his military services. He is Isabella’s intellectual equal. After completing an excellent humanistic education in the famous school for princes founded by Vittorino da Feltre in Mantua, he enters the service of the Duchy of Milan in 1484. Many further military operations in other Italian city-states such as Venice, Naples and Rome are to follow.“

After years of preparation have been finalized down to the last detail and set in motion, and the negotiations concerning the dowry have been completed to everyone’s satisfaction, now – it is 10 February 1490, ten years after the official engagement – the way is free to celebrate a bombastic wedding:

• 8 days
• 60 ships
• Banquets, music and night-long balls

• 17,000 invited guests, among excellencies such as:
• the ambassadors of Naples and Milan
• VIPs such as:
• Pope Innocent VIII   
• Emperor Maximilian I
• King Alfons II of Naples
• King Charles VIII of France

🔘: “The prelude to the wedding celebrations starts on 10 February in Ferrara: a play is performed in honour of the bride and the distinguished company in the Great Hall of the Palazzo Ducale and a banquet is served.  As at the engagement celebrations, the tables are overflowing with choice delicacies: sugar creations shaped as eagles, oxen, bears, monkeys, unicorns and other mythical creatures is presented as a gift from the city to the Duke of Ferrara and the illustrious company of guests. The ball which follows lasts far into the night. The next day, the celebrations continue without interruption.”

🔘: “While Francesco returns to Mantua on horseback to prepare everything for the arrival of his bride, Isabella sets out on her journey to Mantua on 12 February. In keeping with the occasion, she is dressed in the finest gold brocade. Isabella rides through the streets of Ferrara, decorated with sprigs of flowers, on a magnificently harnessed white horse to the splendidly decked out ship which is to take her to Mantua. She is accompanied by her family and the entire court, including the Duke of Urbino, Isabella’s godfather.”

🔘: “This fresco by Benozzo Gozzoli may perhaps give a better idea of what such a festive procession in the 15th century looked like.”

🔘: “Francesco and Isabella arrive with their escort in Mantua on 15 February 1490. The bridal couple is conducted to the ducal residence in the castle with fanfares, where it is already awaited by the Duke of Urbino and a throng of nobility.”

🔘: “While Isabella listens to the official welcoming address, the notaries are busy drawing up an inventory of the dowry she brings with her. The contents of the many chests are meticulously recorded: 50 gold dresses, gold brocade and a dress made of black velvet covered with jewels, chemises valued at 100 ducats apiece, silver candelabras and basins, among them a chamber pot, and a portable altar. All in all a value of 25,000 ducats, a truly princely dowry!”

🔘: “After this, an opulent reception in honour of Isabella takes place, followed by a banquet and dancing.“

This marks the beginning of lavish festivities lasting eight days with over 17,000 invited guests.  For more than a week, everything is devoted to celebration, dining and dancing. Everything imaginable is served. Even the future Emperor Maximilian I. pays his respects.

🔘: “Shall we take a short break and get in the mood with a little music?”

🔘: “It’s not all just eating and dancing: a huge fancy dress party takes place on the square in front of the Palazzo Ducale, a spectacle which Isabella and her mother Eleonora watch from the balcony. There is also a tournament at which Francesco and twenty of his courtiers compete, jousting with golden lances. They ride the famous Gonzaga horses bred in their own stables. As expected, Francesco as the bridegroom and Margrave of Mantua is declared the winner by the jurors. Surprise, surprise…“

🔘: “On 23 February the bride’s father, Ercole d‘Este, returns to Ferrara. Isabella‘s mother Eleonora stays on for three days  in Mantua to help her daughter to settle in at the court of the Gonzaga.”

Hardly is she married – Isabella has just turned 17 – than life begins in earnest: in 1491, only one year after her wedding, Isabella already has to shoulder new responsibilities and take over the business of governing Mantua for the first time. Francesco, her husband, knows that he can rely on her fully and completely despite her tender years while he is active as a military commander in the service of Venice.

🔘: “Isabella can now put the advice she already received from her mother as a child into practice. Sadly, there is only a little time together left to the two of them: Eleonora dies in 1493 at the age of 43. At that moment Isabella, meanwhile 19, has already ruled the city for two years and is pregnant for the first time. Two months after her mother’s death, on New Year’s Eve 1493, Isabella gives birth to her first child: it is a girl, who is named Eleonora after her only recently deceased grandmother. And it is just this Eleonora who will go on to commission me, the bowl, and the other items in the service.”

Just married, Isabella is firmly decided to set up a studiolo, thus realizing her greatest dream. For all those who don’t speak Italian, a studiolo is a place of retreat where someone can study and meditate undisturbed. In the 14th century this is a privilege only reserved for popes, the clergy and high secular dignitaries.

Later, in the Renaissance, more and more patricians also set up a studiolo for themselves. Due to the spread of humanism, the focus shifts. In the age of inventions and discovery, the emphasis lies more on the wider world and its wonders, nature, science and the arts.

