Mantua's figurative art had long been influenced by the neighboring region of Emilia and in particular by the artistic innovations of Bologna. The attraction of the Bolognese school, particularly of artists like the Carracci and Guido Reni, was propagated through a wide network of collaborators and students from the beginning of the seventeenth century, both in the city of Mantua and at the court of the Gonzaga, in its seats both within and outside of the city. The fashion of quadratura painting on the one hand and the innovativeness of Bolognese artistic culture on the other are two of the reasons for the widespread influence of Emilian art on Mantuan production in the seventeenth century, not only at the court but also among the aristocratic families that gravitated around it. No school of painting left more of a mark on Mantua than the Emilian school, notwithstanding the loss of a good part of the works brought to Mantua, including the substantial losses occasioned particularly by the destruction of the Villa in Marmirolo.

The presence of Bolognese artists in Mantua and in the neighboring area during the second half of the seventeenth century has been documented in surveys by other scholars, including the syntheses of Ercolano Marani and Chiara Perina and the contributions of Raffaella Morselli, Renato Berzaghi, and Stefano L’Occaso.1 On the Bolognese front, the question has been examined by Anna Maria Matteucci, Eugenio Riccomini, Renato Roli, Marinella Pigozzi, and Deanna Lenzi.2 Lenzi noted for the first time the presence in the Marmirolo workshop of Gian Giacomo Monti, who worked as both architect and painter, and of Andrea Seghizzi, who was active as both quadratura painter and scenographer. The present essay will offer an exposition of the Gonzaga Nevers family's wide range of interests in Emilian art, based on numerous archival sources – including inventories, wills, orders, patents, bills, and letters – that provide firsthand evidence of this phenomenon.