We continued our tour of the ducal palace of Urbino and came to a number of rooms dedicated to late medieval painting. Here we find large polyptychs from churches in and around Urbino. Sometimes the names of the painters are known, for instance in the case of Giovanni Antonio Bellinzoni da Pesaro (ca. 1415-1478). Sometimes a painter is known under different names, such as Antonio di Guido da Ferrara, whom I had previously become acquainted with as Antonio Alberti da Ferrara (the addition “Alberti” is apparently incorrect). And sometimes we do not have a clue as to the real name of the painter, so that in conformity with an old Italian custom the painter is called the “master of…”. This is the case with the Maestro del Trittico di San Bartolomeo. A separate room is dedicated to fourteenth-century frescoes from the church of San Domenico, which stands opposite the Palazzo Ducale. These frescoes were possibly painted by Antonio da Siena.
If we walk on, we enter the large Hall of the Flemish tapestries. This hall in its turn gives access to multiple other rooms. One of these is the Sala degli Angeli, named after the little angels on the fireplace made by Domenico Rosselli (ca. 1439-1498). Here we stumble upon the procession standard of the fraternity of Corpus Domini in Urbino. The standard was painted on both sides by none other than the great Venetian master Titian (ca. 1488-1576), who embellished one side with the Resurrection of Christ and the other with the Last Supper. Once Titian’s Venus of Urbino could also be admired in this ducal palace, but as was already explained in part one of this post, this work was shipped to Florence around the year 1633. The museum does still possess another procession standard, which comes from the church of Santo Spirito. This standard was decorated by the Tuscan painter Luca Signorelli (ca. 1450-1523) from Cortona. On one side we see the Crucifixion of Christ and on the other Pentecost.
Hall of the Flemish tapestries.
Sala degli Angeli, with the fireplace of Domenico Rosselli.
Federico da Montefeltro in the picture
In the Sala degli Angeli we may also see the Pala del Corpus Domini, an altarpiece painted for the oratory of the aforementioned fraternity. The work has a complicated history, and that is putting it mildly. It was commissioned in 1456, but only completed in 1474. Fra Carnevale (ca. 1420-1484) worked on it without much success, after which Paolo Uccello (1397-1475) painted the predella with a sordid anti-Jewish tale about a sacred host and a Jewish usurer. Then Piero della Francesca (ca. 1415-1492) refused to paint the large altarpiece itself and the assignment was granted to the Flemish painter Justus van Gent (died ca. 1480), who may have been summoned to Urbino by Duke Federico da Montefeltro. Justus painted how the apostles take communion with Christ and are presented with the sacred host. On the right he depicted Federico da Montefeltro. The Duke, who ruled over Urbino between 1444 and 1482, is immediately recognisable by his battered nose. During a jousting tournament in 1450 he had refused to wear a helmet with a visor. His opponent had subsequently struck him in the face with his lance, which had led to a broken nose and the loss of an eye. Because of his injuries Federico asked to be depicted exclusively in profile, so that only the side of his face with his remaining left eye would be visible. Justus van Gent dutifully carried out these instructions.
Above the entrance to Federico’s study (the studiolo) hangs another portrait of the Duke. Although some like to see it as another work by Justus van Gent, it is usually attributed to the Spaniard Pedro Berruguete (ca. 1450-1504). The Galleria Nazionale delle Marche in any case sees it as a work by the latter. The work dates from ca. 1475 and represents the Duke with his young son and heir Guidobaldo, born in 1472 from his father’s marriage to Battista Sforza. Once again Federico’s battered nose is hard to miss. The Duke is, on the one hand, depicted as a warrior, in plate armour and with a sword on his hip. On the floor are a commander’s baton and a helmet. The Duke is wearing the insignia of the Order of the Ermine (of the King of Naples) and Order of the Garter (of the King of England). On the other hand, the Duke is also an erudite man who likes to read, as is evident from the book (or codex) in his hands.
Federico read his books in his studiolo, which is a work of art in its own right. The inlaid woodwork, the portraits on the wall and the ceiling of the room are just beautiful. Several big names were involved in the decoration of the study. The woodwork was designed by Sandro Botticelli (ca. 1445-1510), Francesco di Giorgio Martini (1439-1501) and Donato Bramante (1444-1514). It was then carved by the brothers Giuliano (ca. 1432-1490) and Benedetto (1442-1497) da Maiano. The 28 portraits represent famous men who lived from Antiquity until Federico’s own age. Justus van Gent started the series, which was continued by Pedro Berruguete. Unfortunately, only half of the panel paintings are original. When the last Duke of Urbino – Francesco Maria II della Rovere – passed away in 1631, the duchy became part of the Papal States. Pope Urbanus VIII (1623-1644) gifted the panels to his nephew, cardinal Antonio Barberini (1607-1671). Fourteen of them were sold to France in 1861 and are now at the Louvre in Paris.
