Gift exchange and art collecting: Padre Sebastiano Resta's drawing albums

Abstract

This paper investigates the social structure of gift giving among art collectors in early modern Italy. It focuses on Padre Sebastiano Resta, a collector of drawings based in Rome, between 1680 and his death in 1714. Gift giving was the preferred mode of exchange among aristocratic collectors, a practice that shaped their aesthetic response to art objects. A common culture of elite consumption fostered the neo-feudal nostalgia through which gifts were exchanged and the critical perception of art as the object of courtly love.