Arizona State University
Review
Author(s): Julia K. Dabbs
Review by: Julia K. Dabbs
Source: Early Modern Women, Vol. 5 (Fall 2010), pp. 303-306
Published by: Arizona State University
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23541533
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Early Modem Women:
An Interdisciplinary Journal
2010, vol 5
Book
Plantilla
Florence.
Reviews
Nelli (1524-1588):
The Painter-Prioress
of Renaissance
Ed. Jonathan K. Nelson. Syracuse:
Syracuse
University
Press, 2008.210
Sister Plautilla
pp. $24.50. ISBN 978-88-952500-3-8.
whose
were acclaimed
by Giorgio Vasari
in his Lives of the Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (1568),
has only in
recent years resurfaced as an artist of historical interest, though she is one
of the earliest-known
women painters of the Renaissance.
Unlike that of
Nelli,
paintings
many nun-artists, Nelli's oeuvre was not limited to miniature illustrations
in manuscripts
or small devotional
paintings. Instead, she also painted
large-scale, multi-figured religious paintings that could be seen in public,
such as a Lamentation
now in the Museum
the
of
recent
Nelli's
restoration
the
Lamentation
career and subsequently
of San Marco,
spurred
further
led to the publication
Florence.
In fact,
investigation
of this collection
of
of
essays.
brief introduction
to this volume provides use
Jonathan Nelsons
ful background
the
of women artists in the
regarding
exceptionality
Renaissance
and explains how Nelli was able to circumvent significant
obstacles
to a professional career, such as the lack of a traditional appren
with a male master. However,
Nelson
does not offer other
ticeship
information
discussion
of this sort. He omits a
ordinarily included in introductions
historical
literature con
in
the
art
of Nelli's place
burgeoning
cerning early modern women artists or a coherent overview of the essays
of the book's
included in the volume. A framework for and explanation
contents, especially in light of Nelson's
in 2000, would have been appreciated.
edition of essays on Nelli published
303
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All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
304
2010,
EMWJ
Book Reviews
vol 5
The
previous collection, Swor Plautilla Nelli (1523-1588),
First Woman Painter of Florence (Edizioni
Cadmo,
2000), also featured
seven essays derived from a symposium sponsored by Syracuse University
in Florence. There is a fair amount of overlap between the 2000 and the
Nelsons
(by Catherine Turrill, Andrea
are revisions of their earlier essays. A cata
and Ann Roberts)
Muzzi,
textual sources
of
Nelli's
oeuvre
(by Turrill) and sixteenth-century
logue
on the artist are also included in each volume, albeit with modifications.
2008
volumes;
Nevertheless,
three of the contributions
there are sufficient significant differences that the 2008
contribution to the literature.
vol
ume is a welcome
securely attributable to Nelli is still
of
rather limited, so most
the essays place her contributions within a broader
social or art historical context. The first essay, "Nuns' Stories: Plautilla
Nelli, Madre Pittora, and her Compagne in the Convent of Santa Caterina
The
number
of extant artworks
da Siena," by leading Nelli scholar Catherine Turrill, amply demonstrates
that Nelli was not the only artist
through extensive archival documentation
working in the convent of Santa Caterina. As Turrill reveals, there were at
least eight other identifiable nun-artists whom Nelli likely trained, resulting
in
a prosperous
artistic
enterprise
in
devotional
works
that
were
often
sold
outside
the convent and received praise from contemporaries.
Andrea Muzzi next explores "The Artistic Training and Savonarolan
Ideas of Plautilla Nelli." One of the more perplexing issues in comprehend
ing Nellis creativity has been the question of artistic training. She was
not born into a family of artists, and she entered the convent at the age
of fourteen; so how did she learn to paint ambitious, large-scale works?
Muzzi soundly dismisses
a student of Fra Paolino,
previous suggestions that Nelli
who worked in the neighboring
may have been
convent of San
and shows how she was able to formulate
a style outside of a stan
dard workshop context through her study of drawings and works of art.
(Nelli's convent was not cloistered until 1575, allowing her the freedom
Marco,
to see contemporary
art in Florentine churches.) Muzzi also asserts that
Nelli's paintings should be interpreted in light of the theological ideas of
the Dominican
whose influence held sway in the
preacher Savonarola,
San
Marco
demonstrates
convents
even after his execution
that the Savonarolan
context
in 1498.
is quite
Although Muzzi
relevant to Nelli and
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Book Reviews
305
her colleagues,
the topic is insufficiently developed
in this essay; a more
in-depth study seems warranted and would be of great interest to both art
historians and historians of religion.
