Trecento Pictoriality: Diagrammatic Painting in Late Medieval Italy by Karl Whittington (review)

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:

• Trecento Pictoriality: Diagrammatic Painting in Late Medieval Italy by Karl Whittington
• Judith Collard

Whittington, Karl, Trecento Pictoriality: Diagrammatic Painting in Late Medieval Italy ( Renovatio Artium, 13), Turnhout, Brepols, 2023; hardback; pp. xvi, 352; 115 colour illustrations; R.R.P. €150.00; ISBN 9781915487049.

This is a beautiful book. It is richly illustrated with a variety of familiar, and less well-known works, including Andrea di Boniauto's Spanish Chapel, Ambrogio Lorenzetti's Good and Bad Government, and work by Pietro di Puccio di Orvieto in Pisa's Camposanto depicting the Creation of the Universe, as well as a fine, contextualising work by Leo von Klenze from 1898, The Camposanto in Pisa, which gives a better sense of the fresco's former colour. This painting [End Page 338] also features on the book's dustjacket. This very generously illustrated work also includes pictures of illuminated manuscripts, panel paintings, and murals, many photographed by the author. It also includes a substantial, up-to-date bibliography.

The book is divided into three parts: 'Reassessing Surface, Space, and Body in Trecento Painting'; 'Painted Diagrams from Page to Wall'; and 'Diagrammatic Painting: Narrative and Allegory'. Each chapter within these three sections, as well as the 'Introduction' and 'Conclusion', has at least one case study, where works such as depictions of the cosmos or Bonaventura's Lignum vitae are analysed. Karl Whittington places a lot of importance on his historiographical contextualisation, noting particularly the importance of German and Italian scholars to his project. Sometimes, however, this can overwhelm his account of a work's significance.

The Spanish Chapel by Andrea di Boniauto in Santa Maria Novella in Florence bookends this study, appearing in both the 'Introduction' and the final chapter. Whittington uses the analysis of the frescoes that adorn this chapterhouse to illustrate his approach. He contrasts the Calvary scenes with their strong narrative accounts with the Via Veritas and Triumph of Thomas Aquinas. These two walls are quite different in tone, being, he would argue, more diagrammatic. The Triumph represents a complex array of figures surrounding an enthroned Thomas Aquinas, including biblical figures, cardinal virtues, and female personifications of the seven Liberal Arts and the Theological Sciences, together with historical characters. The Via Veritas shows a triumphant representation of the Dominican order laying out its crucial role in the path to salvation, through such activities as preaching, while also anchoring them in a local Florentine context through the presence of the distinctive cathedral. In these two frescoes, Whittington highlights the often-overlooked use of strategies found in Trecento work, where narrative and allegory might also meet the diagram. While this is less obvious in the Spanish Chapel than the example found in Pisa's Camposanto, these more layered works contrast dramatically with the depictions found in the Calvary scenes that emphasise telling familiar New Testament stories. Whittington reminds us that even Giotto, normally acclaimed for his affective storytelling, was also producing non-narrative work, citing as examples his now-lost frescos in Padua's Palazzo della Ragione and Florence's Palazzo della Signoria. As he points out throughout the book, what he is intent on doing is expanding the understanding of Italian Trecento art to incorporate a wider range of visual approaches.

As part of this interest in different explorations of pictorial modes, the second chapter looks at painted crosses. Whittington himself points out that this is a non-diagrammatic genre of painting, even though it was a key form during the Trecento. Important though such crucifixes were in the development of Italian art, I am not sure that this chapter fits into this study as currently constituted, being so different to anything else discussed here.

The third chapter, where medieval diagrams are discussed, also sits uneasily in its current position. It contains a good overview of the scholarly literature around the medieval diagrams found in manuscripts, citing Faith Wallis, Michael [End Page 339] Evans, Jeffrey Hamburger, Bianca Kühnel, and Barbara Obrist, amongst others. It is well illustrated with examples and begins by discussing the large mural of the Florentine Misericordia Domini from Bernardo Daddi's circle, which is then connected to these manuscripts. He provides a compelling and convincing case for...