Imago Musicae

Making music in ancient Khotan

2026-08-16T10:31:20+00:00

This article re-evaluates the musical and iconographic evidence provided by terracotta artefacts from ancient Khotan, a major oasis on the southern edge of the Tarim Basin (Xinjiang, China). Rich in depictions of musicians, both human and animal, the Khotanese terracotta artefacts offer a rare insight into local musical practices and cultural affiliations. The analysis contextualises these artefacts within the broader artistic and cultural exchanges that characterised the region, particularly its close ties with Gandhāra and northwestern India. Through iconographic comparisons, particularly with Gandharan, Central Asian and Chinese art, the study challenges the traditional dating of the Khotanese terracotta artefacts to the 2nd–4th centuries CE. Instead, it proposes a revised chronology centred on the 6th–7th centuries CE. This reassessment is supported by the presence of distinctive musical instruments, ornamental motifs such as pearl roundels and grotesque masks, which parallel artistic evidence in Central Asia and China during this period. Particular focus is given to the prevalence of monkey figures in the Khotanese corpus, which are often depicted as musicians or imitating human behaviour, suggesting a distinctive fusion of South Asian narrative motifs and West Asian visual traditions. The paper also considers the possibility that these artefacts were used for funerary purposes, drawing parallels with comparable items such as painted caskets from Subashi, in the Kucha oasis. By re-evaluating the chronology and purpose of the Khotanese terracotta figurines, the article promotes a more nuanced interpretation of these artefacts, which were forged through various cultural interactions rather than directly derived from early Gandharan models.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

The Parnassus of the Montefeltro

2026-08-16T10:39:01+00:00

The cycle of paintings, originally intended for the Tempietto delle Muse in the Ducal Palace of Urbino—likely commissioned around 1480 by Federico da Montefeltro and completed during the reign of Guidobaldo, dismantled in 1631, partially scattered, and long neglected by scholars—has been restored and thoroughly examined in recent years. This has opened up new research perspectives and approaches to interpretation. Despite the lack of contemporary documents concerning the project’s conception, there is no doubt that the decision to dedicate a small shrine to the Muses and ancient deities, structurally linked as a twin to the Cappellina del Perdono, is connected to a sophisticated program strongly influenced by Neoplatonic and Ficinian thought. Taking into account recent findings, this article proposes a comprehensive reinterpretation of the program, first evidence for the iconographic theme of the musical Muses in a courtly context, based on the reconstruction of the conceptual, iconographic, and musical genealogy of the eight surviving panels depicting Apollo Musagete and the Muses (now in the Galleria Corsini, Florence). The text then focuses on two figures depicted in the lost paintings, which have been neglected by previous scholarship: Minerva, which confirms the clear Ficinian as well as ‘Federician’ impact on the cycle, and an undefined figure identifiable with poetry; as ‘friend of the Muses’ and ‘sacred guardian of Parnassus,’ the latter proves to be key to interpreting the overall program.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

Francesca Bianca Sforza tra cultura umanistica e politica dinastica

2026-08-16T10:50:31+00:00

This article offers a new interpretation of the frescoed vault depicting Apollo and the nine music-making Muses, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. The cycle—executed by Alessandro Pampurino around 1497–1500—is examined with regard to its architectural design, iconographic sources, and cultural context. Based on previously unpublished documents, patronage is reattributed to Francesca Bianca Sforza, Augustinian abbess and sister of Ludovico il Moro. Particular attention is paid to the cycle’s relationship to the model of the Mantegna Tarocchi, especially as regards the musical and celestial symbolism rooted in Neo-Platonic theories, as well as its formal and conceptual echoes of the ephemeral tiburio, erected in 1489 for the ducal wedding in Milan. By identifying the room’s original function as a studiolo and placing its decoration within the broader framework of humanistic culture, musical imagery, and the dynamics of the Sforza dynasty, this study sheds new light on the role of female monastic environments as agents of humanist patronage in late fifteenth-century Northern Italy.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

In praise of polyphony

2026-08-16T10:57:20+00:00

The great monstrance of the Church of Nossa Senhora da Oliveira, in Guimarães, currently housed in the Alberto Sampaio Museum, is a landmark work of Portuguese goldsmithing, belonging to a type of pieces that were produced for the cathedrals of Braga, Porto and Viseu. Used for liturgical purposes, for the exhibition of the consecrated host, it was particularly visible during the feast of Corpus Christi, where music played a prominent role. It is precisely the musical elements in this artwork that caught our attention and will be the subject of reflection in this study. A unique consort of flutes, played by angel musicians, surrounds the tabernacle and stands out from the other ornamental elements. As the purpose of highlighting the musical dimension of the monstrance seems evident to us, we seek to interpret the musical elements as participants in a specific artistic and historical context, attempting to establish links with the festivity of Corpus Christi. The decision to include the flute consort is undoubtedly an interesting testimony to the possibility of music conferring new layers of meaning on other forms of artistic expression, enriching them aesthetically; in this case, the art of sound is called upon for the spiritual enhancement and elevation of the monstrance. The music that was heard, like the one which was made visible by the consort of flutes played by the little silver angels of the liturgical vase, emerges as a superlative form of worship and honor for the mystical body of Christ.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

