Abstract

Bramante's illusionistic apse for Santa Maria presso San Satiro in Milan has long been understood as a triumph of Renaissance rationality. This essay shifts attention to the votive and cult contexts of the space and the miraculous image it enshrines. Thecoro fintoefficaciously enhanced the authority of the Madonna and her sponsors—the Sforza dynasty and a confraternity dedicated to the Virgin—by dramatically framing and amplifying the image's potency. Santa Maria presso San Satiro thus flourished as one of Milan's most intensely contested ecclesiastical arenas, in which devotees and institutions maneuvered for access to the potent cult image.

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