Wait, am I recording? You are listening to Stuff About Things, an art history podcast. All right, let's mango.
SPEAKER_00Hello and welcome to Stuff About Things, an art history podcast. My name is Lindsay. Uh, give me one second. You would never know it from this audio, but I am getting my PhD in art history. Wait for it. I have the pleasure of having a two-year-old niece who just had her birthday party at our house, and therefore we have a supply of helium balloons that would otherwise go to waste. Don't let this audio fool you. I am a very serious person who takes art history very seriously indeed. But I also like to have fun.
SPEAKER_03Alright, back to my normal voice. As I said, my name is Lindsay. Hello. I am a PhD student in art history, and hopefully, hopefully, hopefully, that is the last time I will have to say that on this podcast. That is the reason that I have not been super present lately, is because I was finishing my dissertation, which I have indeed finished, and am just waiting to, you know, get the get the check mark on. Thank you, thank you. I'm assuming you're applauding. Thanks. The last time you heard my voice, I was coming to you from Rome, where I spent seven very weird and very magical months. Uh, I'm now home again in the great state of Wisconsin, coming to you from the second floor walk-in closet of my parents' home. How the Mighty Have Fallen. Ha, just kidding. Or am I? Hmm, time will tell. Before jumping into today's episode, I have got a couple of books and a podcast to recommend. Uh, one of them art history related, and the others not. The first book I was sent uh because of the podcast, and it is called The Stolen Lady by Laura Morelli, which came out on September 21st. The Stolen Lady is a work of historical fiction that tells the stories of two women separated by about 500 years. The first is Belina, a house servant living in Florence during the 15th century, and Anne, an archivist working at the Louvre in Paris during the height of World War II. Separated across time and space, these two women are nonetheless bound by their relationship with a single painting, one that might be said to be the most famous painting, maybe, in the entire world, and one that features at least a little bit in today's episode. Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, aka The Stolen Lady. If you enjoy The Stolen Lady, or if this sounds up your alley, Morelli has several other books that are art historically based for you to enjoy as well. I have now read a couple of them. I enjoyed them all, but I think The Stolen Lady is a great place to start. And a big thank you to her team, especially Jordan, who was lovely, for offering to send me a copy. Once again, that is The Stolen Lady by Laura Morelli. The second book that I wanted to recommend is called Kaleidoscope by Brian Selznick. I was lucky enough to get a printer's proof from Brian, and I absolutely devoured it. I think I read 90% of it in one sitting. And yes, it did make me openly weep on an airplane. Much to the discomfort of myself and everyone around me.
SPEAKER_01I'm fine, sir. I'm just reading my friend's book. That's really good, but it's really sad. Yes, I would please like a diet coke, but I don't think I can eat any pretzels right now.
SPEAKER_03That's what I sounded like for the whole flight. Kaleidoscope comprises a collection of seemingly, seemingly, unconnected stories about an unnamed first-person narrator and a boy named James. In different means and in different measures, all of the stories deal with how love and loss can shape not just our world, but our understanding of the world and our place within it. Brian is also an incredible illustrator, so you will get to enjoy all of the images that he made for the book. They're absolutely fabulous. And I'm very excited because I just used one of my coveted audible credits to acquire the audiobook version of Kaleidoscope, which is narrated by Gwendolyn Christie, best known for playing Brianne of Tarth in Game of Thrones. I haven't listened to it yet, but I'm sure it will be brilliant. Once again, that is Kaleidoscope, written and illustrated by Brian Selznick. The third and final recommendation for you today is a new podcast that my friend Madeline started with her friend Dan called The Grim Cities, which covers local history and haunts in and around the Twin Cities area where Dan and Madeline live. Despite starting the podcast last month, they already have a handful of episodes plus some mini sodes. I have absolutely no idea how they manage that. It's very hard having a podcast, but they are putting that content out there and it's a very fun listen. That is The Grim Cities with Madeline and Dan. Thank you very much for listening to those recommendations. And now on with the show. She even suggested the work of art that I will be talking about today. So here I am. Jean, my friend, this one is for you. The part where I tell you stuff about a rather mysterious painting, the genius who is said to have painted it, and the history that now binds them together. A Young Lady with a Unicorn by Raphael. Though you are forewarned, when it comes to this painting, not everything is as it seems. Ooh, intrigue. The painting known as a young lady with a unicorn or lady with a unicorn is in the collection of the Borghese Gallery in Rome. The painting shows a young woman dressed in a lovely gown depicted Ala the Mona Lisa, so sitting in front of some kind of balcony overlooking a landscape. In her lap is what is unmistakably a unicorn. It's a little fuzzy unicorn and it's got a skinny little horn, and its mouth is open as if giving a delightful little, um, I don't know, nee. Cutest of all is the fact that the woman's fingers are intertwined with the unicorn's little legs. Or as I sometimes refer to my dog Gus's legs, is Yankees. The painting is particularly well known due to having a rather mysterious past. Despite now being a famous painting and one of the Borghese Gallery's treasured masterpieces, the painting ran under the radar for a very long time. We are talking centuries. Sometimes that's just the way things go. You fly under the radar for about 400 years before BAM, your painted face is suddenly on any kind of merch that a museum could possibly sell. That is what the youths might call a glow-up. Today, the painting of a lady with a unicorn is especially well known for two things. One, for being a painting by Raphael, who was one of the most famous and beloved painters of the Renaissance, and two, for featuring a little unicorn, a little cute unicorn. However, both of these aspects of the painting, it being by Raphael and it featuring a unicorn, are relatively recent developments in the painting's history that were only established as of the early 1900s. Otherwise, the painting really wasn't considered to be anything special. Don't worry, we're gonna talk