THE URBINO STUDIOLO
Made in 1476 for Federico da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino (since 1474; before that, Count; lived 1422-82,) this room, less than 4 metres square, was the most private and luxurious in the huge palace of this most famous of all Condottieri, twice Papal general or Gonfaloniere, who defeated his long-time rival Malatesta in 1462 and was the hidden force behind the 1478 anti-Medici Pazzi Conspiracy. The studiolo's lower walls are covered in trompe l'oeil marquetry, flat panelling of different woods jigsawed together by Benedetto da Maiano's Florence workshop in an incredibly sophisticated, illusionistic scheme. Top: among Federico's many emblems is the ermine, chaste and pure, its white winter coat never (nonmai) soiled. Above, two female figures suggest Botticelli's hand, or influence; architect Donato Bramante may have designed the room.
A real, carved entablature contrasted with the complex trompe l'oeil, wooden below and painted above, where windows opened in 'stone' walls: in each sat a pair of illustrious men in philosophical dialogue, framed by columns dividing each window, with inscriptions below each portrait naming the subject and Federico's reason for honouring his memory. The likely artists were Justus of Ghent and Pedro Berruguete. In 1631 Cardinal Antonio Barberini moved into the Palazzo as Papal Legate when the church took Urbino on the death of Federico's great-great-grandson Francesco Maria II della Rovere. Barberini left the unfashionable wood panels, but took the painted ones, sawn up into 28 separate portraits. Today 14 are back in the room, 14 in the Louvre, where I photographed them, adding them to the picture above. Elsewhere in the Palazzo, today the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, is a great double portrait of Federico with his young son Guidobaldo, once thought to have been part of the painted decor. Marcello Simonetta (the renowned expert on Federico, who discovered and exposed his role in the Pazzi conspiracy) tells me this was impossible, and the crude, montaged image that I couldn't resist making, below, does looks very unlikely.
The wooden imagery is a fantastic mixture of visual jokes and allusions, with Federico's emblems like the exploding grenade, above left (military prowess and readiness) next to his armour and spurs, removed and put away, and the broom, right (for his illegitimate birth, scopis mundata - swept clean - by Papal decree.)
Above: in an alcove is Federico's desk, an ingenious, early piece of office furniture. Under a wooden 'view' into a study with lectern and books, a hinged panel would swing open to give a footrest and book-stand, with a metal support for the bench seat, a pull-down panel suitably inlaid with a silk damask cushion design, next to a 'guitar' playfully sitting on the 'ledge.' You can easily imagine the boyish pride and enthusiasm of the Duke, 540 years ago, as he showed off this real, mechanical gadget amid so much purely visual cleverness. The wall opposite, below, has a 'book' casually left on the ledge, below a niche holding one of only three female figures: Faith, Hope and Charity. Here is the final surprise, for this panel is a door to a balcony, open to the valley below: a natural, rugged wilderness, the perfect contrast to the artificial sophistication within.
Above left: the entrance to the studiolo (coloured beige on the plans below) from Federico's audience chamber (marked A on the detail plan.) The left-hand door opens onto the same balcony - the upper arched, columned one between the two narrow, round stair-towers - as does the door in the room. To reach the tiny, exquisite studiolo, visitors came from the piazza (P on the larger plan) into the arcaded courtyard (C) and up the grand stairs, through parades of vast reception rooms to the audience chamber, from which the loggia (L) gave a view of the terrace garden below. Federico could enter from his bedroom (B) through his dressing room (D) from which he could also slip down the spiral stair to the open walkway (W) atop the wall of the secret garden (G) leading to his wife's apartments and thence to their door to the church (far left, bottom picture.) The spiral stair led on down to the two tiny chapels below the studiolo, and below that to Federico's bathrooms.
