Seite - 543 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Band 1

543Other Patrons of Architecture In any case this lack of practical building experience by no means precludes his immediate influence on the architectural patronage at the Imperial court and its Umkreis. Strada is certainly not the only Renaissance architect who did not come to the job out of the building industry: Alberti, Michelangelo, Ra- phael and Giulio Romano are merely the most exalted examples. There can be no doubt that Strada’s role as an architectural designer was taken seriously at court: the trouble Maximilian ii took during his last diet at Regensburg, only a few weeks before his death, to recommend his faithful servant to Elector Au- gust of Saxony is sufficient evidence of his confidence in Strada’s powers. Summing up, we may conclude that Strada’s position as an Imperial Archi- tect and as an expert in the design both of classical Antiquity and contempo- rary Italian architecture and decoration cannot have failed to have had a cer- tain significance. His position was so firm, his network so wide, that it can be confidently assumed that he had a considerable influence on the development of architecture and decorative design at the Imperial court, and occasionally elsewhere in Austria and Bohemia. This effect was linked to the tastes and preferences of his chief patrons, the Emperors Ferdinand i and Maximilian ii, and on those of a select group of their courtiers. Moreover his expertise may have influenced the architects and other artists active at court. Strada exerted such influence partially by means of his own example: at least by the splendid house he built for himself. But doubtless of far greater importance was the collection of relevant graphic documentation on classical Antiquity and contemporary art, architecture and decoration that was housed in it, and which was accessible at least to the upper ranks of courtiers and to Strada’s immediate colleagues. These materials were instructive in them- selves, but in view of Strada’s enthusiasm for his drawings, it is quite likely that he would explain them to, and critically discuss them with his visitors. In this way his Musaeum provided a modest and informal academy of architecture and design. It is for this, perhaps more than for his own designs, that Strada can be considered as an important channel by which the ideas and the formal language of the Italian High Renaissance came to be received in Central Eu- rope. This was only one function of the minor but quite lively centre of artistic and intellectual activities that his house and collection offered to the Imperial court and its many visitors, and which will be sketched in the next chapters of this study. resident of Vienna he was close at hand, and through his eldest son Paolo was represented in the household of the Archduke Ernest, who may also have occasionally referred to him purely out of courtesy to an old, faithful servant once highly prized by his father.