Student Scholarship

Document Type

Research Paper

Abstract

In 1623 artists in Italy witnessed the return of " tl1e golden age of painting." Fifty-five year old Maffeo Barberini had just been elected as the nev Pope, and claimed the name Urban VIII . Shortly after bis election the new Pope set out on a process of"beautifyin11 Rome," essential! continuing the path set b the popes that had preceded him; Urban VIII, perhaps feeling the pre ·ure to con ince the orld that Rome wa the spiritual capitol of the Catholic community, saw these building projects as a way to "stitle doubts within Italy itself," and saw the Baroque a a perfect instrument to use in order to rea ert Rome's importance in the world relying heavily on "persuasion" that is the othe1· feature of the Baroque.''1 Urban VIII 's presence could be felt in all artistic matters, regardless of whether he directly patronized an artist or used his influence to persuade attists to come to Rome. The following essay will examine the evolving nature of patronage throughout Seicento Rome during the reign of Urban VIII and the Barberini in order to prove that Rome was botl1 the artistic and religious capitol of the world.

Publication Date

Fall 11-2013

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

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