AHB Classic: Bad Boys of the Baroque

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No matter the cost, watch "East of Eden" October 1st, only on Netflix. Hey everyone, have a AHB classic for you today. The AHB classic, honestly, this was our first full-length episode where we really dove into some stories from art history. And it was a really fun one to reboot. Very nostalgic, of course. And yeah, we're rebooting it alongside bad bitches of the Baroque, because they kinda go hand in hand. So this episode was originally released April 2016 when we were just little baby podcasters before we dive into the episode. Few housekeeping things if you haven't heard. We're planning a trip to Mexico and we want you all to come with. May of 2022, it's gonna be a super cool time. Lots of art, lots of food, just hanging out, getting to know each other, and getting to explore some rad cities. If you would like to check out the whole itinerary, it will be linked in the show notes for you. And there's still a couple of early bird spots left, so you can get a hundred dollars off your trip. So if you want to take advantage of that, you might want to do that soon. We're so excited about it, and thank you to everyone who's already booked. And yeah, we just, we hope to see as many of you there as possible. And then of course, got to shout out the patreon.com/arthistorybabs. That is what makes all of this possible. We have a lot of stuff going on over there. Like 20 plus podcast episodes. Our book club has really gotten poppin' and we're having a lot of fun with book club. There are video reflections, discussion boards for all of the episodes. Just lots of stuff over there, and that's a great way to connect with us and communicate with us. And it keeps the podcast going. Also, if you've been around for a while, and you kind of miss the vibe of the early art history babes episode, like the one you're about to listen to, patreon is how we're gonna, you know, be able to be together again in the same room and bring that energy to the podcast. So if that's something you'd like to see more of, please consider becoming a patron at any level. Your support is very necessary for the continuation of this project and very, very much appreciated. For all of y'all who have been supporters for, you know, short amount of time or for a long amount of time, we really appreciate you and we're happy that you're here. And yeah, other ways to support, you know, sharing us far and wide iTunes reviews. Tell your friends, tell your family. We have merch and check out the merchandise. There's so many ways. So yeah, look into all of that. Please enjoy this classic episode. Bad Boys of the Baroque. The art history babes. Welcome to the podcast. I'm Corey. And I'm Jay. I'm Natalie. And I'm Jen. And we are the art history babes. Today, we will be discussing the bad boys of the Baroque. Bad boys. What you want, what you want to do. So good. But first, we would like to say thank you for the kind of surprising and overwhelming amount of support. So much love. We have received so far. So thanks friends and family for, for, you know, be overwhelming support. Before we get into the drama, the drama. You might be wondering what Baroque even means. And you would not be alone in that. It's a pretty common question, even among academics. So weird word. It's a weird word. And it means a whole lot of things. But I'm going to do my best to summarize it for you. So you kind of get an idea of where we are in history and we're talking about. So as a stylistic, it's a stylistic term, typically considered the prevailing style of the 17th century. Roughly 1600 to 1750 is kind of the time frame. Most often associated with Europe as many artistic styles are. But it is not, it does not solely belong to Europe. It belongs to lots of other places. It was one of the first truly global art periods. I mean, obviously the Renaissance had quite a bit of influence. But Baroque, partially because of colonial powers that be spread into areas of Latin America and Asia and a lot of American colonies. So it's, it's a pretty all-encompassing period that spread pretty quickly. Right, and it's also not just relegated to the land of painting and sculpture. Baroque was also a largely popular musical sort of movement. Very important, yeah. Music, architecture, all. Often, I feel like it's more often associated with music. And I think that's what more people recognize. Yes, it is. You realize that quickly when you start going through libraries and searching for Baroque, there's so much music that I don't know. Pro tip, don't just search Baroque in your writing of Baroque paper. The term itself comes from the Portuguese word Baroque, which means misshapen pearl. If you want to look at it according to like linear timeline, you can kind of think of it as like Renaissance and then the manorist style kind of came into play and then the Baroque was kind of a response to that. So once again, it's one of those things kind of contested in how you want to look at it. It's complicated. As most stylistic terms are, which is something we will discuss a lot. A whole other podcast topic. So, characteristics of the Baroque, what might a Baroque painting look like? We see with the Baroque, we see the introduction of genre paintings, which genre paintings are scenes from everyday life. This was not a super common thing up into this point. Things like still life and self-portrait kind of came out at this time. Money toss. Yes, the Vanitas theme, which kind of has to do with the vanity and really just the idea that everything dies. And the meant to be kind of dramatic. Conversation. You can't escape it. Yeah, there's still life paintings that you look at. And you just think they're just like fruit flowers. So, a lot more going on there, guys. Baroque is drama. Drama. Totally. The most drama since the Hellenistic period. I'd say. Well, art history joke for you guys. Yeah, so it's very oftentimes Baroque art is very emotionally intense, very emotionally charged. Another very common characteristic is mastery of light and shadow. And use of what is considered 10-a-brism, which is contrast taken to a whole new level. Sure, contrast. Very extreme when you're playing with contrast on like your Instagram. It's that like all the way up. That's a good way to describe. They should come out of a Baroque filter. They should. Very