about it. The painting is now known as a masterpiece by Raphael that dates to about 1506-ish. However, the first secure mention of the painting doesn't come for another hundred plus years, in 1623, when it was recorded as being in the collection of the Aldo Brandini family, a very prestigious and rich family that was mostly based in Florence. Even in 1623, the identities of both the painter of the portrait and the sitter, or the woman featured in the portrait, were lost. The only defining feature of this portrait was the fact that the lady had a little unicorn in her lap. The next mention of the painting doesn't come until 1682, when the painting is described in an inventory of the Borghese family in Rome. It's listed as an anonymous portrait of a lady with a unicorn by a quote unquote uncertain hand. Not very helpful. What this inventory does tell us that's useful is that between 1623 and 1682, lady with a unicorn went from the Aldo Brandini collection in Florence to the Borghese collection in Rome. A switch that likely happened when an Aldobrandini daughter married into the Borghese family. Admittedly, that knowledge doesn't really help us with the portrait, but it does tell us the window in which this painting went from Florence to Rome. Which I think like about 10 years ago, only the 1682 inventory was known, and no one really had any idea how a painting likely made in Florence had made it into the Borghese family's collection, where it has remained for over 400 years. At some point between 1682 and 1700-ish, the painting underwent major changes. For reasons unknown, someone decided to transform the lady with a unicorn into a depiction of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, an early Christian martyr and a very popular saint. In addition to adding a shawl, or you know, something to cover the lady's shoulders in the name of modesty, the intervention also included covering the unicorn with Catherine's signature symbol of the broken spiked wheel. Yes, a spiked wheel. Now I always thought, uh, just based on general knowledge of how these depictions of saints usually go, that Catherine died via spiked wheel. Yes, an execution via spiked wheel was a terrible way to go, and no, you should not read the Wikipedia article on it. A lesson I learned the hard way. But Catherine did not die via spiked wheel. That was how she was supposed to die. But when she laid a hand on the wheel, it broke. Which explains why Catherine is almost always depicted with the symbol of the broken wheel beside her. Now, did her miraculous breaking of the wheel save her from execution? Uh no. But it did help. Because instead of getting crushed to death beneath a spiked wheel, she was simply assigned an execution technique that was more old-fashioned. Which is good old-fashioned decapitation. And she has been a beloved martyr ever since. For over 250 years, the lady with the unicorn midnighted as Saint Catherine and her broken wheel, more or less flying under the radar as a nice painting, but definitely not a masterpiece. That would all change in 1927. The year I was born. No, I'm kidding. It was in 1927 that a gentleman by the name of Roberto Longhi examined the painting. Now Longhi is something of a foundational figure in Renaissance art history, and uh really Italian art history more broadly. He was primarily a scholar of Caravaggio and Piero della Francesca, who are two very different painters, but whatever, follow your dreams, and he was widely noted for his connoisseurship, which is a fancy way of saying that he could look at a work of art, observe how it was painted, the style, the materials, etc., and tell you with a relative degree of certainty who was responsible for painting it. Very helpful professionally, also great party trick. In 1927, Longhi examined the Borghese St. Catherine, aka Lady with a unicorn. The then 37-year-old Longhi not only recognized that expanses of the painting had been repainted at some point, but he also hypothesized with a fair degree of certainty that the painting was not by an uncertain hand, but by none other than Raphael. Now I wasn't there in 1927 when I was negative 63 years old, but this must have been something of a mic drop moment. This painting, for so long considered relatively unremarkable compared to the other masterpieces in the Borghese's collection, was actually the work by one of the greatest masters of the Italian Renaissance. That's like an invitation to party for the rest of your life. You know who probably liked a good party? Raphael. The genius to whom we now turn. Raphael was born in April of 1483 in Urbino, Italy. Remember that, it comes up later. This little tyke would become one of the most famous painters of all time. And you know that because there's a ninja turtle named after him. That's how you know you've made it big. Raphael became an artist after following in the footsteps of his father, Giovanni. Giovanni worked as a court painter at Urbino, which was no small thing that was very prestigious. Unfortunately, Raphael was made an orphan quite early in life. His mother died when he was just eight, followed shortly thereafter by the death of his father when Raphael was just eleven. The fact that Raphael was just eleven when Giovanni died likely means that Raphael never formally trained with his dad, though I'm sure he picked up a thing or two over the years. In fact, we don't know all that much about Raphael's early career and his artistic formation. He does seem to have been something of a prodigy, one who was in contact with some of the greatest artists from that area of Italy. Raphael's first major commission was for an altarpiece in 1501, when he was just shy of 20 years old. Things get a little hazy for a few years after that, though Raphael is documented as being in Florence and working in Florence between the years of 1504 to 1508. This is the period of years in which he would have painted Lady with a Unicorn, which is to say it's very similar to some of the paintings that he was producing during this time, allowing us to tentatively date it. Despite only being in his early to mid-20s at this time, Raphael painted some of his early masterworks during these years, including several rather famous paintings of the Madonna and the Madonna and Child, such as the Madonna of the Goldfinch, the Madonna of the Meadow, as well as a painting of the Madonna, the Christchild, and Saint John the Baptist, known as La Belle Jardiniere, in the collection of the Louvre. And yes, I would like a croissant, to go with my terrible French accent. One of the artists to have a major impact on Raphael and his style during these years was Leonardo da Vinci, whose time in Florence overlapped with that of young Raphael. Raphael seems to have been particularly influenced by none other than the Mona Lisa, which takes on visual form in many of the paintings that