Appel à communication : « Florence Circa 1600 : Patrician Families and the Financing of Culture » (Florence, 11-12 avril 2019)

Appel à communication : « Florence Circa 1600 : Patrician Families and the Financing of Culture » (Florence, 11-12 avril 2019)

Date limite : 30 septembre 2018.

Studies about the cultural life of Florence at the turn of the seventeenth century usually concentrate on the Medici court, the various academies, or the confraternities, and less on the role of patrician families who had sustained both the economy and the society since late medieval times. These élite families participated in the academies and in court life but also had many more focused particular interests; they were a vital to the creation of new forms of art and music.

In this conference, we hope to shine a light on the economic activities of such families and how their economic successes permitted avant-garde culture—in literature, art, music, theatre, etc.—to flourish. We are interested in each family’s patronage of artisans but also how this patronage influenced other families with whom they had contact through informal gatherings as well as established institutions. There are many families which could be studied in this regard, for example the Bardi (especially Giovanni), Corsi (Jacopo and Bardo), Davanzati (Bernardo), Del Bene (Giulio), Del Nero, Gaddi (Niccolò), Guicciardini (Piero), Rinuccini (Ottavio and Alessandro), Strozzi (Piero and Giovanni Battista the Younger/ ‘il poeta’), but also others. We seek proposals about individual patrons in these critical decades but also about more general issues raised by our theme.

We will hold the conference 11-12 April 2019, the 450-year anniversary of the foundation of the Accademia degli Alterati. Associated with the conference is an exhibition on Michelangelo the Younger and the Birth of Opera at the Casa Buonarroti and a production of the recently discovered first rendition of Dafne—the first such production ever attempted. The conference will be held in English at Istituto Lorenzo de’ Medici (Museum Studies) and the University of Florence (SAGAS department). Hospitality will be provided but not travel expenses. Please send your 200-300 word abstract (in English) and your CV to Francesca Fantappiè (fantafrancesca@gmail.com) by 30 September 2018. Decisions will be made by 15 November when the final conference program is expected to be ready.

The conference is organized by Tim Carter, Francesca Fantappiè, Maia Wellington Gahtan, and Donatella Pegazzano.