clever. That would be great. A Baroque filter. There's an idea. Run with it. Oftentimes, there's overlapping figures, um, figure figures. Plains are not as clearly defined as in Renaissance painting. So you kind of have a overlapping going on. In terms of what's going on in history, Baroque is associated with the counter-reformation. And therefore themes considering or concerning martyrdom, and just like intense spiritual experience are very prevalent, because obviously counter-reformation, you're trying to bring people back to the Church. And stop down those prosts and trying to keep a going. Just making the Catholic Church sexy again, basically. Yeah, basically the Catholic Church was like, "Hey, Iconicalism, we're not doing that. We're, these are devotional paintings, but they're also sexy." Yeah, they're, they're for the illiterate. You got to, you got to help out the illiterate and keep them in the Catholic faith and sex cells. So there you go. In that option. Yeah, and that also relates to the emotionally charged aspect of it. because Baroque artwork wants to create this sense of this intense emotional spiritual experience. You want to look at it in no god in some way. Like that's kind of the idea. Behind a lot of it, not all of it, but that's lovely. That's how it relates to the counter-reformation, I guess. So we kind of talked about it a little bit already, but Baroque is kind of a controversial term. As I said, we're in the midst of the counter-reformation. So you have a lot of issues concerning iconoclasm, and what images can and can't be depicted. Iconoclasm is basically like the institutional destruction, sorry. It's the destruction of images for fear of people worshiping the images rather than what they represent. So when you have religious imagery, such as icons, you see the fear of people worshiping the icon more than the actual religious person. It's supposed to represent, hopefully, that made sense. Right, which to be fair, the Protestants were kind of on to something. You know, for several hundreds of years, it seems the Catholic Church was all about the relic, and the, you know, this is the special thing they needed the money. St. So-and-so, and anyway, so it makes sense. It was just there was a reformation and then a counter-reformation. Exactly. 'Cause who's going to put the Catholic Church down? Oh, the Catholic Church in the corner. So the Catholic Church is trying to read a certain control in Europe. The term itself is controversial. It was first used in 1757. So this is a few years after most work was made in the Baroque-style time period. It can easily be associated with negative connotations. Like, as was discussed, it means misshapen pearl, which suggests a, like, something's wrong with it. I guess is the best way, I don't know if you guys. One thing that I really connected with the Baroque after class as an undergrad was this kind of helix shape that keeps showing up. So you can identify it with movement. Jenny's going to talk about Bernini later, but he employs it a lot in his sculpture. So this kind of twisting, think like DNA-shaped. So there's often a bizarreness associated with the Baroque, which can either be the basis of its peel or kind of a reason to hate on it. Like, there's people that belong to bull's camps. Many of the works of this period rejected more traditional ideas of decorum. For example, Caravaggio would paint the bottom of people's feet, which at this time was just like a crazy thing to do. Decorum in the context of at least the 17th century, basically just means something that was considered proper wouldn't make any waves was considered to be acceptable and respectful and traditional. And so when you did not have decorum and you did things like show the bottoms of people's dirty feet in religious paintings, that was like not okay for quite a while. And then that kind of script gets a little bit flipped with that during the Baroque period. The Baroque is complicated, like we said. And it's probably deserving of its own episode. We can talk about this for a really long time. - If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it. - Hey. (all laughing) - Nice show title. - That will, yeah, that will be the name of our Baroque episode. - I stole that. (all laughing) - Crops to Adam. - I stole that from you. (all laughing) - Very clever Adam. - It is very clever, thank you Adam. - Today we will be discussing three key players of the Baroque that also happen to have complicated and dramatic histories. We will start with Michelangelo Marisi, better known as Caravaggio. We'll have a few interesting anecdotes about Gian Lorenzo Bernini. (all laughing) And then lastly, we're going to talk a little bit about Diego Vlasquez. - Mm-hmm. - So it should be. - It should be pretty solid. So yeah, I will pass it along to you Natalie. - All right. - Tell us about Caravaggio. - Oh my god, I can't wait. (upbeat music) - This is Tamsen Fidel from the Tamsen Show. Fall in New York City is my favorite time of year. 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Head over to bombas.com/audio and use audio for 20% off your first purchase. That's B-O-M-B-A-S.com/audio. Code audio at checkout. - Mr. President, my company formed me of the explosion on my rig on October 2nd. - Causing massive water displacement and triggering the tsunami. - They all heat the blame on me. - Tom Cruise is. - Digger, don't listen to this mess. - And Digger is gonna dig us out. - Some of the director of Bergman and the Revenant. - What would happen if I stopped doing it? - You stole, you freeze to death, that's what. - With great power, comes great deniability. - I'm not the earth, daddy. - Digger, see the Traylon law. Only in the years of October 2nd rated R, under 1790, without a parent. (upbeat music) ♪ The art is to be paid ♪ - Michelangelo, Marisi, Caravaggio. I don't know if most people know this, but his name was not Caravaggio. That is the region in Lombardi that he was from. Very common in Italian families. You go by your region. So, because he's the most famous person to come out of Caravaggio, that is how he's known. And you bet that he definitely took sharing the name with a famous Renaissance painter to be a sign that this is what he should be doing. - It was meant to be. - It was fate. Caravaggio believed in fate. So, he was born in somewhere between 1571 and '73. There's, you know, it's