Raphael made during this period of about 1504 to 1508. As of 1508, Raphael moved to Rome, a city that he would make his home for the remainder of his life. Raphael enjoyed many very prestigious commissions while in Rome, including one that he received almost immediately upon arrival, when Pope Julius II commissioned the 25-year-old artist to paint a room in the Vatican, known now as the Stanza della Signatura, which at that time housed the Pope's personal library. That's what we call a big deal. Needless to say, the commission was huge, and it put Raphael on the map as one of the top artists of his time, despite being only 25. I mean, when I was 25, it was my first year of grad school, and I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. And this dude is painting rooms for the Pope. It's in the Stanza della Senatura that Raphael painted one of his most famous works, the one known as the School of Athens, which shows the philosophers Plato and Aristotle walking through a massive basilica-like space filled with other famous philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians from history. It's even rumored, though I don't know that it's ever been confirmed, that Raphael cast, if you will, certain artists and people he knew in the role of those individuals. The figure of Plato, for example, looks an awful lot like Mr. Da Vinci, while the figure of Heraclitus, who's in a kind of like purpley top hanging out on the stairs, is allegedly a portrait of none other than Michelangelo. And Raphael would have known what Michelangelo looked like because good old Mickey Ange was painting the Sistine chapel ceiling at the exact same time that Raphael was working on the stanza della Signatura. Raphael also included a self-portrait, portraying himself as Apelles, an ancient Greek painter that Pliny the Elder, a famous ancient Roman historian, considered to be the be-all end all of painting, which tells us basically everything we need to know about how Raphael saw himself. He knew he was hot stuff. There's even uh a rumor, a rumor, that Raphael even included a depiction of Donatello as the philosopher Plotinus. Meaning that at least three, if not all, of the Ninja Turtles are present in the School of Athens. And I'm not gonna lie, that's the thing I like most about this painting. Don't get me wrong, I don't want anyone to yell at me. I very much appreciate the School of Athens. I understand why it's important. Uses perspective, it's beautifully painted, and somehow Raphael, who again was 25 years old, somehow managed to summarize in visual form about 2,000 years of developments in science, mathematics, and philosophy. It's very impressive. However, as Lindsay, as a poison, I can't help but think of how much of a bummer it would be to be transported into this painting. To have to walk among a bunch of white dead guys who think too much and really like math. Can you imagine the man splaining? Oh my god. That's my nightmare. I've also just seen this painting like 500 times too many. I'm not talking in person, I'm talking in life. One of the times that sticks out the most is when I was an undergrad at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I happened to find myself at a frat house, don't ask me any questions, and they had a School of Athens poster on the wall. And then some kid, drunk off boxed wine, learned that I was an art history major, and proceeded to try to explain the School of Athens to me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, this is a painting by Michelangelo or something. That guy looks like Leonardo da Vinci. Have you read the Da Vinci Code? According to that, Da Vinci was a Freemason. From that moment I've never forgiven Raphael. Never.
SPEAKER_03Wasn't his fault. I don't care. I still blame him. It's because of him that I had to endure that dumb conversation. Raphael's work on the stanza was so well received that even before he finished the stanza della Signatura, Julius II had already commissioned him to paint another room. The so-called stanza di Eliodoro, or the room of Heliodorus. Before anyone gets on my back, I'm not being pretentious in using their Italian names, okay? I mean, maybe a little bit. But these are the names that these rooms go by in art history books. They are known as the Stanze. Despite being painted within a couple of years of the Stanza della Signatura, the Stanza di Eliodoro really shows how Raphael's style changed during those first few years in Rome. The frescoes feature larger figures, they have more dramatic compositions, the paintings are darker, even including one night scene. They're more theatrical, you could say. In fact, one of my favorite works by Raphael is in this room, which is a night scene that depicts the deliverance of St. Peter, in which this glowing angel ushers Saint Peter or saves Saint Peter from a prison cell. And in person, the angel really does seem to glow. It's I don't know how he did that, but it's a very cool effect. Raphael ultimately spent six years working on these two rooms for Pope Julius II, though he was also doing some other stuff in that time frame, including Raphael's forays into architecture. It was around, you know, like 1510, 1512-ish, that Raphael started planning a chapel for Augustino Kiji, who was a rich banker from Siena, who had relocated to Rome, where he almost instantly became the richest person in the city. Dude had money coming out the wazoo. He could have hired any artist or architect to design this chapel. And he chose Raphael, which gives you an idea of just how in demand Raphael was as an artist during this period. Raphael's best known architectural project was that of the Kiji Chapel, commissioned by Agostino Kiji to serve as his final resting place, and he is indeed buried there. The thing is, that chapel is in Santa Maria del Popolo in Rome, a church that is best known today for its paintings by Caravaggio. It doesn't help that later generations of the Kiji family not only made architectural changes to the chapel, but also commissioned none other than Gian Lorenzo Bernini to sculpt a couple of statues for the space. That is to say, most of the people who go to Santa Maria del Popolo today go to see the Caravaggio paintings. They might stop by the Kiji Chapel simply to see the sculptures by Bernini, but it is very easy to leave that place having absolutely no clue that you also just saw a work by Raphael, aka the Kiji Chapel. But now you know, and you can tell all your friends, that the next time you just happen to be in Rome, you can stop by the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo to see Caravaggio, to see Bernini, and also to admire Raphael's work as an architect. By 1514, Raphael was undoubtedly one of the most famous artists in all of Italy, probably even more so than Michelangelo. In addition to his job as a painter and an architect, Raphael