Art and Love in Renaissance Italy

New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2008. Hardbound. VG/VG (as new). Maroon cloth with gilt lettering; matching maroon dj with front cover illustration and white lettering; 392 pp. with 375 illustrations, including 300 color plates. Issued in conjunction with several 2008-2009 exhibitions. "Many famous artworks of the Italian Renaissance were made to celebrate love, marriage, and family. They were the pinnacles of a tradition, dating from early in the era, of commemorating betrothals, marriages, and the birth of children by commissioning extraordinary objects -- maiolica, glassware, jewels, textiles, paintings -- that were often also exchanged as gifts. This volume is the first comprehensive survey of artworks arising from Renaissance rituals of love and marriage and makes a major contribution to our understanding of Renaissance art in its broader cultural context. The impressive range of works gathered in these pages extends from birth trays painted in the early fifteenth century to large canvases on mythological themes that Titian painted in the mid-1500s. Each work of art would have been recognized by contemporary viewers for its prescribed function within the private, domestic domain." (dj).