Page - 860 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

Chapter 16860 Whatever the quality of the material Strada brought together or purveyed to his patrons, most of it was collected not for its intrinsic artistic value, but for its potential use as a model. In contrast to Vasari, Strada appreciated even his most wonderful drawings not so much for their status as exemplary autograph works of outstanding individual artists, but rather because they provided a storehouse of models of the treatment of given iconographical themes, of mo- tifs and ‘inventions’, and more in general as a source of inspiration for new works. That is the reason why he valued even relatively low-quality copies, if nothing better was available. He did not hesitate to offer these also to his pa- trons: if Archduke Ferdinand ii of Tirol’s copy of the frieze of Column of Trajan was purveyed by Strada—which seems the most likely option—it shows that at least in this case both patron and salesman were more interested in the in- formation the album presented—both as an historical source and for its visual motifs—than in its aesthetic qualities [above, Figs. 13.89–13.90]. As we have seen, it seems to have made little difference to Strada whether the model was genuinely antique—say the Column of Trajan—or an authoritative modern example of the antique manner—say Giulio’s comparable double frieze in the Camera degli Stucchi of the Palazzo del Te: both provided information on the warfare of the Romans, and both could be used as sources for new works of art. Strada’s efforts in collecting such material can thus be linked to the current practice of artists of his time to lay in a private stock of sketches and (copies of) drawings and prints, to be used as a source of inspiration and of motifs to draw upon for their future works. But its extent, and the systematic way he set about it, show that he more or less institutionalized this practice, and that the collection he brought together was intended to inspire patrons as much as the artists they employed. Strada’s house in Vienna was built especially to house and to display this Musaeum—his huge library, his collection of graphic documentation, his coin cabinet and other antiquities, his paintings and other works of art. The house itself was designed as an explicit example of the new, correctly Vitru- vian architecture as developed in the Rome of the High Renaissance. It was conceived as a model, a demonstration of the application of the ‘innovations’ Strada wished to propagate. His pride in it, the way he offered its use to his pa- trons, and shared its amenities with his colleagues at the Imperial court and its foreign guests, show that he made it readily accessible at least to a high-placed, well-to-do, well-educated and cosmopolitan court-elite. These were the ‘early adopters’ Strada targeted, to whom both his house and its contents provided information, inspiration and concrete models for their own initiatives. The best and most explicit argument for Strada’s enthusiasm to propagate his ideals is his publishing programme, as exemplified in the various copyright