Thierry Depaulis is curating what I believe is an unprecedented exhibition of the Fifteenth-century Illuminated Tarots at the French Playing-Card Museum, Issy-les-Moulineaux. It will run from 16 December 2020 until 14 March 2021. "Unprecedented" because of the number of Brambilla, Visconti di Modrone, and Colleoni-Baglioni cards, along with the Warsaw museum cards belonging to the same set as the "Issy Chariot."

"The cream of these precious painted tarot cards will be on show, coming from many European and American museums and libraries, with some other works of the Renaissance. A team of historians and art historians, led by Thierry Depaulis, have reassessed these cards and have dramatically revisited their attributions and datings. A superb catalogue will present these findings.
"In mid-February 2021 an international conference will be held at Issy around these illuminated tarots."

Art historians Ada Labriola (Florence) and Roberta Delmoro (Milan) will be contributing new studies of their respective cards.
Thierry has invited me to contribute an essay on the Tractatus de deificatione sexdecim heroum, including insights from the work I have recently done on Marziano's biography.

Will the museum be providing Lysol mist tents and hazmat suits? ;-)

Would love to go to that, but no one has any idea if wave two of this plague will be hitting this winter. If there is any sign this has abated, I will try to get over there. I'd like to also work in a side trip to see the Castello della Manta frescoes near Saluzzo in Piedmont as well - just read an article on them that is perhaps the best piece of scholarship I've read the last couple of years. On JSTOR:
MALINCONIA DI UN LIGNAGGIO: LO "CHEVALIER ERRANT" NEL CASTELLO DELLA MANTA
Robert Fajen
Romania
Vol. 118, No. 469/470 (1/2) (2000), pp. 105-137 (33 pages)

Dunlop's otherwise excellent Painted Palaces (2009) missed the boat here IMO , as this article supersedes or at least improves on all of the other scholarship out there on these frescoes, and she was apparently unaware of the article.

I know it seems like a pointless tangent, but I've been exploring the late 14th century French craze for the Nine Worthies as a context for Marziano's creation (not a template of course but a culturally related project that can illuminate "why" such an odd game was invented).

Phaeded wrote: ↑

20 May 2020, 18:00

Will the museum be providing Lysol mist tents and hazmat suits? ;-)

I imagine that, sans vaccine, we'll have hand sanitizer and masks, and the distancing. Here it's only one metre, not the nearly two in anglophone countries.

But it's going ahead as planned, so whatever it takes.

I'd like to also work in a side trip to see the Castello della Manta frescoes near Saluzzo in Piedmont as well - just read an article on them that is perhaps the best piece of scholarship I've read the last couple of years. On JSTOR:
MALINCONIA DI UN LIGNAGGIO: LO "CHEVALIER ERRANT" NEL CASTELLO DELLA MANTA
Robert Fajen
Romania
Vol. 118, No. 469/470 (1/2) (2000), pp. 105-137 (33 pages)

Dunlop's otherwise excellent Painted Palaces (2009) missed the boat here IMO , as this article supersedes or at least improves on all of the other scholarship out there on these frescoes, and she was apparently unaware of the article.

I know it seems like a pointless tangent, but I've been exploring the late 14th century French craze for the Nine Worthies as a context for Marziano's creation (not a template of course but a culturally related project that can illuminate "why" such an odd game was invented).

Thanks for the reference, I didn't know it.

I look forward to reading your thoughts on the Nine Worthies. It is a subject I have avoided, as too tangential and far too deep. But I imagine you will bring it up to relevance.

Phaeded wrote ...

I know it seems like a pointless tangent, but I've been exploring the late 14th century French craze for the Nine Worthies as a context for Marziano's creation (not a template of course but a culturally related project that can illuminate "why" such an odd game was invented).

9 Helden: More a German invention c 1312 in the context of the emperor Henry VII (Luxembourg dynasty) by a poet near of the region of Luxembourg („Les Vœux du Paon“ by Jacques de Longuyon).
Figures in the Cologne city council c 1350 (possibly some time earlier). In 14th century Germany the figures mainly were used for the pride of cities, for instance in the "Schöner Brunnen" of Nürnberg (made 1385-96).
There are 40 figures on it: beside the 9 Helden there are philosophy, 7 liberal arts, 7 Kurfürsten, 7 prophets and Moses. Further 7 Wasserspeier (for water) as 7 vices and a figure for luck called Adabar, which is a stork (so totally 48 ideas, if this list is complete; somehow a potpourri comparable to Minchiate or Mantegna Tarocchi).
Well, the list isn't complete ...
https://www.nuernberg.de/imperia/md/hoc ... iguren.pdf
... this description has some more figures and it has pictures for each figure. Additional are ...

8 foes of Nürnberg (2 foes are identified)
16 unknown citizens of Nürnberg
8 fabulous animals als Wasserspeier
4 putti, 3 of them are musicians (gitar, drum, horn) and a 4th with bow and arrow (Amor-type)
8 lion masks as Wasserspeier



Lüneburg Glasfenster Rathaus c 1420-1430
https://www.quadratlueneburg.de/das-ael ... thaus.html

Osnabrück Rathaus, end of 15th century
https://www.noz.de/lokales/osnabrueck/a ... 0&0&262531


Pub "Neustädter Schenke" in Hildesheim 1601, the object was destroyed in WW2,
https://www.hildesheimer-geschichte.de/ ... r-schenke/
The outside decoration contained 9 Muses, 9 Heroes and 7 planets + Gula (vice Gluttony) + Bacchus, all with inscriptions and the year number 1601.



Braunschweig, Brunnen 1408
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altstadtmarktbrunnen

In case anyone was planning a special trip to Paris for this exhibition:
It has unfortunately been postponed for a year (for obvious reasons).
https://www.facebook.com/museefrancaisc ... &__tn__=-R

(I was one of those planning to go, but I was planning to be in Europe anyway, so I hadn't booked my flights just for this reason)