Becoming Canova: The Clement Papal Monuments

Thorpe, Elizabeth

Item

Becoming Canova: The Clement Papal Monuments

Thorpe, Elizabeth

Abstract

Antonio Canova began his international career by fulfilling commissions for two papal monuments in Rome. These monuments, one located in the Franciscan Basilica of Santi Apostoli, the other in Saint Peter’s Basilica, are seldom the focus of scholarly research yet they provide a rich foundation to investigate Canova’s innovative style. Through careful visual analysis of the two monuments vis-à-vis other papal monuments both within Saint Peter’s and in other churches of Rome, a consideration of the iconographical, semantic and design solutions will focus on the research question: How and why do these monuments present such radically different modes of representation of the Supreme Pontiff, and how do they negotiate affect and power so divergently? To investigate these issues the thesis relies on primary sources in Possagno and Rome, the writings of Canova’s contemporaries and the current, if scant, scholarship in English, Italian, French, and German. Because both monuments were executed early in Canova’s career, and due to the nature of the research question, an analysis of their reception will contribute to their study, as it will to scholarship on the trajectory of Canova’s career. With the papal monuments, Antonio Canova broke with the existing Baroque tradition in favor of an innovative classicizing style, and coupled execution of the monuments with a vigilant eye to their placement within each basilica’s architecture and the experience they staged for the viewer. How Canova addressed existing conventions, relied on the interplay of allegory, symbol, motif, perspective, execution, narrative and theatricality, and how he negotiated patronage and space, provide avenues to structure this research and, ultimately, aims to contribute to refreshing the art-historical literature on the artist, currently quagmired in an uncritical identification of Canova with sculptural Neoclassicism.