27 LORENZO OTTONI
Italian (Rome), 1648-1726
Portrait Medallion of Pope
Alexander VIII, 1691-1700
White marble medallion mounted
on a bigio antico marble socle
With socle: 88.9 cm (35 in.)
Inscribed around medallion: ALEX.
VIILP. O.M.FRAN. CARD.BARB.F.F
95.SA.9.1-.2
This portrait medallion represents Pope Alexander VIII Ottoboni, who reigned
briefly from October 6, 1689, to February 1, 1691. The inscription, which reads in
English "Alexander VIII Pontifex Optimus Maximus Cardinal Francesco Barberini had
it made," identifies both the sitter and, unusually, the patron of the work, establishing a
close relationship between them. A member of a noble Venetian family, Alexander VIII
was popular for reducing taxes, increasing inexpensive food imports, alleviating political
tensions with France, and supporting Venice in its war with the Turks. He was vigilantly
opposed to Jansenist and other reform movements. Cardinal Francesco Barberini
Giuniore commissioned this image to commemorate the pope, who had elevated
him to the cardinalate in 1690. Alexander VIII is shown wearing the camauro, an
ermine-trimmed cap, and mozzetta, or humeral cape, non-liturgical vestments for
informal audiences.
The portrait medallion is set on to a bigio antico socle carved in the form of a
double-headed eagle that seems to hold the image aloft. Rudolf II granted the Ottoboni
family permission to add this imperial device to their arms in 1588, in recognition of
their assistance in fighting the Turks. The sculptor, Lorenzo Ottoni, took advantage
of the natural shading of the gray marble by carving the eagle from the darkest part of
the stone, which effectively sets off the bright white marble of the medallion. Ottoni,
a member of the circle of the Barberini family in late seventeenth-century Rome, also
carved a series of portrait busts of Barberini family members, including one of Cardinal
Francesco's father.
This work combines several elements usually found in commemorative monuments
or tomb sculpture, making it a small but densely symbolic memorial image of the
pope, created in the decade after his death. For example, portrait medallions were often
employed as part of architectural tomb structures. Furthermore, the eagle—a reference
to the Ottoboni coat of arms and thus a heraldic, dynastic motif—seems to carry the
image and, conceptually, the sitter heavenward. MC and PF
EUROPEAN SCULPTURE 81
