Grotesque ornament comprising a swag and a repeated band

In her article "Grotesque drawings and Spanish-Italian empire" (Cultura architettonica nell’Impero di Carlo V. Storia globale, microstoria, storiografia (1519–1556) edited by Francesca Mattei and Carlos Plaza (Rome; Seville: Roma Tre and Seville University Press, 2024, pp. 119 –48), Angel Jiang examines a set of twenty-six grotesque drawings by a Spanish draftsman and relates them to the 1535 Conquest of Tunis. The drawings likely belonged to a sketchbook whose sheets are dispersed between the Metropolitan Museum of Art (twenty-two), the Masson collection of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts (two), the University of Michigan Museum of Art (one) and an unspecified private collection (one). The group was attributed to Andrés de Melgar by Nicole Dacos, who connected their imagery to frescos by Giulio de Aquili at the Alhambra and Palazzo Doria in Genoa and suggested they were copied from a lost sketchbook. While Jiang maintains Dacos’ lineage for the "Melgar" drawings, she believes the attribution is tenuous and posits that they were created as experimental material for a (now lost) fresco in Spain by a follower of Giulio de Aquili. This follower likely worked with Aquili at the Alhambra.


The article demonstrates that such grotesque imagery and the migration of artists between Genoa and Granada reinforced the connection between Charles V and his Italian allies. The frescoes of Charles V’s Peinador de la Reina at the Alhambra (1539–46) were executed by Giulio de Aquili (responsible for ornament) and Alexander Mayner (responsible for naval scenes) to commemorate the 1535 Conquest of Tunis during which Andrea Doria and Virgilio Orsini protected Charles V’s imperial fleet as they captured Tunis. Dacos believes the "Julio" and "flamenco" inscribed numerous times across some of the sheets reference these two artists. Giulio and Alejandro worked at Andrea Doria’s palazzo in Genoa, where Charles V and his secretary, Francisco de los Cobos, stayed in 1533. Palazzo Doria contained a fresco cycle executed by Perino del Vaga and his assistants (1528–33) that celebrated Doria’s role in defending the Mediterranean against the Turks. Motifs found in the Spanish drawings, Palazzo Doria, and the Peinador de la Reina (such as the Diana of Ephesus on MMA 52.570.316r) provide support for the hypothesis that Charles employed Giulio and Alejandro for the Alhambra frescoes after his visit to Genoa, and that the Spanish draftsman trained in Giulio’s circle.


Images of the Conquest of Tunis framed by grotesque imagery appear in other palaces of Spanish nobles who played a role in defending the Mediterranean under Charles V and Phillip II, such as that of Don Álvaro de Bazan in El Viso. Jiang regards these frescoes of naval battles and Italian grotesques as evidence for an effort to create a shared visual language that celebrated their Spanish and Italian patrons’ military alliances and cultural affinities.


The article derives from the author’s PhD dissertation, "In the Manner of Silversmiths: Architecture, Ornament, and the Plateresque," (Columbia University, 2025). In a chapter on the Spanish ornament drawings, the author categorizes the "Melgar" drawings into three groups based on their imagery and the use of three different scripts (Type A, Type B, and Type C).


The "Julio" and "flamenco" group contain all’antica grotesques inspired by the Domus Aurea ("Julio) and Flemish and Netherlandish grotesques ("flamenco"). The artist appears to have started the "Julio" designs first then filled in blank areas and versos with "flamenco." "52.570.314r, 52.570.315r, 52.570.316r, 52.570.316v, 52.570.321r, 52.570.327r, 52.570.329r, 52.570.330v, 52.570.331v, 52.570.332v.



The Fontainebleau group: 52.570.317r, 52.570.318v, 52.570.320v, 52.570.328r, 52.570.334r.


Northern grotesques, namely fantastical creatures inspired by Flemish and Netherlandish designs (especially those by Cornelis Floris and Cornelis Bos): 52.570.317r, 52.570.318r, 52.570.319r, 52.570.319v, 52.570.320r, 52.570.321v, 52.570.324r, 52.570.330r, 52.570.332r, 52.570.335r.