Journal of Economic Literature
Book Reviews
2026-09-01
Neil De Marchi of Duke University reviews “The Patron’s Payoff: Conspicuous Commissions in Italian Renaissance Art” by Jonathan K. Nelson, Richard J. Zeckhauser,. The EconLit Abstract of the reviewed work begins “Presents an application of the methods of information economics to the study of art. Provides overviews of the main players--patrons, artists, and audiences; the analytic framework--benefits, costs, and constraints; theories of distinction--magnificence and signaling; and selecting and magnifying information--signposting and stretching. Includes five papers that discuss private chapels in Florence--a paradise for signalers (Jonathan K. Nelson and Richard J. Zeckhauser); commissioning familial remembrance in fourteenth-century Florence--signaling Alberti patronage at the Church of Santa Croce (Thomas J. Loughman); signs of success--Leone Leoni’s signposting in sixteenth-century Milan (Kelley Helmstutler Di Dio); Andrea Mantegna’s Madonna della Vittoria and the rewriting of Gonzaga history (Molly Bourne); and whether image is everything--visual art as self-advertising in Europe and America (Larry Silver). Nelson is Coordinator of Art History at Syracuse University Abroad in Florence. Zeckhauser is Frank P. Ramsey Professor of Political Economy in the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Index.”