Exterior Shrine to Interior Altarpiece: Rinaldeschi, the Madonna de’ Ricci, and the Desecration of Street Art

An infamous event involving street art occurred on 11 July 1501 in Florence. Having lost while gambling at a tavern, the frustrated Antonio Rinaldeschi smeared dung on a fresco of the Virgin in a street tabernacle, a decision that led to his execution. Previously unremarked, the Madonna de’ Ricci was immediately acclaimed as miraculous and became the focus of intense devotion. Interestingly, though its cult was directly due to the image’s accessibility enabling Rinaldeschi’s desecration, within months the church took action to enclose it within a chapel and control access. This talk explores the processes and reasons for this transformation.

Sarah Wilkins’s research focuses on mendicant and Angevin patronage, the representation of women, and the cult of the saints. She has published on the visual cult of the Magdalen in Naples and Assisi and was co-editor of Art and Experience in Trecento Italy, the inaugural volume of Trecento Forum, a book series, for which she is series co-editor. Dr. Wilkins received an RSA-Kress Research Fellowship for her book project on the Magdalen Chapel in the Bargello, Florence, to which this talk relates. She was President for the Italian Art Society from 2021-23 and is Adjunct Assistant Professor, CCE at Pratt.