Title: Art of the Royal Court: Treasures in Pietre Dure from the Palaces of Europe
Location: NEW YORK - Metropolitan Museum
Description: This is the most comprehensive exhibition to date on the tradition of hardstone carving (pietre dure) that developed in Italy in the 16th century and subsequently spread through Europe.
Start Date: 2008-07-01
End Date: 2008-09-21

Renaissance masters working in Rome cut colored marbles and laid them in geometrically patterned tabletops, such as the celebrated Farnese Table in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, while Milanese artisans preferred to cut designs in rock crystal, lapis lazuli, and other precious materials. In Florence, the passion of the Medici for importing precious stones led to Ferdinando I de’ Medici’s founding of the court workshops that still survive as the Opificio delle Pietre Dure. Royal patronage encouraged Florentine craftsmen to migrate to Prague, and their practices gradually spread to such centers as Augsburg, Paris, Madrid, and St. Petersburg. Some 150 tables, cabinets, caskets, jewelry, vases, and sculptures represent the range of this extraordinary art form cultivated by the courts of Europe through four centuries.

The exhibition is made possible by Mercedes and Sid Bass and Frank Richardson and the Honorable Kimba Wood.

Additional support is generously provided by Mr. and Mrs. J. Tomilson Hill.

The catalogue is made possible by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Friends of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts.

Additional support is provided by the Mary C. and James W. Fosburgh Publications Fund.

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