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education, a prerequisite among Europe’s royal and
aristocratic classes. The Medusa medallion that cleverly
obscures the keyhole to the central cubbyhole is a witty
inside joke among the
cognoscenti
. But it is possible that
treasures from beyond Europe were kept in its drawers.
Among Jamnitzer’s patrons was the Holy Roman Emperor
Rudolph II, the greatest collector of his day. He was easily
able to call upon his family ties to the Spanish Hapsburgs
to acquire
naturalia
from their New World colonies.
Seville held a monopoly on trade between Spain and
her American colonies and amassed great wealth through
her commercial connections throughout the rest of
Europe. One highly coveted cargo was cochineal, a vibrant
red dye and pigment produced from the exoskeletons
of a Mexican insect. Artists and textile producers paid
huge sums to procure it. Recent scientific analysis has
detected cochineal in the red used in the D’Arcy’s portrait
of San Francisco de Borja by Seville-born artist Bernardo
Llorente Germàn (1680–1759). A pendant image of St.
Francis Xavier, known as the “Apostle to the Far East,”
similarly resides in a private Spanish collection. The pair
could certainly have been part of a series depicting Jesuit
saints, for they are both signed and dated 1726, the year
in which Aloysius Gonzaga, S.J., and Stanislaus Kostka,
S.J., were canonized. It may have hung in the College
of San Hermenegildo, the Jesuit College in Seville from
which so many missionaries set out to the New World
and beyond. Although San Francisco de Borja never left
Europe, he oversaw Jesuit missions around the globe and,
as the Order’s Superior General, dispatched the first Jesuit
missions to the viceroyalty of Peru.
Two objects in the collection testify to the Jesuits’
missionary work in Latin America.The first is a painting of
the Virgin and Child with four Jesuits. While the imagery
is based upon European archetypes, it is the work of a local
artist from Cuzco, Peru. Cuzco had been the capital of the
Incan Empire, and its artists continued to uphold their
rich cultural heritage. The lack of perspective, dominant
red palette, and profusion of floral forms decorating the
Virgin’s robe demonstrate this quite vividly. Stiff as if
embroidered with gold and silver thread, the gown gives
the Virgin the outline of a mountain. Scholars argue
that indigenous artists conjoined the Inca earth goddess
Pachamama and theVirginMary. As ameans of promoting
Marian cults, it was common in Spain and her colonies to
commission paintings of particular cult statues. This work
depicts a Jesuit Marian cult with Ss. Ignatius of Loyola,
Francis Xavier, Aloysius Gonzaga, and Stanislaus Kostka
shown in veneration of the sculpture.
The second object is a bookstand from the Jesuit-
founded mission of La Concepción de Baures in modern
Bolivia. Jesuit missions were organized according to
Renaissance precepts of the ideal city. Indigenous peoples
were educated in the faith there and taught skills that
allowed them to engage with the economic life of the
Spanish Empire. Their success led to fears by the Spanish
Crown of a Jesuit state-within-a-state. Thus, the Jesuits
were suppressed and expelled from the Spanish Empire
in 1767. Surprisingly, the D’Arcy’s bookstand, dated by an
inscription to 1790, bears the Jesuit emblem. Based upon
Christ’s name, the letters
IHS
had been a devotional tool for
centuries before the establishment of the Society of Jesus.
Authorities presumably saw no danger in its continued
use, even by artisans formerly educated by Jesuits.
The Order’s suppression, which formed the prologue
to last summer’s exhibition, brings us back, full circle to
the globes. Their unexpected but fortuitous sojourn has
helped uncover hidden depths in the D’Arcy Collection.
What other connections could still be uncovered? I have
long suspected that some of the ivory figures of Christ
upon the Cross may have been carved by Goan artists from
Asian elephant tusks. Whereas medieval ivory came from
African elephants, it was Asian elephants that increasingly
gave up their tusks to meet the European demand for
ivory goods beginning in the 17th century. The ivory
carvers of Goa supplied a global Catholic market for
carved devotional objects of which we may have examples
in the D’Arcy. There is simply so much more fascinating
research for my interns and me to do!
I would like to acknowledge the research and writing skills of my
two interns and say
Valete
to Frank Walsh (BA, 2015), who leaves
for London to study at the Courtauld Institute of Art, and
Salute
to Michael J. Albani (MA, 2016).
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“Their unexpected but fortuitous
sojourn has helped uncover hidden
depths in the D’Arcy Collection.“