Page - 346 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

Chapter 6346 available, and the discussion chiefly addressed the materials from which the several elements were to be made: the principal decision was to execute the historical scenes in white marble, rather than in bronze. But Schallautzer’s summing up also shows that Terzio’s relatively sober design had itself been changed or discarded: the tomb was to be flanked at the corners by four ‘egh- khpilder’ in bronze. It is not clear who was responsible for this new concept, which was worked out in a ‘Visierung’ or detailed design on true scale, an im- mense drawing in pen and wash pasted onto a canvas support—exactly as the Emperor had earlier asked Uschal to provide. Exceptionally this immense drawing (it measures over two by four meters) has been preserved in the Kun- sthistorisches Museum [Fig. 6.3].13 It is attributed to the painter Florian Abel, who was also responsible for the designs for the individual historical scenes that were commissioned from his two brothers, the sculptors Bernhard and Arnold Abel. These were employed on it for several years, and were paid a lot of money, but in the end realized only a few of the marbles cartouches carry- ing the captions of the scenes, and certainly not more than three of the reliefs. Their greatest merit would be to recruit Alexander Colin from Mechelen as their assistant, who at the Abels’s death would completely take over the project. He is responsible for almost all the sculptures decorating the entire tomb, including the kneeling effigy of Maximilian i, which was cast in bronze and placed only in 1583. Though in the tomb as realized [Fig. 6.4] the reliefs and other elements such as the bronze armorial trophies along the top step of the podium are based on Florian Abel’s designs, the architectural framework is simpler and seems to owe more to Terzio’s sober, architectural proposal than 13 Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Kunstkammer 4971. Figure 6.3 Attributed to Florian Abel, ‘Visierung’ or detailed life-size design for the tomb of Emperor Maximilian i, ca 1561; Innsbruck, Schloss Ambras.