contested. He lived in Lombardi for a while. He was orphaned at a pretty young age. He began his painting, studying in a way he apprenticed under a guy named Pitterzzano. He eventually made his way to Rome, which is where his career really started. That's where things get exciting. - Always, always. - He begins Rome. - Seriously, where all great stories begin. (laughing) So, I guess that he was orphaned at a pretty young age. A fun fact is that he was kind of obsessed with being a knight. And he supposedly spent all of his inheritance on a sword. Which, in the 17th century, you could not carry without proper licensing, which he did not have. - Can you carry a sword now without proper licensing? Is that like it? - Yeah, I don't know. - That could very well be. - That's a good question. - I think if you were walking down the street today with a real sword. - No, you were sure, can't. Think about it, like knives, aren't there, like pocket knives and stuff? There's like-- - Oh, you're sure. - There's definitely some illegal knives that you can get. - We know that you know. (laughing) - If you ever want to take a trip to Chinatown, I know where to get these costume items. But anyway, the sides, the boys. - Swords are bad. - If you're looking for a sword, talk to Jin. (laughing) - Brought it. - Brought it. (laughing) After this whole curvaggio story, I don't know if you guys are gonna really want one. So this is a cautionary tale. - It didn't go well for no. - Mr. Carvaggio, not. - So artistically, he worked from life a lot. He liked to have live models. He did not sketch before he drew. And there are many a theory out there of how exactly he staged his photographs because they are so illusionistic as the proper term. I think people use naturalistic or realistic a lot, which are fine, but illusionistic really kind of embodies it because it's this idea that he's presenting it as something that's out of reality. But it's obviously not, it's a painting. It's too, it's too dimensional. We know that he knows that, but it's an illusion that we are okay with and that we enjoy. So it is, it's very reminiscent of real life and people just really want to know how exactly he did it because in the 17th century, that was new. It was new to see something that was so real looking. That's caused controversy, some people loved it, some people did not like it at all. - Yeah, it was crowned down upon. - Yeah, it was contested. And it's one of those things where people had strong opinions one way or the other, I don't think anyone was lukewarm about it. - I don't think anyone was lukewarm about it. - Yeah, I don't think anyone was lukewarm about it. - No, no. - He was like, "I got a lukewarm guy." - Take him away. - You're dead. (laughs) - So his work really was based on this 10-a-brism that Corey talked about earlier. Very extreme lights and extreme shadows. One right next to him, one another. We'll post some of these pictures on the website so you guys can see them. It's quite striking. - It's great. - Yeah, I'm a big fan, so not to be biased, but I think it's gorgeous. - Not to be biased, but I'm very biased because I love him. - So that being said, he was kind of a little punk and he has a few stories. One of which involves a waiter where he had ordered artichokes and when the waiter came out with artichokes, he had asked for some cooked in butter, some cooked in oil, and when he asked which was whisked, the waiter told him to smell them and figure it out himself, and he threw the hot plate of artichokes in the waiter's face. Hot butter, no way. - So he had a hot temper, he didn't want to mess with him. - Hot buttery temper. - And he legally carried a sword, so. - So he didn't care. - Yeah, there were accounts of him attacking people, and he often did this from behind, I'm sorry to say. - Nothing, nothing noblest of-- - What did the stab-loose stabbing in the back? - Truly. - Yes, so he had some issues with that. He started a negative poem about the painter back in the morning. - Back for Facebook. - Yeah. - Poetry disc. - And that actually went all the way to court. I mean, different times, guys, different times. Carvaggio and invented bullying. - Trash dog. - Yeah. - Rolls. - Poetry. - Trash dog. - It's like the original disc truck, you know. - Exactly. - Exactly. - Man, Carvaggio, he was a backstabber. He was a troll, and he was bad to the service industry. - And a little art shook thrower. - He was kind of a dick. - Yeah, it's like he was a dick. - But he made some great art. - But he made some beautiful paintings, guys. You need to be looking at these paintings as you listen to this because it's not you're gonna hate him right now. - It might be redeeming, it might not. - It's true, I won't swear you. - It's all your opinion. So we had the artichoke incident, the backstabbing, the poem. It kind of culminated. Well, okay, before I get to that, just this idea of him in his street fighting, he also was just very. - He was a street fighter. - He was 17th century street fighting. And he also just was very in with the street crowd. He used a lot of what would be called low life of Rome to be models for his painting, which is something that had not been done before. And I mean, Rome's a big city, but some of these people would be recognizable. And this got him in trouble a few times with his religious paintings and alter pieces because his genre paintings, like the card sharks and his gypsy fortune teller paintings, those are genre paintings that depict day to day life. But then when his less than respectable models make their way into his religious paintings, it becomes an issue. So that's where he runs into a lot of criticism, not just with showing bare feet and bottoms, but also just not respectable figures. But it all kind of culminates in him getting into a street fight, sword fight, whatever you want to call it. - A duel. - A duel. I don't know if you could even call it that. - I would not do that. - It was not until then lay it off, it was not. - On a tennis court in 1606, Renisio Tomasoni was his opponent, it was over a lady. Carvaggio ends up killing the guy. And you know, that's brown upon his legal sword. So there's now, he's a dead man walking. Essentially in the 17th century, he was given a sentence that if someone were to see him, they could be had him and bring his head in and it would be fine. - Do we know anything about