Page - 428 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

Chapter 8428 this. Certainly at one time Fugger warned the Duke that Maximilian had been heard to express himself rather caustically on this head. So Strada literally may not have had the time to work on the project, and Fugger may have preferred to take the sketches once they were finally available—they were after all com- plete in all essentials—than wait for the preparation of a complete set of fin- ished drawings. The second reason may have been that Strada was well aware of the financial limits that would be imposed on the project and that even while making his designs he realized that his project would never be executed in this form. What is certain is that Strada was not expected, and neither seems to have been expecting, to go to Munich to actually supervise the building of the Antiquarium, even had his designs for it been accepted. This implies that, though the commission might be lucrative, the lucre would go to someone else.65 Strada’s role in the building of the Munich Antiquarium does illuminate his position in Vienna, where there is likewise no evidence that he ever functioned as a supervising, executive builder. Strada’s role in Munich was largely advi- sory, and consisted in helping to formulate the purpose of the project and to invent solutions for the problems it posed. Doubtless he referred to examples of similar buildings he knew and illustrated the points he made by providing examples drawn from his own library and huge graphic collection. He put him- self in the position of the patron, and helped the patron make up his own mind about his desires, and about the means to be chosen to realize these. In Mu- nich at least the next step was demonstrably also taken, that is the providing of a workable, concrete proposal, worked out in a set of detailed designs. Strada’s competence in this was based on his early training and his expertise in archi- tectural theory and draughtsmanship; but his attention to practical and func- tional detail is surprising for someone not actually charged with the execution of a project. It can be explained partly by his familiarity with Serlio’s treatises, partly by his own earlier experience, in any case as a patron in his own right. 65 Fugger’s letter of 19 February from Vienna is interesting in this respect: doubtless prompt- ed by Strada he advised the Duke that the ‘graue Stain’ used for the windows and stairs of the Hofburg, the Stalburg and ‘dess Ertzherzogen Hauß’ would be particularly suitable; if one could not find anything similar out there in Bavaria, one could order the windows to be made here at the same price paid by the Emperor and the Archduke, ‘die marckhten auffs genauist’; the transport by ship would not be expensive either, and they would last for ever, ‘so die hiltzin Fenster nimmer sein...’. It is tempting to see here an attempt on Strada’s part to increase his income: while he would not be paid a separate fee for his de- signs, he doubtless would obtain some recompense if he supervised such a commission, not counting the provision he might obtain from the local supplier with whom he placed the order.