also did some other stuff. He designed tapestries, he collaborated with printmakers, he was even given the position as superintendent of antiquities, a position that required him to inventory all of the famous monuments of Rome, bestowed on him by none other than Leo X, who in addition to taking up Julius II's position as Pope, after Julius died, of course, inherited Julius II's high esteem of Raphael, who was by far Leo X's favorite artist. This is all to say that Raphael was busy. Very busy, maybe too busy. In fact, Raphael may have worked his way into an early grave. According to Giorgio Vasari, who is the source on artists' life from this time, Raphael died of exhaustion, uh, not from his workload, but from what Vasari alleges was quote unquote amorous excesses. Which is the fancy way of saying that Raphael was taken one too many trips on the love boat. You know what they say, when the boat's a rockin', don't come a knocking. Although Raphael was pretty well known for his luck with the ladies, it's a bit far-fetched and even a little cruel to claim that he died from sexual exhaustion. Other, more probable causes have been suggested, including exhaustion due to the amount of work that he had undertaken, his body just kind of gave out, while others claim that he had some kind of pulmonary issue or a flu-like sickness, the severity of which I can imagine was exacerbated by just how much stress he was under. Bodies and stress don't mix. Whatever the cause, the result was the same. Raphael, a Renaissance great in both his day and ours, died on April 6th, 1520. A date that some allege was his birthday. Whether true or not, it was a life cut short. At the time of his death, Raphael is believed to have been just 37 years old. Raphael's sudden death was shocking for much of Rome and Italy more broadly. Even Pope Leo X was absolutely crushed at the loss of his favorite artist, especially given that Raphael had been basically fine just two weeks before. His funeral drew massive crowds, and it's even alleged that his body was carried by cardinals and accompanied to its final resting place by the Pope himself. That resting place was nowhere other than Rome's famous Pantheon, a former pagan temple that had since been turned into a Catholic church. And that is exactly where Raphael has rested for the past 501 years. One can still see his tomb there today and read the words inscribed on his sarcophagus that were written by Renaissance poet Pietro Bembo. The words read, quote, Here lies that famous Raphael by whom nature feared to be conquered while he lived, and when he was dying, feared herself to die. End quote. Of course, Raphael still lives on in any number of artworks that he left behind, which these days includes a lady with a unicorn. And I say these days because, as I said earlier, the painting wasn't attached to Raphael until 1927, at which point the lady with the unicorn was actually St. Catherine with her wheel. It was in 1927 that a young Roberto Longhi examined the painting and asserted that it was the work of the master. Longhi also hypothesized that the painting had undergone at least one major historical intervention by another painter. There were expanses that just weren't up to snuff, particularly St. Catherine's dress and the symbols of her martyrdom. This hypothesis was proven correct when the painting underwent its first major restoration, though I should probably say underwent its first major attempt at a restoration. Attempt being the operative word. The results of that restoration were and continue to be quite controversial. Especially controversial was the decision to transfer the painting from its original wood panel to a canvas. I'm not exactly sure how the process works, but it's a pretty common intervention that conservators and restorers take when a painting's original support, which refers to the material on which the artist applied the paint, so in this case, wood panel, is in such a poor state that the painting itself is at risk. You usually hear about paintings being transferred from wood panel to canvas, but there are also instances in which a canvas painting is transferred to a new canvas. The reason that paintings are more often transferred from wood to canvas is due to the basic material properties of wood. It tends to take on moisture, it warps, it is tasty, tasty food for creepy crawly insects. Also, anything that's 500 years old is going to have its issues. There's not a ton available regarding the 1936 restoration of the painting. From what I read, the process of transferring the painting didn't go super well, ultimately inflicting more damage than it did good. One very helpful thing to come out of that restoration project was that the team did X-rays of the painting. To a lot of you that might sound a little cray cray, because why in the world would you X-ray a painting? But x-rays are very useful, and are used often in these kinds of projects, as a tool for seeing what changes have occurred on the panel or on the canvas over the years. They revealed that the painting wasn't a St. Catherine after all. At least it didn't start that way. Instead, all of St. Catherine's attributes had been added later. The X-rays also allowed the restorers to see, kind of, what was underneath those added layers of paint. And what do you ask was lurking beneath Catherine's wheel? Twas an animal. But was it a unicorn? Yes, but also no. You'll have to keep listening for that one. Along with this knowledge about how the painting had changed over time, the team also came to one other very important conclusion. Something that they saw during the Restoration convinced the team that this was not the work of a quote unquote uncertain hand, but one by Raphael. That, my friends, is what you would call a very important discovery. How did they come to those conclusions? I don't know. But they did. These discoveries, however, came at a huge cost, because the restoration attempt is now widely believed to have caused unspecified but significant damages to the painting. And it must have been bad because in 1959 the painting underwent another restoration to reverse some of the damage or to mitigate some of the damage that was caused by that earlier restoration. That's how bad it was. If I understand the timeline correctly, and I'm like, I don't know, 80% sure that I do, as of 1959, I'm pretty sure the painting was still a St. Catherine. So the x-rays from the 1930s confirmed that the attributes of St. Catherine were added later, but there was no attempt made to remove those from the surface of the now canvas painting. That all changed in 1959, when the team removed those later additions to reveal what was underneath. The team essentially reverted the painting back to what it looked like between the years of 1623 and 1682, when the painting appeared in inventories described as a lady with a