Tomasoni? - Do we know? - He was wealthy enough that it was a problem. Carvaggio killed him. - Fair. - It was not someone that Carvaggio should have killed. - If anybody could hang out on the tennis court in a 17th century, that was where the fight was arranged. - Oh, that's right. - We'll meet you at the tennis court, George. - Pretty much, yeah. - Yeah, if you haven't already kind of figured out by your discussion so far, we're talking about a point in history where class is a very big issue. Not that it's not now, but it's like a very, very big issue. - Pretend that class wasn't real back then. - Yeah. - I mean, do you now look like class? - What if that's class? - We're all equal. - Yeah, that was not a thing. It was a very clear disparity among classes. There were the rich and the wealthy and the well to do, and there was everybody else. And if you wanted to paint everyone else or be involved with everyone else, the elite didn't want anything to do with you. - Get a relatively decent modicum of success. He was actually pretty well. I wonder if the mic picked that up. Natalie has this really amazing fancy, it's a bridge stone. Oh, well, there's our product placement of the night, my friends. - This particular bottle is DaVinci Keonti. - Oh, Keonti recommend it, highly. - And there's a beautiful illustration. - Lovely drawing by DaVinci on the label. And obviously he's not part of this time. - But he's still Italian and he's an artist, so. - He's an important precursor, but back to Carvaggio. - Yeah, so he kills a guy. And you know, perfect timing, he heads out. He goes to Naples for a while, completes some commissions there. And he basically waits it out for Shippione Borgese, who's a very important character in the 17th century. He's a cardinal. And he is holding Carvaggio's fate because he has the power to pardon him and get him back to Rome safely. At one point, he heads to Malta and he's working on commissions there. And he actually gets knighted in Malta. He becomes one of the knights of Malta. I mean, this is a big deal for Carvaggio. I mean, you guys know, he spent his inheritance on a sword. He really wants that. And he ends up screwing it all up. Yeah, he gets into a fight in Malta. He gets a rest again. He's wanted. It's just like layer upon layer of misfortune. And within all-- - It's not misfortune. - It's not misfortune. It's misbehavior. - It's what he considers it misfortune, which is a big part of the story. He thinks that this is kind of like the world caving in on him. He does not reflect on himself. And paint at this time had lead in it. And people have, people have drawn connections to the lead in the painting. And him being very successful at a certain point in painting a lot. And then that in turn, just causing his insanity, just eating lead paint. That's the old Van Gogh theory as well, or Van Gogh. - Yeah, and he is on the run for murder. And a lot of his paintings throughout this period had to do with biblical beheadings. I mean, Judith beheading Hall of Farnies, John the Baptist, David and Goliath, you name it. And I mean, he deals with a lot of beheading themes. He starts to head back to Rome and he gets on a boat. Oh, there's so much going on. Sorry guys, he has a really long story. - They're so much to say about him. - He had been attacked in Malta and this attack was pretty severe and it caused an infection. That's also been traced to why he was acting so crazy, although he had already been acting crazy at that point. But the infection could have really, no antibiotics. - Damn. - Who knows? - So this could have been super debilitating, but he's trying to get back to Rome. He's heading north and he gets off at a certain location and he gets arrested again because he is wanted. - He's going to catch a break. And in the time period where they figure out that they're no longer looking for him, he wasn't supposed to get arrested. He was supposed to be in the clear at this point, but that wasn't known by the people who got him and by the time they let him go, the boat was gone with his paintings on board. Those paintings were the only ticket that he had to pardon, to be pardoned. - Yeah, so as the legend goes, he chased down the boat on the beach and then collapsed out of exhaustion. I don't think that's true. - I think that is definitely funnier. - Oh my gosh, I can see it in my mind. - Yeah, oh, because there's so many a cheesy video reenacting it, you guys. - Oh man. - Get on YouTube and look at Pervasia. - Now we're gonna put some links on the website to some really great reenactments for you guys. - Oh yeah. This is a greenery artichoke scene. Yeah. You want to see it. it's all he's so bad so whatever the reason he ends up dying shortly thereafter so 1610 Parvazio dies the sad part of the story is that he was granted this pardon right around the time that he died so it's just you know tragic character but well that's what's my boy so Gio thank you for your for your work thank you Parvazio okay we're gonna or rather I'm gonna be talking about John Lorenzo Bernini and Bernini is really kind of a giant of the broke but he's not necessarily an artist that you hear about as much as say um other Italian artists like your DaVinci, Michelangelo, Raphael and part of that could be because Bernini really stayed within the realm of sculpture and then later architecture and Bernini was lucky in the way that he was born into a family his father Pietro Bernini was a manorist sculptor and he was born in Naples his mother was from Naples and his father was from Tuscany but his family moved to Rome when he was very young and so he had this kind of privileged upbringing even though he was one of 13 children you know just that kind of Catholic family dynamic oh boy so he was exposed to art from a very early age and then moving to Rome when he was still young and impressionable he really was benefited by having a pretty enriched artistic education and by the time he was eight he was already making his own marble sculptures and he was deemed the next Michelangelo by the time he was eight years old which is crazy but he was just that gifted and he was obviously after Caravaggio so he was born in 1598 but he was very much affected by what Caravaggio did so that's why he's really a good artist to discuss kind of after Natalie's discussion of Caravaggio and so this idea of like shock theater that Caravaggio