Rhetorics of Power and Dissent: Michelangelo and a 1000 Medici Manuscripts

Abstract

The present study theorizes the ornamentation of the Laurentian Library’s vestibule as early modern architectural rhetoric and examines how architectural design constructed societal norms pertaining to articulation and eloquence, influence and power. I frame the Laurentian Library and its Medici manuscript collection as apparatuses that challenged and legitimized perceptions of the Medici’s constructed nobility and overbearing political identity. The study unfolds one manner in which early modern Florentine art production centralized around Medici patronage to glorify their lineage and the emerging Tuscan duchy.

Keywords

• early modern library
• book collection
• knowledge production
• patronage
• architectural ornament
• monastery of san marco
• laurentian library
• florence