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Guido Guerzoni presents the results of fifteen years of research into one of the more hotly debated topics among historians of art and of economics: the history of art markets. Dedicating equal attention to current thought in the fields of economics, economic history, and art history, Guerzoni offers a broad and far-reaching analysis of the Italian scene, highlighting the existence of different forms of commercial interchange and diverse kinds of art markets. In doing so he ranges beyond painting and sculpture, to examine as well the economic drivers behind architecture, decorative and sumptuary arts, and performing or ephemeral events. Organized by thematic areas (the ethics and psychology of consumption, an analysis of the demand, labor markets, services, prices, laws) that cover a large chronological period (from the 15th through the 17th century), various geographical areas, and several institution typologies, this book offers an exhaustive and up-to-date study of an increasingly fascinating topic.
Making Copies in European Art 1400-1600 comprises sixteen essays that explore the form and function, manner and meaning of copies after Renaissance works of art. The authors construe copying as a method of exchange based in the theory and practice of imitation, and they investigate the artistic techniques that enabled and facilitated the production of copies. They also ask what patrons and collectors wanted from a copy, which characteristics of an artwork were considered copyable, and where and how copies were stored, studied, displayed, and circulated. Making Copies in European Art, in addition to studying many unfamiliar pictures, incorporates previously unpublished documentary materials.
Everyday political business in early modern cities took place under many different sources of tension. De facto establishment of the oligarchy in the government collided with the urban community’s expectations of participation and with the responsibility for common welfare which was supposed to be the guideline for policies in the municipal boards. Urban Elections and Decision-Making in Early Modern Europe offers new interpretations of the governmental techniques applied by urban elites to cope with these tensions. Written by leading historians of urban history and based on a broad foundation of previously unpublished research the volume explores the procedures of decision-making in early modern cities from an international and micrological point of view. It examines the attempts of delegating and stabilising power through elections, asks for the different ways of developing and demonstrating consent or dissent within the cities’ walls—urban revolts included—and offers a new theoretical framework to describe and understand these phenomena adequately.
Through the lens of identification procedures, this book examines how the processes of state-building affected European societies during the Napoleonic period. By focusing on the Kingdom of Italy, the author shows how the top-down change usually associated with Napoleonic state-building had to compete and share spaces with the agencies of other often-neglected actors such as local bureaucrats, the clergy, and common people. What emerges is the coexistence of different understandings of personal identities, defined as “cultures of identification”. One was rooted in the traditional habits of the population and based on a continuous performance of identities, allowing for a certain degree o...
Justice Blindfolded gives an overview of the history of “justice” and its iconography through the centuries. Justice has been portrayed as a woman with scales, or holding a sword, or, since the fifteenth century, with her eyes bandaged. This last symbol contains the idea that justice is both impartial and blind, reminding indirectly of the bandaged Christ on the cross, a central figure in the Christian idea of fairness and forgiveness. In this rich and imaginative journey through history and philosophy, Prosperi manages to convey a full account of the ways justice has been described, portrayed and imagined. Translation of Giustizia bendata. Percorsi storici di un'immagine (Einaudi, 2008).
This book is the culmination of a research project funded by the University of Pisa's internationalisation support programme of 2008-10. The project's underlying idea is that the Mediterranean is of decisive importance for any investigation into the political and commercial relations between states of different size and constitutional structure in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It thus scrutinises the practices, institutions and cultural tendencies of the region's ruling classes, from those of the Italian small states to those of the great powers. Salerno, Edigati, Angiolini, Addobbati and Zamora examine the theme of the small state by focusing on the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and it...
Through ten case studies by international specialists, this book investigates the circulation and production of scientific knowledge between 1750 and 1945 in the fields of agriculture, astronomy, botany, cartography, medicine, statistics, and zoology. In this period, most of the world was under some form of imperial control, while science emerged as a discrete field of activity. What was the relationship between empire and science? Was science just an instrument for imperial domination? While such guiding questions place the book in the tradition of science and empire studies, it offers a fresh perspective in dialogue with global history and circulatory approaches. The book demonstrates, not...
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