really kind of brought to like the precipice of Baroque Roman art is the tradition that Bernini started working off of and the thing about Bernini is that while he was trained in drawing and painting he really thrived with sculpture so a lot of what he did was take this kind of shock theater and um relationship between kind of this torment and ecstasy and movement and drama he depicted it through marble rather than oil on canvas so a lot of what his early work did was to kind of show the momentary the dramatic the emotional through marble as his medium and like I said luckily for him he came from a background that was well connected he didn't have to hustle like Caravaggio did um you know he didn't come from an incredibly noble background per se but he came from a background that was well versed in the arts and he was never really at a loss of connections and it helped that he was incredibly charming he was incredibly witty and he was talented and he was good looking um he was and I just actually really he is Ginny has a little bit of a cry I I do but I I want to say though that the story that I'm going to get into is going to be violent and disturbing and it's just a trigger warning for people that may have um kind of a sensitivity to there's nothing that's going to get into rape or um anything like that but there's definitely going to be some physical violence and I just want to say that I do not like Bernini for those I don't condone any of those actions none of his actions that I'm going to talk about other than art related or what really makes me love Bernini yeah yeah yeah exactly but despite all that like I said he was incredibly talented and he had all this charm going for him and by the time he was in his early 20s and Rome he was thriving um he was doing incredibly well and he was made a night and he didn't marry for quite a while so by the time he was in his um mid to late 30s before he was 40 he was single and that was kind of part of him like dedicating himself to his art but that didn't mean he wasn't having sex because he was um Bernini by the time he was in his late 30s had a very successful workshop where he had other artists working under him helping him on commissions one of those artists was Mateo Bonarelli and he uh had a wife named Costanza and wouldn't you know it Bernini and Costanza really connected in a whole lot of ways oh yeah and they had um quite the affair for a number of years and we'll post this image on our website but he did a portrait bust of Costanza in um about 1635 and this was like at the height of their affair and at this time Bernini was about 39 years old and it's a really interesting bust for a few reasons marble portrait busts for the most part during the 17th century especially in Rome were of typically men and they were men of status and they were men of power so they were cardinals popes kings but Bernini made a portrait bust of his mistress Costanza and it's really beautiful and it's very sensual and it makes no bones about that she is depicted and he does this a lot with his portrait bust where the lips are slightly parted to kind of capture that moment of speaking and so parted lips are also this incredibly sexy that was not unintentional that's the best way to make like your selfie sexy it's just parted a little bit because it's just like what am I thinking what am I gonna say you know it's the mystery of it's like hey what that mouth do oh boy so this is what he does with Costanza and and she was actually a very smart woman she was from a well-to-do family a noble family in Rome she was well educated and she was known for being a very intelligent and fiery personality in that she spoke her mind and this was known amongst a lot of the noble upper class of Rome and so part of her depiction with this kind of look in her eye in the parted mouth was also you know of course it was sensual but it was also commenting on her intellect and you know she's wearing a blouse and just the button on the top is unbuttoned and it's kind of this like momentary depiction of you know his lover and and her blouse is just unbuttoned at the top is kind of inviting just little glimpse of these like marble breasts that are just moving so it's it's beautiful it's beautiful and so you'll have to look at it and like I said we'll we'll put it up see I'm blushing just the thing it's okay it's incredible it's incredible and like I said this was not common for the time but we're generally pretty formal and they were not sexy like that was not really a thing so this was again kind of Bernini working within the tradition and really being successful because of his charm and his skill but still kind of putting his own little sexy spin-on things which he was able to get away with for the most part so things are going pretty well he's very successful he's single he's got this you know bodacious intelligent mistress but then things start to really come apart so in the Roman court life kind of imagine these courts of the 17th century as like very upper class maybe private high schools it's so like gossipy and people are talking about like someone so I hate about you yeah like someone so and someone so we're together but like she's with also with him and so it's kind of that climate so Bernini hears that his girl Kastanza is also sleeping with his younger brother Luigi and as I said you know Bernini is one child of 13 so this is just one of his many siblings but also you know obviously Bernini's like this is an issue but he but he wasn't sure if it was actually legitimate and his brother was also very talented he was a sculptor and architecture he was also a into math but yeah he's a numbers man but he you know he paled in comparison to Bernini's artistic skill at the moment. the time. So Bernini says okay I'm gonna kind of set up this scenario where I can find out whether or not this this is true instead of just saying Kastanza are you two time in me on top of like two time in your husband because you're a boss are you three time in me instead of saying that he sets up this kind of trick where he says hey babe I'm going out to the country I'm gonna be out of town but he's not so he goes to the Bono Reilly house and he's there in the early morning hours and he's waiting out in the dawn in the mist on a hill looking down on Kastanza's house oh man and what does he see but Kastanza Luigi leaving the house