Visual Intentions: Alessandro Vittoria and Early Modern Venetian Art

This book project examines the formulation of spatial relationships within Venetian art and architecture in the second half of the sixteenth century. It connects visual innovations formed in Venice to the broader European movement of the structured ordering and presentation of knowledge (such as memory palaces, trees of knowledge, libraries, and art collections) as well as to growing Counter Reformation spirituality. While I examine a number of multi-media projects, artists, and patrons, the sculptor/architect Alessandro Vittoria (1525-1608) and his artistic commissions guides this study. Not only did his career launch at a pivotal moment when artistic monuments were intentionally connected to larger visual systems, but Vittoria was also responsible for directing key spatial developments that relate monuments across spaces (within an interior setting; interior to exterior; and exterior to the urban fabric).