unicorn. The young lady with the unicorn was thus reborn. She had a renaissance, if you will. However, the x-rays from the 1930s show that the unicorn itself was a later addition to the painting after it was first finished. Before this portrait became a lady with a unicorn, she was instead a lady with a dog. In the very poor pictures I have of the x-ray, I personally think it looks like a baby cow, but it's ultimately a little dog curled up in her lap. We also know from technical analysis that the unicorn was definitely added after the painting was originally considered finished. We know that because there is a layer of varnish that separates the paint of the dog and the paint with the unicorn. You wouldn't apply varnish to something that wasn't finished. I guess it's not impossible, but it's very unlikely. Ergo, therefore. The presence of varnish between the dog and the unicorn indicates that the artist thought this work was finished when it was just a lady with a lapdog, and the unicorn was then added at a later date. It's not like halfway during the process he thought, hmm, I think this dog should be a unicorn. No. If they added varnish, they were probably done. This means, dear Listener, that the unicorn was added sometime between the early 1500s and 1623. 1623 being the first known mention of a young lady with a unicorn in the Aldo Brandini inventory. For all we know, the unicorn could have been added two weeks after the artist finished the painting, if the patron was like, no, I want a unicorn. Or it could have been added decades later. There's really no way to know one way or another based on the tools we currently have. This is where things get a little bit sticky, because the restoration team working in 1959, surely in agreement with the Borghese Gallery, which owns the work, decided to remove the attributes of St. Catherine, which were confirmed later editions, but not the Unicorn, also confirmed to have been added after the painting was originally finished. We just don't know when. To be clear, I'm not judging them for that, but it is interesting to consider why they stopped where they did. The reasons for this choice have never been made public, though I do have a couple in mind. It might be a combination of all of these, it might be none of these, but this is my best guess. The first is that if you choose to remove the unicorn, the unicorn is gone. There is no getting the unicorn back. It is gone, bye-bye. That just automatically encourages a slightly more conservative approach. The second reason, and I'm putting this very bluntly, removing the unicorn would be very bad for business. A viewer is more likely to stop in front of a painting with a unicorn in it than a painting of a woman with a dog. Unless that dog is Gus, then he wins. After you spent two hours walking through a museum with some of the most beautiful masterpieces in the world, a painting with a little lap dog in it, it's not gonna get your attention. One with a unicorn in it though, uh-uh, that might get you to stop. But that opens its own can of worms. Because then the question becomes whether or not it is art historically speaking, ethical to make a decision on what to do with a painting simply to get people in the door. I am not judging whoever made that particular decision, uh, because I totally get it, I would definitely choose to retain the unicorn. But we have to be realistic in recognizing that these decisions with what to do with a painting during restoration are not always aimed at returning it to its most original state. Especially if that original state is more boring than whatever exists at the moment. And hey, you can always go back to the boring. That is always on the table. But once you remove the unicorn, you remove the party, and then there's no more party. The third reason for why the restoration team might not have wanted to remove the unicorn is a combination of the first two reasons. That the restoration team decided to return the painting to what it looked like in 1623 when it was first mentioned in the Aldobrandini inventory. We absolutely know that by 1623 there was a unicorn in the painting. We have no idea what the painting looked like in 1510, for example. Maybe the unicorn was already there, maybe it wasn't. But we know, without a shadow of a doubt, that in 1623, 'twas the unicorn that reigned. Me. Alongside those questions of why the restoration team chose to do what they did, and whether or not the unicorn is quote unquote original, is another very uncomfortable question that I now must ask. Is this painting actually by Raphael? There is nothing, nothing, that connects any artist to this work. The practice of connoisseurship, which is what Roberto Longhi was doing when he assessed the painting and determined it was quote unquote likely by Raphael, is not an exact science. Not even close. I don't necessarily disagree with Roberto Longhi. If Roberto Longhi said this is a work by Raphael, who the heck am I to say that it's not? The answer: I am no one. The thing that bothers me most is that 1927 is the first time anyone connected this painting to Raphael. He was one of the best painters of his time. It's hard for me to believe that by 1623, everyone had forgotten that this painting was by Raphael. I know it happens, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, but it does give me the odd historical heebie jeebies. I don't like it. For another thing, it is well established in scholarship on Raphael that if this painting was indeed originally by Raphael, his touch has now been mostly erased. Art historian and Raphael expert Jorg Meyer Zuhrkapellen, no idea if I'm saying that right, examined the painting under a special kind of light and determined the following. And this is a quote. Today the painted surface consists of major areas of repair and overpainting and crackolatures largely covered by a thin paint layer. The landscape is completely ruined, and the lady's shoulders, especially the contours down to the puffed sleeves, are seriously damaged and overpainted. End quote. With Lady with a Unicorn, the area that is most original, that has undergone the least amount of historical intervention, is the woman's face. Everything else seems to have been touched quite a lot. The average museum goer will have absolutely no idea that most of the surface of this painting is not original, or that one could question whether it is. Heck. I am literally uh 10 days, 10 days away from getting my PhD, if all goes well. And if you put me in front of this painting and said, hey, this is by Raphael, and I didn't know any better, which I usually don't, I'd be like, cool. Which just goes to show very few of us, even those of us with PhDs, have any idea what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_02Our sheer narcissism and a relatively good vocabulary just makes us sound like we do.