Kastanza gives him a passionate embrace and then his brother leaves and I can only imagine really what went on in Bernini's mind when he saw this but clearly flames just engulfed his mind and just turned him into a rage machine where he chased his brother from Kastanza's house through Rome into the very hallowed halls of St. Peter's Basilica where Bernini himself was commissioned to do the Baldequino Bernini knew it well Bernini was also a very religious man but nonetheless he chased his brother into the nave of the church where he proceeded to beat him with an iron bar can we like take a second to really think about how dramatic this is like if you have ever been to Catholic Church if you've ever ever heard of the Catholic Church not no not that I know it was very early but if you have had the experience of being in St. Peter's Basilica it is a very imposing yeah there's a lot go it's a large space a lot of really beautiful art um you also have you know god looking down upon you whether whether you believe in that or not like all those people did yeah yeah but like even if you don't like that that is there in some way like this is a very dramatic scene and really the only reason that Bernini didn't kill his brother Luigi was because his mom knew what was going on and his mom had actually been concerned about Bernini for some time and was writing to the then Pope just saying he's out of control and she alerted the papal guards which were by you know stood guard around St. Peter's in Vatican City and so they were able to separate the two brothers but he he did manage to break two ribs of Luigi but that wasn't it Bernini wasn't satisfied with only trying to murder and then breaking two ribs of his brother he had a man servant go to Kastanz's house and slash her face with a knife so that her beauty would be forever changed and her face the scars a mark of her shame and infidelity even though Bernini was not her husband he um you know was her lover so obviously we can guess that being a woman in the 17th century in Rome wasn't great but it wasn't able to charge him with anything right no this went on no undisciplined and the fact it gets even more fucked up in terms of justice so Bernini was charged three thousand Scoody as a fine which was later waived by his friend the Pope and Bernini was almost always very good friends with the popes so his brother was sent into exile to Bologna and Kastanzza with her cut up face was sentenced to jail so the only person that was actually sentenced to criminal offenses put into jail was Kastanzza just take a second let that set it to ruminate on on the white male privilege yes there yes there's um yes i'm mad can you imagine going home to your husband with a slashed-up face from your lover who is mad yes because you were having a double yes and no and don't don't forget that Kastanzza's husband worked for Bernini oh so not only was she having an affair with him with his boss and his brother Bernini was directly responsible for cutting up her face and also Bernini's servant who did the face cutting was arrested as well Bernini's punishment you may ask well let me tell you make sure it was just marriage marriage to one of the youngest and most beautiful bachelorettes in Roman society high class noble society katarina tezio oh bummer so the pope was like Bernini your out of control this has gone too far you've got to get married you've got to have a lady washing your clothes making your food giving your babies that's going to just spray you in keep you in control so that's what happened at this point understandably you're probably like god Bernini what a dick like how did he get away with this and perhaps some kind of karmic retribution he was shortly thereafter commissioned to do the bell towers of saint Peters where he tried to kill his brother and due to foundation issues and his kind of lack of skill in some of the technical aspects of architecture the bell towers cracked and they had to be taken down and Bernini was actually scorned and it took him quite a long time to get back in the good graces of the pope so that is kind of a balance but really it's not castanza was eventually bailed out of jail and by all accounts she did remain married to her husband but Bernini's brother Luigi later was you know allowed back into Rome and then was arrested for violent sodomy what exactly that means I can't I can't tell you because because I don't know and perhaps I don't want to really know but Bernini was able to clear his family name and get his brother a papal pardon through another sculptural commission that he made and as for this beautiful central castanza bus that I've talked about Bernini obviously wanted nothing to do with it but fortunately he did not destroy it and it was purchased by the Medici family and it still resides in Florence today and if you are ever in Florence please go and see it pay castanza her well deserved do she was a very smart lady and she was a sexual lady in a time that did not respect that but rather punished it so that is the end of that story and I'm sure we'll talk about Bernini at another time more on his art and less on his shitty personal duty yeah and you know let's not downplay how we do not react very differently at all in 21st century society in regards to women and affairs so very true you know 17th century and 21st century you'd think there'd be a big difference in some ways there's not yeah you're probably still going to get your face slashed and you'll you can probably buy yourself jails I don't know but it's just it's not that different so this monday.com ad was created by a team of people and AI agents Reese our content agent wrote the copy based on our best practices like mentioning monday.com three times that was the second Johnny our coordination agent built the timeline and kept everyone aligned Olivia our human creative director stayed in the loop because agents are great but they don't always know when a joke lands she had one note tell listeners it only takes minutes to build an agent so minutes create your own AI agent today on monday.com whoever says saving money is hard doesn't know that new customers who bundle and save with progressive save hundreds because switching your home and auto insurance is better than cutting down on the things you love like those 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And I also want to