The church and monastery of Brou, Bourg-en-Bresse were built under the attentive patronage of Margaret of Austria (1480--1530), Duchess of Savoy, Regent of the Netherlands and daughter of Maximilian I and Mary of Burgundy. Brou was intended to symbolically and economically secure the region for the Habsburgs as well as memorialize the glory of its patron. Located in Savoy, a strategic territory in the battle for Italy between the Habsburg Empire and France, Brou's secular and religious references, chosen by the patron herself, reflect her and her family's political needs. This paper explores Margaret of Austria's role as patron and creator of Brou, her political and propagandistic agenda, her pivotal role in its planning and construction, her architectural and stylistic choices and the results of her efforts and their reception.

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Margaret of Austria (1480--1530) ruled the Burgundian Netherlands for over twenty years and was an integral member of the joint Houses of Burgundy and Habsburg. She was also one of the most prolific patrons and collectors of her time. This dissertation examines Margaret's patronage in relation to her contemporary environment with the aim of extending and deepening our understanding of her commissions within the dynamics and discourses of the culture of the early sixteenth century. / Margaret of Austria was a highly conscientious patron and the art and architecture she commissioned intimately reflected her life. Chapter one introduces the historical facts of Margaret's life as well as issues affecting her patronage. Chapter two considers the monastery of Brou in Savoy as Margaret's architectural autobiography. Drawing on documentation and the building itself, it examines Margaret's involvement in Brou's creation. Chapter three looks at several of Margaret's other commissions such as her residence, the Palace of Savoy in Mechelen and the Convent of the Annunciate in Bruges. This chapter considers the potential goals of these projects, as ambitious as founding a capital city, embellishing her authority as a ruler, or attaining sainthood. Chapter four turns to Margaret's self-portraits, that is, images she commissioned of herself. Created in several mediums for a variety of audiences (including herself), Margaret's self-portraits portray her as everything from a widow to a goddess to a saint. Each image was designed for a specific audience and demonstrates Margaret's understanding of the function of images in negotiating a place in the contemporary world and history. Chapter five presents Margaret's view of herself as one of the rulers of a New World Empire with her pioneering collection of artefacts from the Americas. The conclusion considers the unique image of Margaret of Austria that emerges from her commissions.

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Traditionnellement perçu comme expression de la politique impériale de Marguerite d’Autriche, régente des Pays-Bas, dans le duché de Savoie dont elle était douairière en Bresse, le couvent Saint-Nicolas de Tolentin à Brou monumentalise en fait la dévotion de son défunt époux Philibert II. Le souverain avait hérité des derniers ducs de la branche aînée son inclination ignorée pour l’influente congrégation observante des Augustins de Lombardie qui participant de la création renaissante, fournit, transcrit dans un style local, le schéma claustral de Brou. L’idée maîtresse de Marguerite fut le prestige de la Renaissance, découverte au dôme Saint-Jean de Turin. A l’encontre des lectures erronées du XIXe siècle, la princesse ne s’inspira pas de Champmol. Pour son italianisme, elle confia les tombeaux et l’église au français Perréal. Seules des impossibilités pratiques l’amenèrent à recruter fin 1512 le bruxellois van Boghem. Son art et son réseau brabançons accompagnaient le tropisme ibérique de la cour de Bourgogne mais dès 1524-25, il insuffla à Brou les touches maniéristes que permettait la pénétration de la Renaissance aux Pays-Bas, plus tardive qu’en France. Le programme de l’église sotériologique emphatise la piété du duc et à un second rang, celle de la maison de Marguerite, mais aussi les devoirs du regnum, que Philibert et sa veuve exercèrent dans des pays distincts : ils culminent dans l’exercice de la justice dont le modèle est le Christ du Jugement dernier qui jadis, figurait sur le vitrail nord du transept de Brou. Marguerite signa l’œuvre : promouvant l’échange compassionnel, elle incitait autant à la conversion de chacun qu’à la prière d’intercession et à la mémoire, par-delà les siècles, de l’archiduchesse dont la naissance d’exception, impériale, avait engagé la vie et le monument d’exception. / Instead of expressing, as it is traditionally regarded, the imperial politics in Savoy of Margaret of Austria, regent of the Netherlands, the convent Saint Nicolas of Tolentino in Brou she erected in her dower of Bresse embodies the devotion of her late husband Philibert II, duke of Savoy. The sovereign had received from the last dukes of the eldest branch that unrecognized inclination towards the soaring observant congregation of the Austin Friars of Lombardia, which joined the Renaissance and provided the claustral scheme of Brou. Margaret’s main idée was the search of the Renaissance she had discovered through the Duomo San Giovanni of Torino. Against the incorrect readings of the XIXth century, she was not inspired by Champmol. She entrusted the graves and the church of Brou to the Italianizing French artist Perréal, and only practical impediments prompted her to sign on van Boghem at the end of 1512. His brabantine Gothic’s practice and circle accorded to the Spanish tropism of the burgundian court but around 1524-1525, the arrival of the Renaissance in the Netherlands allowed him to bring mannerist accents. The iconology of Brou reveals its soteriological aim. It magnifies the duke’s devotion and at a second rank, the one of Margaret’s house, but also the duties of the regnum that Philibert and his widow both practiced in different countries. Their acme is the ministry of Justice whose reference is the Christ of the Last Judgment, which once figured on the lost northern glass window of the transept. Margaret signed the work: ruled by a will of compassion and exchange, it induced anyone both to the conversion for one’s own salvation, to intercede for the princes, and to remind through ages the memory of the archduchess, whose exceptional imperial birth had involved her unique life and memorial.