SPEAKER_03So is this painting by Raphael? I don't know. Your guess is probably as good as mine. And it's not like the Borghese Gallery is going to tell you any different. Like, what are they gonna do? Are they going to put a didactic on the wall that basically says her face might be by Raphael? Maybe it's Raphael, maybe it's Maybelline? No! They are going to sell this and have been selling this as a Raphael masterpiece for decades. They're invested in us believing that this is an original Raphael. Again, maybe parts of it are, but there's a lot more to this painting than first meets the eye. For all this talk about what parts of the painting are original, what parts are not original, etc. etc. etc., it's easy to forget the experience of actually seeing this painting in the Borghese Gallery. It's a beautiful painting. I personally would say it's beautifully painted because apparently I don't know the difference. And it doesn't really even matter if I did know the difference or didn't. It's a very charismatic painting that you can't help but look at. It demands your attention. And not because of the unicorn. That's the weird thing for me. It's not the unicorn. And this whole time I've been like unicorn, this unicorn, unicorn, unicorn, blah blah blah blah blah. The unicorn might be the thing that catches your attention first. Like, whoa, that's a unicorn. But what keeps you looking at the portrait is the woman. I mean, maybe that's because Raphael painted her face, I don't know. But something about her, her blue eyes, her stare, it's just entrancing. And that begs the question who is the woman with the unicorn? And the answer is, drummole please. Nobody knows. No clue. I mean, maybe some clues, but for the most part, uh no. There are certain deductions that we can make to limit the scope of who this individual might be. Those deductions, however, operate on the assumption that one, this is indeed a painting by Raphael, and number two, the dating to 1504 to 1508, somewhere in that time frame, is correct. If either of those things don't turn out to be true, then the foundations for this guesswork that I'm about to outline crumble. But who cares? Let us speculate wildly. There are a few things about Raphael and this portrait that allow us to limit the scope of who this woman might, might be. The most important piece of information that we actually know is that portraits of young women like this one were often painted to commemorate a young woman's marriage and or wedding, either right before it happened or just after it had taken place. In those kinds of wedding portraits, it was very common to include symbols related to matrimony. These included both the dog, a symbol of fidelity, and a unicorn, which was a symbol of virginity. Why, you ask? It was said that only a virgin could tame a unicorn. At least they get to do something for fun. Although it was a fitting symbol for a bride before her marriage, it wasn't super common to see a unicorn in these kinds of portraits. That's what makes this particular portrait so compelling. If unicorns were just a dame a dozen, it'd lose a little bit of the wow factor. That general knowledge about portraits of this nature is not super helpful, but it does narrow down the candidate pool somewhat. This is a young upper-class woman who is on the cusp, cusp, of getting married. We can also assume that her family has some kind of connection to the artist, or at the very least, access to him. Operating under these assumptions and general knowledge, there are two women who stand out as potential candidates for the identity of Lady with a Unicorn. The first is a Florentine noblewoman by the name of Maddalena Strozzi. Maddalena was a noblewoman who married a very rich, very, very, very rich merchant by the name of Agnelo Donni in 1504. Raphael painted at least one portrait of Maddalena along with one of her husband that are dated to around the same time as we think he painted Lady with a Unicorn. So Maddalena Strozzi would line up with a lady with a unicorn both time-wise, so 1504-ish, and event-wise, she got married. They also lived in Florence, and clearly, at least at some later point, knew Raphael. That all checks out. But no one really talks about that. Instead, they point to the resemblance between a lady with a unicorn and the portrait of Maddalena Strozzi that Raphael painted around 1504 to 1506. And yes, they do look alike. But they don't look that much alike, okay? I mean, Lady with the Unicorn would have been painted before Maddalena's wedding versus her portrait, which would have been painted after her wedding, in which case, woof. That marriage really took its toll. But there is some kind of resemblance between the portrait of Madalena Strozzi and the woman in A Lady with a unicorn. If you told me they were sisters, I would totally believe you. But are they the same person? I don't know. Let's just say that the woman in A Lady with a Unicorn is more conventionally pretty than Madalena Strozzi. Whose portrait by Raphael, the one that we absolutely know was painted by him, has since become a meme on the internet. Because Homegirl looks over it. She is not here for your crap. And the portrait of Madalena Strozzi really did become an internet meme, which essentially boils down to how disappointed one must be when they sit for hours and hours and hours for a portrait only to have the artist turn the portrait around and be like, ugh, we'll have to put that in a closet. Despite what the meme claims, of course, Modelina Strozzi would not have had that reaction to this portrait. If anything, it probably makes her look a lot better than she did in real life. Because ultimately Renaissance portraits like this weren't necessarily about likeness. The number one priority was not to capture exactly what you look like at a given moment. It's more about privilege, family lineage, showing you got money, and that you deem yourself important enough, worthy enough, to be immortalized in paint. I mean it should look like you, kind of. People should know who they're looking at. But that wasn't the be-all end-all factor of a portrait. When people are speculating about who a lady with a unicorn might be, Modalina Strozzi is definitely the name that comes up the most. But it's not the only name. There's at least one other that crops up from time to time. A young Roman woman by the name of Lauda Orsini. In 2016, curator Linda Woke Simon addressed this theory in an essay. You can find it on the internet for free, because she's posted it. Here's the gist. Lauda Orsini was the daughter of Julia Farnese, and allegedly, and probably, Pope Alexander VI. Yes, you heard that right. The daughter of the Pope. For those of you familiar with the TV show The Borgias, you will know Alexander VI as Rodrigo Borgia, aka Jeremy Irons. Needless to say, Alexander VI was a very, very naughty pope. Very naughty. Despite basically everyone knowing that Laura Orsini was the daughter of the Pope, she was formally recognized as the daughter of Julia Farnese's husband, Orsino Orsini.