Isabella d’Este is the first woman to set up a studiolo. Her models are the studiolo of her uncle Leonello d’Este in the Villa di Belfiore near Ferrara (completed in 1448) and the two studioli of her uncle Federico Montefeltro, one of them in Urbino (1476) and the other in the Palazzo Ducale in Gubbio (1478/82).

Isabella sets up her first studiolo in the Castello di San Giorgio in Mantua. The castle stands by itself, but belongs to the constantly expanding complex of buildings constituting the Palazzo Ducale. This seat of the governing Gonzaga family ranks among the six largest palace ensembles in Europe. The ceiling of the grotta is the only element of the original studiolo complex to have survived to the present day in its original form in the Castello di San Giorgio in Mantua.

🔘: “You can find a reconstruction of Isabella’s first studiolo here:” https://vimeo.com/178788050

For her private “sanctuary”, Isabella chooses two small rooms connected by a flight of stairs and a marble portal. The upper room becomes her private studiolo, the barrel-vaulted room below it is the so-called grotta. Isabella works in the studiolo, while she keeps her collection of art and antiques in the grotta.

The grotta is richly decorated. The arms of alliance of the Gonzaga/Este families is emblazoned in the middle of the ceiling. The impresa with the musical rests, too, graces the vault of the grotta. Isabella commissions some of the most eminent artists of her time to create the paintings for the walls of her studiolo, among them Andrea Mantagna, the court painter at Mantua.

When Federico, Isabella’s eldest son, accedes to the throne following the death of his father in 1519, the widowed margravine moves to the Palazzo Ducale, taking up residence in the apartments of the Corte Vecchia. Here, Isabella sets up a new studiolo to her own design, using a large part of the furnishings of the original. The grotta has a direct access to a secret garden. It is here that Isabella has the Latin inscription already mentioned above, emphasizing her status, written on the wall in 1522: “Isabella d’Este, granddaughter and niece of the Kings of Aragon, daughter and sister of the Dukes of Ferrara, wife and mother of the Margraves of Mantua.“

🔘: “Isabella's studiolo is famous! No-one who comes to Mantua is going to pass up the chance to visit her studiolo and the art collection in the grotta. It is an absolute “must see” in the city, even long after Isabella has died.”

Isabella manages to assemble the largest art collection of her time. An inventory of the objects in her grotta and her studiolo drawn up in 1542 (three years after Isabella’s death) lists 1,620 items. The true number of objects was probably much higher. The list details paintings and sculptures, small- scale art objects such as cameos, medallions, antique coins, vases, curiosities such as a supposed “unicorn horn” and a library. Classical busts, fragments from the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, reliefs and a sarcophagus complete the spectrum. Isabella’s art objects are either given away or sold after her death, and can be found today in the major museums all over the world.

🔘: “Besides me, the bowl from Isabella’s famous majolica service, there are two other objects which can be related to the Este dynasty in the collection of the MK&G.“

The surviving probate inventory (1540/1542) of Isabella d’Este’s possessions lists an “eye of chalcedony set in gold”, whose whereabouts is unknown till today. It probably looked much like this one here in the MK&G.

The power to protect the wearer against the supposed “evil eye” has been attributed to amulets in the form of a human eye ever since ancient times.

The gem in the MK&G, a stone cut from agate and carnelian, probably in Classical Antiquity, is given a delicate contemporary gold mounting in the Renaissance, indicating that such works have probably been made for persons of high standing.

This work by the artist Christoforo Solari depicting the fight between Hercules and Cacus has a special meaning for Alfonso d’Este (born 1476, reigned 1505₋1534), Isabella’s brother. A group of figures with Hercules and Cacus is also listed in the inventory in Ferrara.

The small, exquisite sculpture in the MK&G is intended to be examined at close quarters in a sophisticated private collection. The victory of Good over Evil is here stylized into a heroic pose. Hercules has just strangled the giant Cacus in a dark cavern, since the latter has stolen cattle. He drags the body of the giant out into the open so that the people can convince themselves that the tyrant is defeated. The demigod Hercules with his twelve heroic deeds personifies courage and strength. Secular rulers in the Renaissance take these virtues as their model.

🔘: “Apart from me and these two works connected with Isabella, there are many more beautiful  Renaissance objects to be discovered in the MK&G. You are very welcome to browse through the Online Collection of the MK&G…”

🔘: “And now it’s time fo me, the bowl, to say goodbye digitally, but not before I have invited you to visit the MK&G, because I am still at my most beautiful in the original, even if I do say it myself!”

1: A SERVICE FOR ISABELLA D’ESTE  – A BOWL TELLS ITS STORY
2: HOW DOES A BOWL END UP IN A MUSEUM?
3: AN IMPORTANT COMMISSION FOR NICOLA DA URBINO
4: A CRASH COURSE IN MAJOLICA
5: FOCUS ON THE BOWL
6: A PORTRAIT OF ISABELLA D’ESTE