Master Art

The events relating to the commission of the four busts took place in late seventeenth-century Rome, and concern one of the most important figures of the Corsi family, Domenico Maria, the fourth child of Giovanni and his first wife, Lucrezia di Antonio Salviati. As the youngest son, Domenico was destined for an ecclesiastical career and was therefore educated by his uncle, Monsignor Lorenzo Corsi, a sophisticated music lover and art collector. Lorenzo had a successful religious career; indeed, for seven years he was vice-legate of Avignon, a position that was considered the prelude to becoming a cardinal, but his death from the Roman plague of 1656 put an end to his aspirations.