SPEAKER_02A man whose first ibe and last ibe are basically the same word.
SPEAKER_03At the time that Raphael painted A Lady with a Unicorn, Laura Orsini would have been about 14 years old and getting ready to marry into the Della Rovere family, most famous for being the rulers of Urbino, Raphael's hometown. So she's about the right age, she has a connection to Raphael, and she's getting married, which might be the reason why this portrait was commissioned. When I was reading Linda Woke Simon's essay, I was like, oh my gosh, it's all fitting up, all of the pieces are falling into place. But this is where it starts to fall apart. I shouldn't say fall apart, but this is where it all becomes very circumstantial. Woke Simon argues that Laura Orsini may have had blonde hair, because Alexander VI's daughter Lucrezia was a known blonde, and blonde is not a very common hair color in Italy. She argues that in the landscape behind the Lady with the Unicorn, that you can see landscapes from Urbino, making clear that the sitter has some kind of relationship with that town. She argues that Laura Orsini would have owned jewelry like the pendant worn by Lady with the Unicorn. And finally, Linda Woke Simon has even argued that the unicorn would have been something of a twofer with regards to Lauda Orsini. In addition to symbolizing her potential career as a unicorn hunter before her wedding, the unicorn also served as an emblem of Lauda's maternal side of the family, the Farnese. Two birds meet one unicorn.
SPEAKER_02Gaga! Me.
SPEAKER_03All of those pieces of evidence, however, are one circumstantial, like I said, and two. Use aspects of the painting that we know have either been repainted or later additions of an unspecified date, like the unicorn. There's also the fact that Raphael likely never saw Laura Orsini. From what we know about both of their movements, they would not have encountered each other before this painting was made. That doesn't necessarily prohibit him from being able to paint her portrait. There are enough instances of an artist painting a portrait of someone they'd never seen that this would not be out of the question. I'll grant you it might be a little weird, but life is weird. Go with it. Ultimately, it's only the basics that serve as evidence that Laura Orsini could be a lady with the unicorn. Mind you, the same could be said from Maddalena Strozzi. But at least we kind of know what she looked like. And we know that Raphael would have known what she looked like. In any case, much like the people who watch Ancient Aliens, I love a good theory. But at the end of the day, we really don't know anything about this compelling blue-eyed lady. Was she Laura Orsini? Was she Madalena Trozzi? Was she some random Florentine lady? As they say in Italy, bo. Just talking about this though, it makes me think this painting and the lady within it would make for a really good premise for a historical fiction novely thing. Kinda like Sarah Dunan's The Birth of Venus. I think this one could get similar treatment. I would totally read that book. After all of that, nearly an hour of background on this painting, what exactly do we know about this alleged Raphael masterpiece, Lady with a Unicorn? The answer, obviously, is very little. What we don't know vastly outweighs what we do know. It's one of those annoying paintings that you can't get out of your head because it inspires more questions than answers. Some of these questions are pretty basic. Did Raphael paint this? Who is the lady? Why is there a unicorn? It also inspires questions that are just a little bit more uncomfy. If this painting has been almost fully repainted, can or should we still say that it's a work by Raphael? If we have absolutely no documentary proof that it is in fact by Raphael, is it wise to promote it as a masterpiece by the artist? When it comes to historical repaintings, such as the additions of Catherine's symbols and the unicorn, what drives conservators and museums to pick and choose what to keep and what to remove? If we found out tomorrow that this was not in fact a work by Raphael, what would happen? And finally, why does any of that matter? And of course it does matter, but the reasons for it mattering have very little to do with the painting itself, and instead everything to do with our perceptions of fame, artistic talent, and ideas of genius. That brings me to my final point, or rather my final question. The one that started it all. Do I still think that Raphael is boring? I grant you, this probably isn't the best episode to address that because we're dealing with a painting that may or may not be by Raphael, but just go with it. I know the right answer to this would be no. I know that. But the honest answer I'm scared is kind of. But that's not Raphael's fault. I don't have any beef with Raphael. In fact, I have a rule in my life that I try not to start drama with people who are, one, far more talented than I am, and two, that have been dead for 500 years. It's a pretty good rule. Unfortunately for me, by calling Raphael boring, I was unknowingly creating beef with my future friend and conservator extraordinaire Jean, who has not been dead for 500 years, but is way smarter and far more talented than me. When Jean called me out on this particular art historical indiscretion, she made a case for Raphael. She is a valiant defender of his honor. And she said something that stuck with me. I'm paraphrasing because there were a couple glasses of wine involved, but she said something along the lines of, How can you think Raphael is boring? He is such a beautiful painter. And it's absolutely true. Though to be fair, I never said he wasn't a beautiful painter, I just said he was boring. These were very different things. I can only speak for myself, but for me, the beauty of Raphael's works really come across in person. That's where the wow factor is. And a lot of us learned about