Dipingere la varietà dei suoni

2026-08-16T11:08:10+00:00

The Trattato dell’arte de la pittura (Treatise on the art of painting) written by Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo (1538–92), theorist, painter and poet from Milan, is among the most important of the second half of the sixteenth century. This essay focuses on the various musical elements present in the Treatise starting from the ut pictura musica. It complements them with some ideas related to music in the Idea del tempio della pittura (Idea of the temple of painting) by the same author. It highlights and analyzes original questions raised by Lomazzo that have not previously been addressed in the musicological field, essentially how to paint high or low sounds, that is, how to represent the diversity of pitches, specific to music together with its temporal dimension. Furthermore the topic of ‘convenient’ depictions on musical instruments is explored in the final section.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

Thomas van der Wilt’s portrait of Dirck Scholl of Delft at his double-manual and pedal clavichord

2026-08-16T11:13:09+00:00

This article examines a Dutch genre painting from the second half of the 17th century portraying a musician in a private interior next to a large clavichord with two manuals and pedals—the only known depiction of this instrument type today. The musician holds a recorder and is surrounded by various musical instruments. A four-part canon by the composer and theorist Dirck van der Hooch positioned on the clavichord’s music stand, along with a large poster on the wall (presumably a calendar or a musical diagram) further enhance this sophisticated domestic tableau. Three different versions are documented through historical photographs, yet none of the paintings remains extant today. The sitter can now be identified as the composer, organist, and carillon expert Dirck Scholl (1641-1727), who began his career at the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft. Rather than Pieter de Hooch, to whom art historians have attributed the painting, probably mislead by the musical inscription, we propose instead the authorship of Thomas van der Wilt (1659–1733), who worked in Delft for several decades and created Scholl’s portrait engraving of 1699, a painted version of which recently (2022) reappeared on the art market as a portrait of an unknown musician, whose identity can now likewise be established.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

Crónica visual y musical de un ballet ecuestre del siglo XVIII: Las Parejas Reales de Luis Paret (1770)

2026-08-16T11:22:13+00:00

On June 6, 1770, the Fiesta de Parejas took place in the Royal Palace of Aranjuez—a magnificent equestrian ballet of great social and political significance. It was the first of a series of annual celebrations performed in Aranjuez that continued until 1788, when Prince Carlos, its main sponsor, ascended the throne as Carlos IV. Several sources report on this first event, including an oil painting by Luis Paret (Las Parejas Reales, 1770, Museo Nacional del Prado). Depicting four squads of horsemen dressed in traditional knightly armor, along with trumpeters and drummers, four music ensembles strategically positioned around the arena, the elaborate decorations, and a large audience attending the performance, among others, it can be considered a detailed visual chronicle. The splendor and luxury of the Fiestas (and thus their immense costs), as well as the code of conduct to be followed by those present, were recorded by Álvarez de Quindós, one of the attendants, in his chronicles (1804), in addition to other sources such as the account books kept in the General Archive of the Royal Palace (Madrid). Music was a central element of the spectacle, especially marches, galops, and contradanzas by well-known composers like Marescalchi and Brunetti—all short pieces for wind ensembles with powerful, distinctive rhythms. It even inspired Boccherini to compose a quintet for his patron, Infante Luis, intended to evoke the music of the Fiesta de Parejas.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

Warburg before and after the Renaissance

2026-08-16T13:53:42+00:00

Aby Warburg (1866–1929) made Nachleben the central theme of his anthropological approach to Western art. In Georges Didi-Huberman’s reinterpretation, it is studied in terms of its logic, sources and philosophical resonances, ranging from historicity according to Burckhardt to the unconscious according to Freud, via eternal return according to Nietzsche and biological memory according to Darwin. A multiplicity of approaches is the only means of describing the paradoxical ‘life’ of images and through which Warburg introduces the constitutive paradoxes of the image itself: its nature as a ‘ghost’, its power to convey pathos, its structure as a ‘symptom’. With this in mind, the essay analyses works by Giorgio de Chirico, Paul Delvaux, Salvador Dalí and Albert Moore, together with some examples of early Christian art, in an attempt to demonstrate that while it is possible to apply Warburg’s reflections to the arts of the 19th and 20th centuries, the same cannot be said for those prior to the Renaissance, which do not seem to lend themselves to a retrospective analysis.

https://www.lim.it/it/imago/7096-imago-musicae-xxxiv-97855435024.html#/2-tipo_prodotto-libro

In memoriam Jordi Ballester Gibert (1963–2023)

2026-08-16T13:58:48+00:00

Jordi Ballester Gibert was Professor of Musicology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. In 1988, he earned his degree in Philosophy and Letters with extraordinary honors from the same university, and in 1995, he accomplished his doctorate with a dissertation entitled: Iconografia musical a la Corona d’Aragó (1350–1500): Els cordòfons representats en la pintura sobre taula. Catàleg iconogràfic i estudi organològic. In this work he analyzes and disseminates a rich, previously little known iconographic heritage, paying particular attention to the objects of the Museo nacional de arte de Cataluña. His research focused primarily on organology and musical iconography within Catalonia.