Marriage chests from Renaissance Italy will be on display at the Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia from March 9 through May 26. The exhibition “Life, Love and Marriage Chests in Renaissance Italy” is organized by Contemporanea Progetti in collaboration with the Stibbert Museum, in Florence. The curator is Martina Beccatini, curator of decorative arts and paintings at the Stibbert.

During the Italian Renaissance, cassoni, as the elaborately decorated wedding chests of the time are known, were an important part of marriage rituals and were perhaps the most prestigious furnishing in the house of newlyweds. Typically, they were commissioned in pairs by the bride’s father as part of her dowry and to hold her trousseau. They were very much an expression of the family’s wealth and position in society.