UPFRONT


Gilt and guilt


Ludwig von Langenmantel (Michaelsberg 1854–Munich 1922), Savonarola Preaching Against Luxury and Preparing the Bonfire of the Vanities, 1881; oil on canvas; 193.04 x 312.42 cm. St. Bonaventure, NY, St. Bonaventure University, The Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts.


Barbara Smith visits a unique exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence. Money and Beauty. Bankers, Botticelli and the Bonfire of the Vanities. A fascinating look at a conflict of values in Renaissance Florence.


M


oney makes the world go round. Thought Giovanni Rucellai standing on the Lungarno in 1492 watching the


inauguration of his luxurious palazzo. “Spendere bene il denaro è più bello che farlo” he remarked to fellow banker Filippo Strozzi not knowing - how could he - that 500 years later the Strozzi family’s similarly splendid palazzo would become the perfect exhibition location in which to illustrate this very making and spending of money. What he must have known however was that in certain


circles such talk was dodgy. And in the back of his mind would recall that not so long ago Cosimo dei Medici had been hounded out of town by envious Florentines pointing the finger at his riches. Money was sinful and dangerous, you see. If a common woolworker managed to save a few piccioli each month, convert them into florins and buy a piece of silk for his wife, would he not rise above his station and upset social stability? And did not the Bible say money was to be


8 | THE TUSCAN MAGAZINE


earned by the sweat of your brow? Not by playing around with exchange rates, collecting papal taxes , speculating on the price of Cotswold wool increasing as you shipped it round the Bay of Biscay, or a sudden war making your stockpiled commodities scarce and lucrative. And definitely not by practicing the mortal sin of usury. A scenario of tension and conflict then; each week town


administrators issued new laws to restrict the acquiring and flaunting of riches. Fashion police checked the number of buttons on a cuff, pearls on a headdress, gold and silver ornaments on a lady’s belt. Only a magistrate’s wife could show her silk gowns in public. They even measured the transparency of veils, the width and depth of necklines! What a job! Handily the Medicis and their merchant -banker allies had


sewn up the town elections, and were free to tie themselves in knots, twisting and manipulating dogma and city laws to protect their rich lifestyle. Through beauty one strived to reach a higher moral plane. Wealth enabled the creation of this beauty. Botticelli wanted to be paid after all. And if you worried about going to Hell, you could make a large donation to a church or monastery like Cosimo I who lavished San Marco with frescos and gold to the horror of the more conservative monks. Closing the chain of logic, a family whose money enabled beauty was


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