Sunday, February 8, 2009
Wagner College professors imagine painter’s
affection for his novice in ‘The Miracles of Prato’
By MICHAEL J. FRESSOLA
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — The release date is no accident. “The Miracles of Prato” (Wm. Morrow Books), an art-historical romance, is landing in bookstores in time for Valentine’s Day.
The novel, set in Renaissance Tuscany, imagines that the great 15th century painter Fra Filippo Lippi fell in love with a young novice — a nun-in-training — and vice versa.
The perfect, intelligent countenance that graces some of his most celebrated madonnas? It’s hers.
Far-fetched? Not at all, according to co-authors Laurie Albanese (L.A.) and Laura Morowitz (L.M.), who are professors (English and art history, respectively) at Wagner College.
Renaissance artists did not work from imaginary models. Real people were their inspirations.
Last week, the authors talked about division of labor, artists’ muses, love, beauty, “Girl with a Pearl Earring” and how they’d cast the movie version.
By the way, they strongly recommend a visit to the town of Prato, where there are heart-piercing Filippo Lippis, even if you have to trim your time in Florence to do it.
Q. What about that old saying, “Too many writers wreck the story”? Was getting along paragraph by paragraph a challenge?
L.A.: No.
L.M.: Yes.
L.A. and L.M.: OK, sometimes yes, sometimes no. We didn’t compromise on anything — we worked until we both agreed that what we had was exactly what we wanted.
Q. Who contributed what?
L.M.: Actually, we had pretty clearly divided things up, so that made for less conflict. Laurie is a novelist and poet, so she handled the scenes with character development and interior motivation. I took on the scenes with more pageantry and art. The plot developed in a constant dialogue between us — on the phone, over e-mail, in person.
Q. The “outside” world seems fascinated with the women whom artists portray, whether they are the Venus of Willendorf, Madame X (Sergeant) or Helga (Wyeth). Why?
L.M.: I’m going to speak here as an art historian. Part of this fascination has to do with idea of woman as the passive object, the foil to the creative genius of the male. For most of history, women simply weren’t given the opportunities to create — they were too busy procreating. And I suppose everyone loves the idea of the muse, of someone being so beloved that they inspire great heights of creativity.
L.A.: I think it’s natural to wonder about the private and interior lives of people we’ve seen portrayed as physically beautiful, whether it’s on television, in the movies or in paintings. As a writer, that’s what I do all the time — imagine the private and secret lives of others. Artists and their models already have a built-in sex appeal for us, the same way, I think, Brad and Angelina or Barack and Michelle Obama do.
Q. Invariably, your book will be compared with “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” another story about a great artist and a girl. Let’s cast the movie version: Who gets to play Lucrezia, the face that launched Filippo Lippi?
L.M.: Believe me, we’ve thought about this a lot! Obviously Scarlett Johansson comes to mind. Casting Lippi is going to be tough because he wasn’t exactly tall, dark and handsome (bulky and bald is closer to the truth), but he definitely had something going on. We would need to find an actor who was sexy and powerful without being traditionally good looking. We’ve talked about Liam Neeson.
L.A.: I am all for Liam playing Lippi. For Lucrezia, I think it should be an unknown beauty, plucked from obscurity — the same way Lucrezia is an unknown beauty when Lippi sees her.
Q. Prato is a little off the beaten Tuscan track. Your book may send new hordes into the town. Will the citizens thank you for this?
L.A. The people in Prato were very welcoming when we were there to research the book, and the tourism office was thrilled when people from the States came in carrying the travel piece on Prato I wrote for the N.Y. TIMES. Prato is actually an easy 30-minute train ride from Florence, and I recommend it as a side trip for anyone who is doing the Tuscan circuit. Very few people there speak English — but they are very happy to welcome guests with typical Italian gusto and hospitality.
L.M.: I’m sure in this economy there’s a lot of hope that the book WILL bring lots of hordes there. And don’t forget there are the newly restored Lippi frescos there just waiting to be admired.
Q. As authors, you worked with historical fact and imaginative reconstruction. Are their parts of the story that are on thinner ice than others?
L.A.: Imagining the tenderness and romance between a monk and a nun was challenging, but Laura and I were happily up to that task. We created a whole world to help us understand how such an impossible affair could take place in such an unlikely time, between two people whose fates had presumably been decided by other people.
L.M.: It was really important to us that historians and art historians agree that our version was plausible and reflected the world we were writing about. But there are some characters, like Sister Pureza and the Prior General, who are entirely fictitious. We simply can’t know what went on in the main character’s minds, because they left us no record, no letters or poems. That is where our reconstruction takes over.
Q. Is there another duo-author project in the works? Is there another artist/muse relationship that you are interested in re-imagining?
L.M. and L.A.: The short answer is yes! There are lots of other historical settings we want to explore, maybe 19th century Paris or 1920s America. But whatever we ultimately decide to work on, it will be a story with lots of intrigue and romance, and, of course, art.
Michael J. Fressola is the Advance arts editor. He may be reached at fressola@siadvance.com.