Book contents
- Vasari and the Sacred Image
- Vasari and the Sacred Image
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Chapter OneRenovation
- Chapter TwoVasari’s machina aretina
- Chapter ThreeThe Cappella di casa Vasari
- Chapter FourRenaissance Recycling
- Chapter FiveReconstructing the Camaiani and Fraternita Altars
- Chapter SixReframing Mary
- Chapter SevenCommemoration
- Book part
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter Six - Reframing Mary
Vasari’s Pieve Altars in Dialogue
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 March 2026
Book contents
- Vasari and the Sacred Image
- Vasari and the Sacred Image
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Chapter OneRenovation
- Chapter TwoVasari’s machina aretina
- Chapter ThreeThe Cappella di casa Vasari
- Chapter FourRenaissance Recycling
- Chapter FiveReconstructing the Camaiani and Fraternita Altars
- Chapter SixReframing Mary
- Chapter SevenCommemoration
- Book part
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
This chapter explores the degree to which Vasari designed his Pieve altars to integrate, alter, or reproduce the liturgical and artistic precedents in the Romanesque church. It evinces a surprising level of stylistic, iconographical, and functional harmony between them and other works in the Pieve—an early sixteenth-century Madonna of Mercy altarpiece in particular. The conception and creation of Vasari’s altars for the Pieve was nowhere near as carefully orchestrated as it was for his better known Medici-sponsored church renovations in Florence, but this chapter shows that his gradual transformation of the Pieve’s interior constituted an important precedent and counterpart to those better-known Florentine projects.
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- Vasari and the Sacred ImageRenovating Santa Maria della Pieve in Arezzo, pp. 210 - 228Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
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