Federico Borromeo and the Ambrosiana: art patronage and reform in seventeenth-century Milan

Abstract

Federico Borromeo founded the Ambrosiana in the early seventeenth century as part of his pastoral programme as Archbishop of Milan. The Ambrosiana, which included a library, art academy, and art museum, was intended to reform sacred scholarship and art in response to the decrees of the Council of Trent. This book considers Borromeo's artistic reform program in light of his own notions of the roles of art in Christian society. His reform is interpreted on the basis of extensive documentation including works of art in the Ambrosian Museum and Library, acts of the Ambrosian Academy, hundreds of letters directed to Borromeo, and tracts that he wrote on art, devotional prayer, and sacred oratory and history. Included in the book is a catalogue of the original Ambrosian Museum.