thank Natalie for the wonderful Caravaggio story. So I'm gonna be discussing a little bit about our boy Diego Velasquez, full name Diego Rodriguez de Silva. Velasquez. Velasquez or as the Habsburgs would have pronounced his name Velasquez. We'll talk some more about the Habsburgs and their speech impediment that became the national accent of the Spaniards. More about that in a bit. Velasquez was not that much of a bad boy in comparison to our friend's Brunini and Caravaggio. It as a matter of fact, Velasquez was a little bit of an ass kisser. That is really going to sort of draw the question, how much can a ass kisser be a badass? Can we think of ass kissers and opportunists as people who are essentially bad? I'm gonna say yes. He was the absolute opportunist but wonderful brilliant painter and let's talk a little bit about his life. So Velasquez born in civil in 1599 to a Portuguese family actually. Little is known of his early life as is typically the case with people of the 17th century and earlier there isn't a whole lot that we know about his life until he was around the age of 14 and he went to study fine art with the artist Francisco de Herrera the elder but Herrera was a asshole. He was an asshole. Velasquez could not handle his temper tantrums and was apparently being heavily overworked by the master. He shortly after went to apprentice with the artist Francisco Pacheco and Pacheco although less accomplished of an artist was much more tolerant and way better connected in society and would end up being a very important connection for Velasquez in his ultimate ascent into Habsburg court sweetheart. He married Pacheco's daughter and started to paint in the realist manner. Velasquez drew upon Carvaggio in a very obvious way with not only his use of what we now call realism but also his depictions of the common folk better known as the outcasts of society and in Velasquez's case every day Spanish life so there's a few famous paintings by the artist one is the old woman frying eggs which depicts a scene of an old woman frying eggs and it sounds quite simple but it's a quite beautiful work of art and it is a scene where we get to see Velasquez and all of his talent. You've never seen better fried eggs. It's beautiful. Thank you. I'm really hungry. Next time you're frying up an egg you're going to think huh how do I paint that well you know what it's not easy and it gets you the attention of kings a little bit about that genre these paintings are called bodegonis and they literally mean tavern pieces tavern paintings paintings of taverns wine sellers kitchens etc they're paintings drawing from everyday life this is what turns Velasquez on this is where he really begins to develop himself as a super accomplished painter so 1621 fill up the fourth ascends to the throne and count olivaris becomes his prime minister so count olivaris was a great patron of the arts he was known for his love of poetry and painting and etc music so Pacheco sense an opportunity for Velasquez and they run to Madrid they're just like oh my god we gotta get him in here it's gonna be huge he's gonna be famous it took two years for Velasquez to impress the king and actually impress olivaris to then arrange a meeting between the king and Velasquez Velasquez would paint an equestrian portrait of the king and this portrait was a success and at 24 years old Velasquez became appointed court painter and he would work in the Habsburg royal court until the end of his life in 1660 so he's in court it's going great and he really starts to find himself in a position where he needs to depict the head of the Spanish Empire in the most flattering way possible so those of you who are not schooled in the history of the Habsburg royal lineage let's just get it right I'm gonna be really impressed if one of you in I know it's it's you know that's a funny thing to say but lately it just seems like there is this sort of like interest all of a sudden in how decrepitly in bread the Habsburgs were so so many royal families yeah exactly it's it's a it's a fact of royalty queen Victoria married her first cousin Albert king tuton common was horribly in bread and inbreeding and imperialism look into it it's a thing it's a very real thing so um just you know to to get it out there from 1516 to 1700 it's been estimated that over 80% of the marriages within the Spanish branch of the Habsburg dynasty were between family members close blood family members and um these close blood relatives were often uncles and nieces or double first cousins or um you know what's a double first cousin so double first cousin is just a marriage between two first cousins okay right so um yeah no um it's it's kind of nasty and um you know just spoiler the Habsburg dynasty went to shit in 1700 when um king Carlos the second died without having conceived an heir no one was surprised um king Carlos the second could not walk until the age of eight he didn't speak until the age of four this one who couldn't chew that was him yeah the Habsburg jaw and that's where this is all going is um Philip the fourth was a product of inbreeding and Philip the fourth just as most of the Habsburg clan exhibited varying distinct features indicating inbreeding I don't think they knew that at the time but we know that now and one of the most distinct features is the Habsburg jaw which is characterized by a very exaggerated under bite yes so so what's the point of all this right why are we talking about this we're talking about this because Velasquez as opposed to his predecessors in the Habsburg court depicted Philip the fourth in all of his Habsburg jaw glory and this was a very daring move on the part of Velasquez um to depict the king in a somewhat non flattering light um if you compare images of Philip the fourth to like Lewis the 14th at the time um you know Louis is out there looking glorious you know he's actually compared he you know he had the hair and the face and he was just uh I don't know he was like a rock star I mean I want him to headbang in the front row of whatever show um anyway Philip the fourth didn't look like that and Velasquez depicted him realistically and it speaks volumes to his position in court that these paintings were not altered Philip the fourth allowed himself to be depicted in a less than grand light and Velasquez's prowess as a painter really allowed him to get away with a lot that