Antonio Fantuzzi

Antonio Fantuzzi after Francesco Primaticcio
Bath of Venus and Mars
ca. 1543
etching
Bibliotheca Hertziana, Rome

Antonio Fantuzzi after Francesco Primaticcio
Artemis, Athena and Aphrodite leaving Olympus
ca. 1543
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Francesco Primaticcio
Omphale dressing Hercules as a Woman
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Francesco Primaticcio
Sibyl
ca. 1544-45
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Francesco Primaticcio
Antique Statue of a Muse
ca. 1544
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Giulio Romano
Figures after a Roman Frieze
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi
Genius bestowing Laurel Wreath on the Goddess Roma
1544
engraving
Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Design for Covered Cup supported by Satyrs
1543
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Royal Elephant with Emblems of François I of France
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Terms flanking Cartouche with Landscape
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Vertumnus and Pomona
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Classical Scene with Funeral Pyre
ca. 1542-43
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Rosso Fiorentino
Classical Scene with Roman Ruler
(Allegory of State Unity)
ca. 1543
etching
British Museum

Antonio Fantuzzi after Parmigianino
Seated Figure in Landscape
ca. 1545
chiaroscuro woodcut
Cabinet d'Arts Graphiques,
Musées d'Art et d'Histoire, Genève

Antonio Fantuzzi after Parmigianino
Martyrdom of St Peter and St Paul
ca. 1545
chiaroscuro woodcut
Universitätsbibliothek, Hamburg

Antonio Fantuzzi
Ornamental Panel with Mythological Figures 
ca. 1543
etching
British Museum

from Matinées

Dear Mrs. Livingston,

I want to say that I am still in a daze

From yesterday afternoon.

I will treasure the experience always –

My very first Grand Opera! It was very

Thoughtful of you to invite 

Me and am so sorry

That I was late, and for my coughing fit.

I play my record of the Overture

Over and over. I pretend
I am still sitting in the theater.

I also wrote a poem which my Mother

Says I should copy out and send.

Ever gratefully, Your little friend.

– James Merrill (1969)

Narrative Tendencies (1553-1620)

Nicolas Beatrizet after Francesco Salviati
Sacrifice of Iphigenia
ca. 1553-55
engraving
British Museum

Gillis Coignet
Diana and Callisto
ca. 1575
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Paolo Veronese
St Anthony of Padua preaching to the Fish
ca. 1580
oil on canvas
Galleria Borghese, Rome

attributed to Nicolas Bollery
The Actors
ca. 1590
oil on canvas
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Florida

Master of the Egmont Albums
Battle of Tritons
ca. 1590-95
drawing
Yale University Art Gallery

Joachim Wtewael
Cephalus and Procris
ca. 1595-1600
oil on canvas
Saint Louis Art Museum

Anonymous Flemish Artist
Tarquin and Lucretia
17th century
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux

Francesco Villamena
The Quarrel
1601
engraving
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Alessandro Allori
St Giovanni Gualberto and the Miracle of the Grain
1603
oil on canvas
(altarpiece)
Palazzo Pretorio, Prato

Hendrik Goltzius
Hermes presenting Pandora to King Epimetheus
(episode from Hesiod)
1611
oil on canvas
Kunstmuseum Basel

Giovanni Lanfranco
Rinaldo abandoning Armida
(scene from Gerusalemme Liberata of Torquato Tasso)
1614
oil on canvas
Kunsthaus Zürich

Peter Paul Rubens
Ixion, King of the Lapiths, deceived by Juno
1615
oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre

Jacob Jordaens
Atalanta and Meleager
ca. 1617-18
oil on canvas
Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp

Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri
Joseph interpreting Dreams in Prison
ca. 1618
oil on canvas
Galleria Borghese, Rome

François Perrier
Looting of a Classical City
ca. 1620
drawing
Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen

Nicolas Tournier
Tobias taking Leave of his Family
ca. 1620
oil on canvas
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Florida

But as the rarest Jewell is not to be had but at the highest rate: so her peerelesse perfections must have all this businesse to gaine her; but now she is wonne, and he almost lost, not daring to thinke so, or ventring to winne it: He would with his eyes tell her his heart, with kissing her delicate hand, with a more than usuall affection, let her feele his soule was hers: She found it, and understood what hee would have her understand, nay, shee would answer his lookes with as amorous ones of her part, as straightly, and lovingly would she hold his hand, but knowing modesty forbid, shee would sigh, and in her soule wish that he would once speake; but bashfulnesse with-held him, and woman modestie kept her silent; till one afternoon, walking into a most curious and dainty Garden, where all manner of sweets were ready in their kind to entertaine them; Flowers of all sorts for smell and colour; Trees of all kinds of fruits, and walkes divided for most delight, many Birds singing, and with their notes welcomming them to that place: At last, a payre of innocent white Turtles came before them, in their fashion wooing each other, and so wonne, enjoying their game in billing, and such like pretty joy.

