Cassone Painting, Humanism and Gender in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge Studies in New Art History and Criticism) [Hardcover]

Cristelle L. Baskins (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 13, 1998 | Series: Cambridge Studies in New Art History and Criticism

Overlooked in traditional studies of Italian art, cassone painting was nonetheless a popular genre in Early Renaissance Tuscany. In this study, Cristelle Baskins questions the traditional readings of these decorated chests as merely didactic or moralizing. She argues that the pieces performed an important role in the socialization and gender formation of women during the Renaissance. She demonstrates that cassone, which invariably depict exemplary women from classical mythology, invited a range of responses, ranging from coercion to pleasure.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...she provides a wealth of thoroughly researched information regarding the heroines' stories..." Maria DePrano, Comitatus

Book Description

Overlooked in traditional studies of Italian Art, cassone painting was nonetheless a popular genre in Early Renaissance Tuscany. In this study, Cristelle Baskins questions the traditional readings of these decorated chests as merely didactic or moralizing. She argues that the pieces performed an important role in the socialization and gender formation of women during the Renaissance. She demontrates that cassone, which invariably depict exemplary women from classical mythology, invite a range of responses, ranging from coercion to pleasure.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 278 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (November 13, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521583934
• ISBN-13: 978-0521583930
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,480,751 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Cassone: A key to Renaissance sex/gender systems, September 19, 2005

By 

Wildeguy "wildeguy2000" (New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cassone Painting, Humanism and Gender in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge Studies in New Art History and Criticism) (Hardcover)

I highly recommend Cristelle Baskin's book. Not for the pictures (who cares?) but for the text! This is a study that is unique and extremely informative. Baskins has researched her topic very well and has written about cassoni without being afraid to talk about gender construction in the Renaissance, a topic that many are not comfortable writing about. Why? either because of unfamiliarity with the territory, or perhaps (more likely) because the tradition of humanism that has dominated iconographical studies does not think sex/gender systems are relevant. Baskins makes an excellent case for the importance of looking at the history of cassoni from the theoretical framework provided by gender studies.

The cassoni functioned as much more than a trousseau or what we might call a hope chest. The Tuscan cassoni were the material embodiment of the sex/gender system in Florence and hence, the unique remainders of sex/gender thinking in that period. There was also an interesting revival of interest in cassoni in late nineteenth century Victorian Britain. I was interested in cassoni because of the large cassone in Dorian Gray's attic in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. I didn't know that Spence had been largely responsible introducing Tuscan cassoni into England. Baskin's interesting study of the cassone in terms of what the Renaissance thought about procreation has added alot to the study of art forms that have something to say about gender systems. It was believed that women's contribution to procreation was her imagination. The male "seed" did all the rest. The woman in Machiavelli is "materia" and the male is "mola" (form).

If a woman was looking at the beautiful pictures on a cassone while having sex, she would have beautiful children. Interesting, Lessing still believed this in the eighteenth century "Beautiful statues created by beautiful men reacted back on them, and the state was indebted to beautiful statues for its beautiful people...Laocoon" Sound like Nazism? It is...compulsory heterosexuality, and it's never a far cry from eugenics and the systematic elimination of other-gendered peoples. Oscar Wilde ([...] martyr? hetero-gender slave) borrowed the idea from Walter Pater's Renaissance (who had got from Winckelmann, who had passed it to Lessing and Goethe) "The Greeks put a statue of Hermes or Apollo in the brideschamber so that in her agony or in her pain she might beget beautiful offspring...The Decay of Lying"

Baskins is not a gender activist but she provides alot of information that can help people who are interested in the history of gender construction. Baskins has a great writing style and although this book is specialized and academic it may also be enjoyed by the layperson.

6 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars No color photographs..., March 19, 2001

By 

Baroque Music Lover (Pebble Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Cassone Painting, Humanism and Gender in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge Studies in New Art History and Criticism) (Hardcover)

This very expensive book contains 0 (zero) color photographs of the subject matter. I returned my copy immediately. I wish that publishers would take note that buyers expect color photographs.