Page - 621 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

6��The Musaeum: Its Contents feet of the personification of Wisdom of what is quite obviously an Imperial crown only strengthens this supposition.97 Though unlikely, it cannot be com- pletely excluded that the paintings were commissioned—through Strada’s mediation—by Maximilian ii himself, perhaps for the Neugebäude, but were somehow left on Strada’s hands.98 12.7.3 An Impression of the Cabinet of Paintings In addition to the two Veronese allegories the inventory mentions forty paint- ings. These were mostly full-sized canvases, but there were also a few described as ‘4 claine retrati’ (four small portraits) or ‘1 clain Taffellin’ (‘one small panel’), as well as a number of other miscellaneous objects. Like those in Strada’s ac- quisitions mentioned by Stopio, the paintings in this list are ‘modernissimi’ (‘quite new’), recent works of major artists working in Venice, except for two paintings by Giorgione and (the young?) Titian, which are explicitly described as ‘old’. Unfortunately the descriptions are too summary to identify the paint- ings mentioned with existing individual works with any certainty. But since artist, technique and subject matter are always indicated in the list, it is possi- ble to illustrate it by means of images of corresponding pictures that are still in existence. It should be noted that—with the exception of two Veronese allego- ries now in the Frick Collection—as yet none of these paintings can with cer- tainty be identified as the actual objects in Strada’s possession. Popular themes were often repeated by their author, replicas and variant versions of various sizes were prepared in his own workshop; very popular ones were copied by other painters. So the paintings illustrated here are not intended to present a hypothetical reconstruction of Strada’s collection of paintings, but merely aim to provide an approximation of its size, its character and its quality, and so to help visualize the impact it had on his patrons, his fellow artists and his other guests.99 The first paintings mentioned, and therefore probably highly esteemed, are five paintings by Jacopo da Ponte, called Bassano. Three of these are huge 97 This possibility has been suggested by Salomon 2006, p. 20. 98 The list may even date from after Maximilian’s sudden death in the autumn of 1576: in that case perhaps Strada was asked to try and sell them in order to meet some of the Em- peror’s staggering debts. This would explain why nothing is said about the provenance of the paintings. It is quite probable that Strada, as the resident expert at court, would have made such an inventory. 99 Since most painters often provided variant readings of the same subject matter, and even produced several versions of the same pictorial invention, a concrete reconstruction is impossible; detailed investigation of the provenances of potential candidates might make it possible to identify a few of these with objects mentioned in the list.