Sally Quin
"Plautilla Nelli's
Serafino
Razzi's
two literary sources for Nelli's life in her essay,
Role in Giorgio Vasaris Lives of the Painters (1568)
and
Illustrious
Men
In
contrast
to
other
(1596)."
History of
considers
scholars
who have recently considered
the Lives, Quin offers a more positive
within
the theoretical
endeavor
comments
framework
the characterization
two other Renaissance
in
interpretation that is well-situated
of Vasaris work. She succeeds in this
by broadening the interpretive lens to consider
on Nelli's career, but also to relate them
regarding
Mirándola
of women
women
artists, Lucrezia
not only Vasaris
to his attitudes
Quistelli della
underscores the
In addition, Quin
Anguissola.
of
women's
abilities
evidenced occasionally in Vasari s
changing perception
text, and interestingly links his views to those found in contemporary
and Sofonisba
on the nature of women. She concludes by comparing Vasaris
treatment of Nelli's career to that of the religious historian Razzi, and pro
for their telling differences.
vides convincing explanations
discourses
of the publication presents more narrowly focused
Scudieri gives an
works by Plautilla Nelli. Magnolia
of Plautilla Nelli's
History, Sources, and Restoration
final section
The
essays on specific
overview of "The
which is then followed by a technical restoration report. Ann
and Cristina Acidini both provide essays on Nelli's Last Supper,
Lamentation"
Roberts
resulting in some overlap regarding probable visual sources identified by
both authors. Acidini's essay ("The Last Suppers of Dan Brown, Leonardo
da Vinci, and Plautilla Nelli") is written in a more popular vein, whereas
Roberts's
study
("The
Dominican
Audience
of Plautilla
Nelli's
Last
of the painting that
Supper") provides a fascinating scholarly examination
of the Dominican
closely ties its subject to the daily lives and dietary habits
nuns who would
have seen this work.
The publication is enriched with appendices
documenting
drawings
and paintings attributed to the artist, and Italian texts (with English trans
lations) of Vasaris and Razzi's life stories of Nelli. The volume is further
with forty-nine illustrations (thirty-eight in color) of works of
art by Nelli or other artists, which in turn may spur efforts to recover more
embellished
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306
EMWJ
Book Reviews
vol. 5
2010,
is warmly
intriguing artistic corpus. Overall, this publication
recommended
to those desiring to delve further into the artistic and social
of Nelli's
contexts of religious
women
in the early modern
K. Dabbs
Julia
of Minnesota,
University
The Marvelous
Girls:
Hairy
Wiesner-Hanks.
Merry
New
period.
Morris
The Gonzales
Haven;
Sisters and Their
Yale University
Press,
Worlds.
2009.
248 pp. $30.00. ISBN 978-0-300-12733-1
This
book describes
the folk and intellectual
cultures
surrounding people,
and objects that were considered strange to most Europeans.
The
an
extended
Gonzales
provides
especially hairy
family (ca. 1573-1656)
case study for Merry Wiesner-Hanks's
into
inquiry
early modern European
attitudes toward physical difference and strangeness.
animals,
Given the limited historical
archive on the Gonzales
family, Wiesner
be a footnote about an "odd"
deftly takes what might otherwise
and
uses it as a point of departure to assess the place of the strange
family
and exotic in early modern Europe, The family patriarch, Petrus Gonzales,
appeared to suffer from a genetic condition of excessive body hair known
Hanks
or hypertrichosis universalis, which caused
today as Ambras
Syndrome,
his entire body and face to be covered in hair. Born on Tenerife, part of
the Canary Islands, Petrus traveled as a small boy to the royal court of
France's Henry II. Source materials from the period express uncertainty
about
Petruss
national
and ethnic origins; some refer to him as a Guanche
and others as a Spaniard.
Historians
have confirmed that Petrus married
a non-hairy woman named Catherine
from Paris around 1573, and the
had
a
number
of
most
of whom were hairy. The family
children,
couple
relocated to the Farnese court around 1590.
Early in the work, the author states her decision to focus as much as
sisters Maddalena,
Francesca, and Antoinetta.
possible on the Gonzales
This
decision
expanding
enables
scholarship
Wiesner-Hanks
to draw connections
on gender and feminist studies
to the ever
in the early modern
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