Raphael and his works in the classroom. I did go to Rome when I was 17 and saw some stuff, but I was an idiot and had no idea what I was looking at. So I learned about Raphael and his major works on flashcards. And boy oh boy, did I memorize the crap out of those. But knowing and understanding are two very different things. There is only one work that I've seen of Raphael's in the classroom that I can remember feeling like, wow. And that's his portrait of Baldessar Castiglione. But all of the rest that you typically see in a classroom environment, the School of Athens, various Madonnas and Childs, early portraits, altarpieces, though some of his later altarpieces do get a little bit weird. But they're weird in a pretty way. And those things just don't do it for me. They don't. Maybe I'm defective. That's the debate for a different day. But it also seems to be a generational thing. Because I've heard from several professors who are excellent teachers and have been doing this for a very long time, that in the past 10 to 15 years it has become harder and harder to keep their students' interest, not only when they're discussing Raphael, but any number of early to mid-Renaissance artists. There are probably a ton of reasons for that. But one of the bigger ones is the fact that the younger generation's relationship to images, to visual culture, to our consumption of media has changed so drastically over the past, I don't know, 10 to 20 years. We have been programmed to more easily relate to the visual imagery of artists like Caravaggio and Rembrandt and Velazquez. There's also something about this that speaks to just the natural ebb and flow of artists' popularity over the years. A hundred years ago, Bernard Baronson called Caravaggio not just the death of painting, but the death of art. And Homey loved Raphael, loved him. Obviously, tastes change. Because nowadays we are obsessed with Caravaggio, and Raphael is becoming harder to teach in the classroom. But I can also almost guarantee you that in 25 years max, we will be so freaking sick and tired of seeing and hearing about Caravaggio that the wheel of fortune, not to be mistaken with St. Catherine's wheel that crushes people to death, but the wheel of fortune for artists will start to shift, like it always does. And a new artist, well, an old artist, will once again wear the crown of popularity. Personally, I think the next person in line is Giotto. I think he's gonna snatch the crown. But after that, probably gonna be Raphael. Homeboy is not going anywhere. Will he be inspiring any Dan Brown novels soon? Probably not. But his life could totally inspire a very steamy, very sexy series on HBO, Netflix, or Showtime. And you best bet that I would watch the crap out of that. Excuse my language, but I totally would. Maybe that's the way to get Raphael back on the top. At the end of the day, I think what's important is that we all have the opportunity to engage in conversations that don't necessarily just parrot the bottom line that we've been taught. It is about respecting and appreciating an artist's talent while also being able to acknowledge that sometimes things just don't connect with you. And that's okay. It's also okay for people to vehemently disagree with you. That's not important. What is important is the conversation. So this is my advice to you. If you have the privilege of doing so, engage in loud debates about what you think is beautiful, what you think might be quote unquote boring, what artists you love, what artists you don't, with friends at the dinner table. Which in my experience is always made just a little bit better if there are spirits involved, and I'm not talking ghosts. That's the kind of stuff that's important. And not just in art history, but in life. On that sentimental note, that's all I've got for you today. As always, I will post images related to today's episode on the podcast's website, which should still, I think, I think, be under the domain of www.stuffaboutthingspodcast.com. In addition to those images, you can also find the sources that I use to write the episode and the option to contact me, though you are also welcome to do so through the podcast email, stuffaboutthingspodcast at gmail.com. Speaking of, I want to say a massive thank you to the handfuls of people who have reached out to check on me, to make sure I'm okay, and to ask when they could expect another episode. I love getting those emails, even if it makes me feel a little bit bad about not posting as often as I would like to. Now that my dissertation is finished, hopefully, hopefully, I can post episodes a little more often. A we shall see. As for Gus Corner, this episode, Gus is doing awesome. He's eight and a half, he's a little old man. Currently sleeping on his throne of a dog bed. It's very comfy. He is well fed, well watered, and of course, very well loved. If you enjoyed the podcast, if you've been listening to the podcast and liking it, I would really appreciate it if you took five seconds to five minutes out of your day to leave it a review wherever you are listening to it. Not only does that make a podcast a lot easier to find, the more engagement there is, the more likely it's to come up in a search, for example, but it also lets people know what to expect and it gives them a sense of if they'll like it. It also just makes me feel good, so there's that. The usual thanks go out to hook sounds.com and freemusicarchive.org, which provide the royalty free music that you hear in the episode. The first tune you hear is a version of Box Brandenburg Concerto Numero Quattro by Kevin McLeod, and the second gentier tune is called success dreams. That is all for me today. Let me remind you, as always, that it is so important to take the time to look at something beautiful. Keep an eye out and you'll find it.
SPEAKER_00I am a very serious person who takes art history very seriously. But I also like to have fun.