Urbino in the picture
After the Duke’s bedroom we suddenly find ourselves face-to-face with a famous panel painting that is usually called “the ideal city” (Città Ideale) and that is dated to ca. 1470-1480. The view of this empty and anonymous city, constructed entirely according to the Renaissance ideas on perspective, was once attributed to Bramante, while the names of Luciano Laurana, Fra Carnevale and Piero della Francesca have also been mentioned. Nowadays the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche attributes the work to an anonymous painter from Central Italy. There is little doubt that “the ideal city” was originally painted for the ducal palace, but in 1775 the work was found in the church of Santa Chiara in Urbino. Apparently, it had been moved there for some reason.
Città Ideale.
Of course, the museum has works by painters from Urbino as well. Three of these painters are closely related. I am referring to Giovanni Santi (ca. 1440-1494), his brilliant son Raphael (1483-1520) and Raphael’s student Timoteo Viti (1469-1523). Although Giovanni Santi was a court painter, the quality of his works in the museum collection is not very high. Raphael’s portrait of a noble lady from ca. 1506-1508 – usually known as La Muta (“the mute”) – is, on the other hand, an absolute masterpiece. Unfortunately, we do not know the identity of the sitter. There is a theory that she is Giovanna da Montefeltro (1463-1513), one of Federico’s daughters. Giovanna married Giovanni della Rovere, a nephew of Pope Sixtus IV (1471-1484). In 1508 their son Francesco Maria I della Rovere became the new Duke of Urbino. Regretfully this theory cannot be proven. A work by Timoteo Viti in the collection is the so-called Pala Arrivabene, which once adorned the cathedral of Urbino. The work was commissioned by Giampietro Arrivabene, who was bishop of Urbino between 1491 and 1504. He is the kneeling man on the left; on the right is his nephew Giacomo. The saints in the painting are Thomas Becket and Martin of Tours.
If you think of Urbino, you also think of Federico Barocci (ca. 1535-1612). When we visited the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, there was a large exhibition dedicated to the work of this local master called “Federico Barocci Urbino. L’emozione della pittura moderna”. The exhibition comprised both secular and religious works. An example of a secular work is the portrait of Francesco Maria II della Rovere, freshly returned from the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571. This battle saw a Christian fleet defeat that of the Ottoman Empire. The portrait comes from the Uffizi collection in Florence, but we may assume that it originally hung in Urbino. Barocci’s Escape from Troy, which comes from the Galleria Borghese in Rome, is another secular work. Beautiful religious works were, for instance, the Deposition from the Cross from the cathedral of Perugia, the Madonna di San Simone from the museum itself and the Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, on loan from the Chiesa Nuova in Rome.
Della Rovere apartments
The Della Rovere apartments were largely realised by the architects Bartolomeo Genga (1518-1558) and Filippo Terzi (1520-1597) during the reign of Guidobaldo II della Rovere, Duke between 1538 and 1574. Here we find the later works from the collection of the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche. Works from the seventeenth century are, for instance, those of Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri (1589-1657), a painter from Fossombrone. We may also admire paintings by Giovanni Battista Salvi (1609-1685), nicknamed Il Sassoferrato, and Mattia Preti (1613-1699). Special attention is given to the brothers Federico (1539-1609) and Taddeo (1529-1566) Zuccari from Sant’Angelo in Vado, who were closely associated with the court in Urbino. I was slightly surprised to find a Madonna and Child by Vitale da Bologna (ca. 1310-1360) in this part of the museum, as it took us back to the Middle Ages. As it turned out, the Madonna was part of the collection of the writer, poet and communist politician Paolo Volponi (1924-1994), who left his collection to the museum.
Religious and cultural life in eighteenth-century Urbino was stimulated especially by members of the Albani family, who were of Albanian extraction. In this respect the museum relates the achievements of Giovanni Francesco Albani (1649-1721), who was elected Pope Clemens XI in 1700, and those of his nephew cardinal Annibale Albani (1682-1751). However, I personally found the eighteenth-century works in the museum to be less interesting than those from previous centuries. Perhaps we had also become a bit saturated after seeing so many beautiful artworks from different periods. We concluded our visit to the Palazzo Ducale with a tour of the basement of the palace. Here we find, among other things, the stables, kitchens and a bathroom.
Website of the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche: Home – Galleria Nazionale delle Marche GNDM.IT