Objects of Virtue: Art in Renaissance Italy (Getty Trust Publications: J. Paul Getty Museum)

You are what you own. So believed many of the elite men and women of Renaissance Italy. The notion that a persons belongings transmit something about their personal history, status, and character was renewed in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. Objects of Virtue explores the multiple meanings and values of the objects with which families like the Medici, Este, and Gonzaga surrounded themselves. This lavishly illustrated volume examines the complicated relationships between the socalled fine artspainting and sculptureand artifacts of other kinds for which artistry might be as important as utilityfurniture, jewelry, and vessels made of gold, silver, and bronze, precious and semiprecious stone, glass, and ceramic. The works discussed were designed and made by artists as famous as Andrea Mantegna, Raphael, and Michelangelo, as well as by lesserknown specialistsgoldsmiths, gemengravers, glassmakers, and maiolica painters.