Raphael's Loggia of Cupid and Psyche in the Villa Farnesina: an analysis of the hermetic ideals related to alchemy

The progress of my dissertation in Chapter One involves a detailed and well documented analysis of the reception given the Cupid and Psyche tale, derived from the second century ‘Golden Ass’ of Apuleius, by its learned Renaissance readership. Placed among the hermetic texts considered by Italian humanists important to Christian exegesis, Apuleius’ ‘fabula’ in the’Golden Ass’ was consequently thought to contain pagan wisdom, or ‘prisca theologia’, and a “secret mystery” of pious religious import. Such revelation they believed was concealed within the narrative under the poetic veils of allegory and judged to be in harmony with the doctrines of Catholicism. The Cupid and Psyche tale was consequently given a theological value by Italian humanists, which legitimized its moral and didactic usefulness in art, just as the richness of Apuleius’ narrative lent itself over particularly well to visual representation. Chapter Two consequently analyzes the first artistic programs of the Cupid and Psyche tale, in light of the allegorical meaning Apuleius ‘fabula’ was given by Renaissance luminaries. Chapter Three continues with explaining the hermetic science that was used by Italian humanists to grasp the deeper perennial philosophy they believed was providentially put into pagan myths like the Cupid and Psyche tale. Using Paolo Cortesi’s ‘De cardinalatu’ (On the Cardinalate) and Alberti’s ‘De re aedificatoria’ (On the Art of Building), I demonstrate that the mythological subjects for Italian art at Renaissance domiciles of patrician aspect like Villa Farnesina, were made for a viewership of ‘cognoscenti’ that would tremendously impact upon Raphael’s artistic formation and the hermetic ideals it presupposes. With this as a foundation, my work continues in Chapter Four to explain precisely what those hermetic ideals were and how with examples they were embraced by Raphael in his art. My intellectual approach to explaining his art, therefore, is basically a process of reclamation and application of the hermetic science as far as we can understand it from what the humanists wrote (for example in their commentaries on the ancient poets or works by classical authors like Apuleius). My task, therefore has been to break down the barriers that have conventionally separated humanist theological hermeneutics from Renaissance art, to grasp the consequences of the relationship between them in Raphael’s work. It therefore becomes essential to explore the plurality of the phenomenon, projecting it beyond the legend of Cupid and Psyche to identify recurring allegorical and hermetic themes in Raphael’s art, while problematizing mundane interpretations. The objective, of course, will be to harness what we have learned to provide a new and more serious interpretation of the ‘Loggia of Cupid and Psyche’, the final act in which (in the words of Egidio da Viterbo) ‘all secrets will be revealed.’