Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Per la anima della donna: Pregnancy and Death in Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Visitation for the Tornabuoni Chapel, Cestello

2011; Brepols; Volume: 42; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1484/j.viator.1.102254

2031-0234

Maria DePrano,

Renaissance and Early Modern Studies

The Visitation altarpiece (Louvre, Paris) by Domenico Ghirlandaio has been previously examined as a work in the artist’s oeuvre, and as one of the paintings adorning Santa Maria Maddalena di Cestello (today called Santa Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi) in late fifteenth-century Florence. It has not been recognized as one of the few funerary altarpieces that commemorate a young patrician woman in Renaissance Florence. While funerary objects for men have been extensively studied, little work has been done on art objects remembering women. Commissioned by Lorenzo Tornabuoni, son of the Medici banker Giovanni Tornabuoni, the altarpiece graced the memorial chapel he founded in honor of his first wife, Giovanna degli Albizzi, who died while still with child. Examining the Visitation via the religious narratives depicted and Giovanna’s biography, this article demonstrates that the altarpiece focuses on themes of importance to married Renaissance women, namely, fertility and childbirth, as well as death and the hope for life after death for those women who died while performing their reproductive duties, a common occurrence in late Quattrocento Florence.