Giambologna, Narrator of the Catholic Reformation by Mary Weitzel Gibbons

Abstract

724book reviews were a feature of the EngUsh history of those days. Persons the man and the priest gets lost in the clutter. His important work Ui manning and helping finance the seminaries comes out clearly, but his work as a writer—and he was one of the best EngUsh stylists of his day—is slighted. One would have preferred to see a clearer picture of Persons' character and personaUty. There do exist some published efforts along this line, especiaUy those focusing in on the last dozen years of his life, which he spent mostly as rector of the EngUsh CoUege, Rome. The reader rarely gets a hint 'why Persons inspires so much devotion on the one hand and so much enmity on the other. He enjoyed the complete confidence of Claudio Aquaviva, one of the greatest Jesuit generals. PhUip II of Spain trusted and revered him. He was a close collaborator of WiUiam Cardinal Allen and was highly regarded by his Jesuit brethren on the English mission. Nevertheless, there is every indication that almost aU Protestants and a good number of EngUsh Catholics opposed his policies and revUed his person. Nevertheless, this biography is a good first step. Edwards has addressed the most difficult and puzzling side ofhis subject. It wUl be easier for future biographers to fiU Ui the blanks, especiaUy if they have access to a good edition of aU of Persons' letters. This is a book that students ofJesuit history, English history, and the Reformation wUl have to read. I would recommend that they do so surrounded by reference books. It wUl repay thetf effort. Thomas H. Clancy, SJ. JesuitArchives, New Orleans Giambologna, Narrator of the Catholic Reformation. By Mary Weitzel Gibbons . [California Studies in the History of Art, XXXIIL] (Berkeley: University of California Press. 1995. Pp. xviii, 262; 13 colorplates, 81 black and white figures. $50.00.) Mary Gibbons successfully challenges the generaUy held view that Giambologna was not interested in subject matter. She demonstrates that the style he invented for the bronze reUefs of Christ's Passion in the Grimani Chapel in Genoa was his response to the newly voiced requirements of the CathoUc Reformation that art be legible and comprehensible to the worshiper. She thus removes these works from the context oflate maniera court art and places them firmly in the avant-garde of Baroque reUgious art. The chapel, commissioned Ui 1579 by Luca Grimani, a prominent Genoese who would later serve as doge, has been neglected because it was destroyed when the church of San Francesco di Castelletto was suppressed under BOOK REVIEWS725 Napoleon and Giambologna's bronzes transferred to the university. The author reconstructs the Grimani sepulcral chapel with the aid of the artist's contemporary Salviati Chapel Ln San Marco Ui Florence, which she caU his "most important extant architectural and sculptural complex" (p. 27), and other precedents where painting and sculpture were combined. She associates die rare pairing of a series ofVirtues with a Passion cycle to the CatiioUc Reformation's focus on good works and the new catechism of 1566 that joined these two elements (p. 57). Passion cycles took on new prominence with the post-Tridentine emphasis on the Eucharist as first among the sacraments, insistence upon the real presence Ui the consecrated host, and the desirabUity offrequent communion for the faithful. The Passion story reminded the worshiper that Christ's sacrifice was made for humankind's redemption, as celebrated m the Eucharist. The prominence ofPUate in Giambologna's cycle is linked to the dUemma of choosing between poUtical expediency and personal conscience, faced by the patron Grimani as a prominent member of the Genoese government. The final chapter, "Giambologna's Narrative Method," contains the essential argument. The artist's technique in the bronze reliefs is shown to be an adaptation of the multiview technique for which he is famous in his statues Ui the round, like the Rape ofthe Sabines. By means of a series of photographs of the reUefs shot from three angles, subtle variations In the narrative are revealed. The spectator's eye is kept Ui constant motion, rendering the narrative dynamic and serving to involve the worshiper. Giambologna's reUefs are contrasted witii...