Eleonora di Toledo was celebrated in Renaissance Florence for her fecundity, with Bronzino’s portrait with her son Giovanni among the most famous representations of the Grand Duchess. This talk will examine how Eleonora also contributed to the city’s future cultural heritage through commissions such as her private chapel and public reception rooms in the Palazzo Vecchio, and her purchase of the Palazzo Pitti. Eleonora employed court artists such as Giorgio Vasari, Benvenuto Cellini and Baccio Bandinelli, and served as regent in her husband Cosimo I’s absence. We’ll explore how this Spanish noblewoman affected art and culture in Renaissance Florence.

Dr. Meghan Callahan has lived and worked in London since 2006. Like Rocky, she earned her Master’s degree in Art History from Syracuse University as a Florence Fellow. She has a Ph.D. in Art History from Rutgers University. Meghan is the Assistant Director for Teaching and Learning at Syracuse University London, where she has taught art history and history classes on Italian Art in London and the UK; Women and Art: London and UK; and Underground London.

She worked on the reinstallation of the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and then with the sculpture dealer Patricia Wengraf. Meghan has published various articles and essays on the architectural patronage of the 16th-century mystic nun Sister Domenica da Paradiso, miraculous paintings in Renaissance Florence, and Italian Renaissance and Baroque sculpture.