would not normally be tolerated in such settings as a Spanish royal court. One of the most famous paintings by the artist is the quintessential work Las Meninas depicting the princess of Philip IV and Mariana of Austria. The daughter, short lifespan of the young girl. In the painting we see her in the company of her ladies in waiting and there are several elements of the work that make it one of the most talked about pieces in art history until today it's still just completely captivating for so many that are art historians that have made a career out of analyzing this work. Honestly, if like you're not familiar with Las Meninas you need, if you look up nothing else from this podcast, look it up. It's a very important thing. And if you can see it, I haven't had the chance to see it in person but I've only heard that it is quite the experience. It's huge, first of all, and second it really draws you in. It draws you in not only because of its stature in relation to a human viewer but also because of the painting's curious treatment of the viewer. Velasquez paints a scene where you're essentially, you don't know where you are and one would guess that you may be in the position of the royal king and queen. However, upon a closer analysis of the work and just an understanding of how refraction and reflection work, in the back of the painting there is a small square that some have interpreted as being a mirror that is displaying King Philip IV and Mariana of Austria in the scene. And we think it's a mirror, but knowing what we know about mirrors and seeing as the image does not reflect the rest of the room, we don't think it's a mirror, it could be some maybe like a painting. Nobody knows, okay? It's just weird. It could still be a mirror because maybe it's a mirror. All of the images in the background of the image, it's the only one that's reflective. The rest are shrouded in dark darkness. So you have this weird. Is it a mirror? Is it a painting? We don't know. Who knows? And what we're getting at is that this whole treatment of the viewer, the fact that Velasquez inserted himself in the scene of the royal family, he thought very highly of himself, he was breaking a lot of rules and he just didn't care. Because he was honestly the royal sweetheart of the court and he knew that that was his position and he played it up for whatever it was worth. Velasquez was crazy popular, he was insanely successful and he would find that he could really do no wrong with the Habsburgs, with Philip IV. They supported him and everything that he did. And he really was a person who was aware of his ability to work his way into the social situation that he wanted to live in. And he was aware of his capacity as a brilliant painter and this is reflected in most of his works of art done between the time he was appointed as court painter up until his death in 1660. Altogether, he wasn't much of a bad boy, but he was certainly aware of his talent and even in a painting like the portrait of Innocent X, which was the Pope, Velasquez used the portrait as a vehicle to display his talent. And compared to past images of popes done by other artists, it's very obvious that Velasquez didn't want to trick anybody. It was a painting. He shows obvious brush strokes and details and he's really inserting his talent into the work. And this is a consistent theme with the work of Velasquez. There's never a time where he's trying to fool the viewer as to whether or not this is a painter real life. He wanted you to know this is a painting painted by Velasquez and it's the shit. And you should like it. Pretty much. It's not a bad boy, but he's a bad ass. He was a bad ass. And on that note, we're going to wrap up on our boy Velasquez. A little bit of a goody two shoes, if you will, compared to Caravaggio. Yeah, you know, and he wasn't quite as violent, but regardless, we have three stories of artists that were very confident and in some ways very privileged. Opportunist. Opportunist. Hopefully, we have provided you with some things to chew on, some things to think about. We hope you have an image of the broke. Yeah, the broke, some key players in the broke, what their lives were like, what life was like in that time period, in that place. If you have any thoughts, questions, ideas, please email us at art history [email protected]. Thank you so much for listening. As I said before, we really appreciate all the support we've gotten so far. It's been so great. As of right now, art history babes.tumbler.com is our primary website. We will have an additional website in the future, but that's in progress. So we're working on it. We are also on Instagram as art history babes podcast, and we are on Twitter at art history babes. We're on Facebook, like us, anything. Share the page. Share, you know, just get us out there. And anyway, we appreciate it. Just listening is great. Anybody else have anything to say? Oh, our next episode. Oh yes. Our next episode is going to be Weird Poutine. Weird Poutine. Weird Poutine. Weird Poutine. And if you don't know what that is, that's even better, because we'll explain it next time. Thank you for listening to the bad boys of Baroque with the art history babes. Bad boys, what you want? What you want to do? We are mystery babes. If you're looking for a sword, talk to Jen. Throw it. The art history babes podcast is made possible by support from our lovely listeners via Patreon. Head over to patreon.com/arthistory babes to help keep the art history babes going and for access to bonus content. President Mark Company told me of the explosion I'm not rigged. On October 2nd. Causing massive water displacement and triggering the tsunami. They all heat the blame on me. Tom Cruise is. Digger, don't listen to this mess. You're strong, you freeze to death, that's what. I'm not the earth, daddy. Digger. See the tree long long. Only the years of October 2nd. You're under 17 out of mid without parrot. This episode is brought to you by Netflix's new series East of Eden. A bold reimagining of John Steinbeck's masterpiece following generations of the Trask family. Through love, betrayal, and the choices that shape humanity. Starring Mike Feist and Christopher Abbott as the Trask Brothers. And Florence Pugh as Kathy Ames. The complex anti-heroine determined to build the life she wants. No matter the cost. Watch East of Eden, October 1st, only on Netflix.