The House of Gonzaga, rulers of the Duchy of Mantua, one of the most important patrons of the arts in the Renaissance and Baroque periods came to power on 16 August 1328, when Ludovico I (Luigi) Gonzaga seized power from the Bonacolsi Family. They commissioned and amassed numerous works by the most prominent artists of the 14th to 18th centuries. Although now dispersed in museums and private collections worldwide, the many artworks in their collection were once held at the Palazzo Ducale, Palazzo Te, and the Palazzo San Sebastiano in Mantua. The Gonzaga were important patrons of artists such as Andrea Mantegna, Correggio, Annibale Carracci, Titian, and Peter Paul Rubens, among others.
Andrea Mantegna, La Corte 1465-1474, Fresco, Camera degli Sposi (Camera picta), Castello San Giorgio, Mantua.
Andrea Mantegna, Cristo morto (The lamentation over the dead Christ), circa 1475-478, Tempera on panel, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan.
Andrea Mantegna, Death of the Virgin, 1461, Tempera on panel, Museo del Prado, Madrid
Correggio, Allegory of Virtues, 1565-1570, Distemper, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Annibale Carracci, Butcher’s Shop, 1583, Oil on canvas, Christ Church Picture Gallery, Oxford.
Peter Paul Rubens, Gonzaga Family in Adoration of the Holy Trinity, 1604-1605, Palazzo Ducale, Mantua.
Titian, Portrait of Federico II Gonzaga, circa 1529, Oil on canvas, Museo del Prado, Madrid