– from The Countesse of Mountgomeries Urania, by the right honourable the Lady Mary Wroath, daughter to the right noble Robert, Earle of Leicester, and neece to the ever famous and renowned Sʳ Phillips Sidney knight, and to ye most excellant Lady Mary Countess of Pembroke, late deceased (London: John Marriott and John Grismand, 1621)

Mid-Century Figures

Nicolò dell'Abate
Ignudo lifting Garland
ca. 1540-50
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Heinrich Aldegrever
Paris, Oenone and Cupid
1550
drawing
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Luca Cambiaso
Mercury
ca. 1550
drawing
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Domenico Campagnola
Penitent St Jerome
ca. 1550
drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Paolo Farinati
Abduction of Sabine Woman
ca. 1550
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Girolamo da Carpi
Antique Statue of Bacchus
1550
drawing
Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh

Giulio Romano
Andromeda
ca. 1540-44
drawing
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Sebald Beham
Ceres
1549
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Anonymous Italian Artist after Michelangelo
St Bartholomew
(from Last Judgment fresco, Sistine Chapel)
ca. 1550
drawing
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Anonymous Italian Artist
Study of Seated Model
ca. 1550
drawing
Fondation Custodia, Paris

Pirro Ligorio
Venus and Cupid
ca. 1550
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Melchior Lorck
Statuette of Diana the Huntress
1553
drawing
Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen

Tiziano Minio
Three Studies for Figure of Hercules
ca. 1550
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Bartolomeo Passarotti after Michelangelo
Charon
(from Last Judgment fresco, Sistine Chapel)
ca. 1550
drawing
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

Raffaello da Montelupo
Figure Study
ca. 1550
drawing
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Pellegrino Tibaldi
Polyphemus
ca. 1554
drawing
(study for fresco)
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Ovum

You'd take it for zero, or nothing, 
or the spotless oval your lips make saying it,

as if you blew both yolk and albumen

through its pin-pricked head: the meat

of the word made orotund and Latinate.
It's like putting your mouth to the smooth

breast of the ocarina, from oca, the goose,

hooting out its fledgling notes.

Unless you seal the gap it's left, they'll fall

out, those other o-words, like bubbles

streaming through a soapy blow-hole:

from oblation and obloquy to oxlip and ozone,
and that sneaky Trojan obol,

coin-shaped, it's true, but spawned

from the spiky Greek of obelus,

the death-mark, dagger or crucifix,

as phallic and obvious, now that you say it,
as that double o in spermatozoon,

which enters by its own locomotion –
the flagellum, its tiny whip and scourge.

– Caitríona O'Reilly, Geis (2015)

Writers Writing

Gerard ter Borch
Woman writing a Letter
ca. 1655
oil on panel
Mauritshuis, The Hague

Guillaume Voiriot
Portrait of Dom Étienne Galland
1751
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon

Angelica Kauffmann
Virgil writing his Epitaph at Brundisi
1785
oil on canvas
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Angelica Kauffmann
Sappho inspired by Love
1775
oil on canvas
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota

Giovanni Francesco Romanelli
Sibyl
ca. 1640-50
oil on canvas
Galleria Borghese, Rome

Sebastiano Conca
The Cumaean Sibyl
ca. 1725
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Marcantonio Franceschini
Sibyl
ca. 1700
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Pordenone (Giovanni Antonio Licinio)
St Matthew
ca. 1535-37
oil on panel
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Nicolas Régnier
St Matthew and the Angel
ca. 1622-25
oil on canvas
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota

Pieter Lastman
St Matthew
1613
oil on panel
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence

Lucas van Leyden
St Matthew
1518
engraving
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Lucas van Leyden
St John the Evangelist
1518
engraving
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Carlo Dolci
St John the Evangelist
ca. 1650
oil on copper
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota

Lorenzo Costa the Elder
Portrait of a Cardinal as St Jerome in his Study
ca. 1519
tempera and oil on panel
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Gerrit Dou
Scholar sharpening his Quill
ca. 1632-35
oil on panel
Leiden Collection, New York

Godfrey Kneller
Scholar in his Study
ca. 1668
oil on canvas
Leiden Collection, New York

The Dawn

I would be ignorant as the dawn
That has looked down
On that old queen measuring a town
With the pin of a brooch,
Or on the withered men that saw
From their pedantic Babylon
The careless planets in their courses,
The stars fade out where the moon comes,
And took their tablets and did sums;
I would be ignorant as the dawn
That merely stood, rocking the glittering coach
Above the cloudy shoulders of the horses;
I would be – for no knowledge is worth a straw –
Ignorant and wanton as the dawn.

– W.B. Yeats (1919)