DAY 2: Today is Thursday, June 2nd and we are examining the first iterations of the art market during the Italian Renaissance through the connections between artists, collectors patrons and the "commissioning game." Read the introduction and chapters 1-3 of Jonathan K. Nelson and Richard J. Zechhauser's pioneering study The Patron's Payoff: Conspicuous Commissions in Italian Renaissance Art (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008) and view the powerpoint presentation of these chapters. Once this has been completed, write a response to the reading, considering the following questions: 1) Who were the patrons – specify private and corporate patrons – and what was their relationship to one another and their significance in the commissioning game? 2) What were the stakes (costs and benefits) of the commissioning game? 3) What provided incentives for the Patron's Payoff? 3) Name and describe at least three avenues for expenditures and conspicuous consumption (i.e. art: portraits, frescoes, tomb/chapel decoration). 5) Detail and give examples of signaling, stretching and sign-posting. 6) Who were the audiences? 7) Discuss the attributes of "being distinguished" with reference to magnificence and signaling.
Patron's Payoff
[Powerpoint Presentation{+}|^The Patron's Payoff - presentation.pdf]+