Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

In this extraordinary explication of one of the most enigmatic and influential works of the Renaissance, the Uffizi Circumcision of Christ, Jack M. Greenstein reassesses the nature and goals of high humanist narrative painting.

"Greenstein has raised the level of sophistication of the historical criticism of Renaissance painting by at least one whole notch; at the same time, he has written a book for everyone interested in problems of interpretation."--David Summers, University of Virginia

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: Reading Renaissance Painting
• 1 The Significance of Historia in Antiquity and the Middle Ages
• 2 Alberti's View of the Structure of Significance in Pictorial Narrative
• 3 Historia and Mantegna's Sense of the Past
• 4 Representational Ambiguities in Mantegna's Circumcision of Christ Appendix: On Which Part of the Temple Is Shown
• 5 Reading and Representing the Biblical Text: Vagaries of the Literal Sense
• 6 Making Narrative Sense of Significance: Iconographies of the Circumcision before Mantegna
• 7 Representational Imperatives and the Subject of Mantegna's Circumcision of Christ
• 8 Mantegna's Circumcision of Christ as Historical Narrative
• Notes
• Index

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

A mistitled and turgid read, Greenstein's reworked doctoral thesis attempts to reconstruct the "willful decisions expressed by virtual actions" depicted in Mantegna's Circumcision and Presentation, now in the Uffizi. It has long been recognized that the iconography blends elements of two ceremonies. The basic point here, that Mantegna's ambitions extended beyond illustrating the letter of texts, is uncontroversial. Greenstein further argues, in a vein reminiscent variously of his advisor, Leo Steinberg, and the blurb provider, David Summers, that Mantegna constructed "an intelligent revision" of Origen's homily on "the Lucan text," that is, the Gospel of Luke. Mantegna "almost certainly" knew the homily, which suggested such flexibility in "narrational unit" as his painting shows. The mother who stands at the right of the composition is dubbed amor proximi, in an Albertian attempt to show the "multilevel significance of the historia." Her small son, whose bread ring signifies his unsatisfied spiritual hunger, was included primarily to achieve a composition of eight figures, for circumcision took place on the eighth day. The original circumstances of the painting and its place in Mantegna's development as an artist are left untreated. There are no color plates. P. Emison; University of New Hampshire