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The Italian Renaissance
Subject: History
Paper: Rise of Modern West
Lesson: The Italian Renaissance
A Study of the Visual Culture of the Early Modern Era
Author: Dr Richa Raj
College/ Department: Jesus And Mary College
National Coordinator: Professor R.C Thakran,
Department of
History, University of Delhi
Reviewer: Dr Amrit Kaur Basra, Associate
Professor,Academic
Secretaty, ILLL, Deputy Dean, FSR,Uinversity of Delhi
Language Editor: Dr Shashi Khurana,Associate
Professor,Department of English, Satyawati College,
University of
Delhi
1
The Italian Renaissance
Contents:
1. Introduction
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Visual Arts in Italy: Periodization
Paintings
Sculpture
Architecture
Artists and Patrons
Visual Arts outside Italy
Summary
9. Did you know?
10. Exercise/Practice Questions
11. Glossary
12. Bibliography
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The Italian Renaissance
The Italian Renaissance
A Study of the Visual Culture of the Early Modern Era
INTRODUCTION
This chapter introduces the undergraduate student to the cultural movement of the late 14th16th centuries in Italy, known as the Renaissance. The movement flowed through various
channels such as the visual arts and the performing arts. Focussing on the former, the
chapter will discuss the reasons for the rise of the Renaissance in Italy and will navigate
through various phases of the development of the visual arts, with an eye on the styles and
techniques of individual artists, in the spheres of painting, sculpture and architecture.
European Renaissance essentially means the revival of European art and literature under the
influence of classical models in the late 14th-16th centuries. Its origins in Italy, beginning
with Florence, are attributed to several reasons. One, Italy in the middle ages comprised the
most advanced urban society, where the aristocrats lived in urban centres rather than in rural
castles unlike the aristocrats north of the Alps. The Italian aristocrats consequently became
fully involved in urban public affairs and many of them engaged in banking or mercantile
enterprises. Alternatively, many rich mercantile families adopted the manners and life-styles
of the aristocracy making ambiguous the division between the aristocracy and the
bourgeoisie. Second, late-medieval Italy was wealthier in comparison to the rest of Europe
making it easy for the Italian aristocracy and the bourgeoisie to invest in culture, a fact
boosted by the intensification of urban pride and concentration of per capita wealth. The
richest cities competed with each other in building the most magnificent public monuments
and in supporting writers whose role was to glorify the urban republics in letters and
speeches. In the course of the 15th century, the princely families began to patronise art and
literature in their courts to glorify themselves. Third, the Italians had a far greater sense of
proximity with the classical past than any other territory in Western Europe because ancient
Roman monuments were scattered throughout the Peninsula and the cities and sites
mentioned in ancient Latin literature were recognised by Renaissance Italians as their own.
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In his Philosophy of History (1837), G.W.F. Hegel, while describing the arts (such as politics,
law and religion) as so many ‘objectifications of spirit’ suggested that the flowering of the
arts, the revival of learning and the discovery of America were three related instances of
spiritual expansion. He called this phenomenon the ‘spirit of the age’.
Two explanations have been advanced by the Enlightenment writers for the emergence of
Renaissance in Italy: Liberty and Opulence. In their schema, liberty encouraged commerce,
while commerce encouraged culture. For instance, Lord Shaftesbury in Letter Concerning the
Art, or Science of Design (1712), attributed the ‘civil liberty, the free city states of Italy as
Venice, Genoa and then Florence’ to the ‘revival of painting’ there.
Later, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, in The German Ideology (1846) too emphasised the
relation between the arts and the economy. They suggested that it was the ‘economic base’
that shaped the ‘cultural superstructure’ and that how much an individual succeeded in
developing his talent depended wholly on demand, which in time depended on the division of
labour and the conditions of human culture resulting from it. Robert Lopez (1959), however,
turned this prosperity theory of culture upside down and posited a theory of ‘hard times and
investment in culture’. His study is based on the economic history of Genoa in which he
argued that the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were a period of economic recession for
Europe in general and Italy in particular. Bringing to light the fact that medieval Italy had a
booming economy and small churches, while medieval France had great cathedrals and a less
successful economy, he put forward the hypothesis that the cathedrals used up capital and
labour that could have gone into economic growth. Thus, Renaissance merchants may have
had more time to spare for cultural activities because they were less busy in office. The value
of culture, thus, ‘rose at the very moment that the value of land fell. Its returns mounted when
commercial interest rates declined.’ However, the notion of ‘investment’ is open to debate.
Ignoring the power of ‘economy’ in shaping cultural patterns, Jacob Burckhardt (1860),
attempted to relate culture to society. He saw the Renaissance as an age of individualism and
stressed the importance for Renaissance culture of the wealth and freedom of the towns of
northern Italy. In general, he analysed societies in terms of the reciprocal interaction of three
‘powers’: the state, culture and religion and singled out visual arts as the highest of all human
creativities.
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The Italian Renaissance
Another attempt was made in the 1930s to find connections between the social and cultural
history of the Renaissance. Alfred von Martin (1932) was concerned with the themes of
individualism and the origins of modernity like Burckhardt, but he placed much more
emphasis than the latter on the economic basis of the Renaissance. He called it a ‘bourgeois
revolution,’ while explaining that the nobles and the clerics were replaced as leaders of the
society by the capitalist. This social change led to the rise of a rational, calculating mentality,
which in turn nurtured culture.
Hans Baron (1966) put forward a more political explanation of the Renaissance. His study of
Florence notes the important changes in ideas that took place in the years around 1400.
According to him, about that year, Florentines suddenly became aware of their collective
identity and of the unique characteristics of their society. The rise of Florentine selfconsciousness was a response to the threat to the city’s liberty from the ruler of Milan,
Giangaleazzo Visconti, who made an unsuccessful attempt to incorporate Florence into his
empire. This awareness led them to identify with the great republics of the ancient world,
Athens and Rome, which in turn led to major changes in their culture. To become aware of
one’s ideals, there is nothing like fighting for them.
Putting all the arguments together, the Renaissance can be said to have been the result of the
culmination of spiritual, social, economic and political factors. Humanism as an intellectual
trend too played a great role in creating an interest in art, architecture and music. Humanism
encompassed the recovery of the secular and humane philosophy of Greece and Rome and
aimed to perfect all forms of art and scholarship. The emphasis on the emancipation and
dignity of men created an atmosphere of intellectual freedom and individual expression. This
promoted new trends and styles in the sphere of art as architects, sculptors and painters broke
away from the Byzantine Gothic patterns and immersed in independent expressions inspired
by a craze of classics and the love of beauty.
Visual arts emerged during this time as symbols of power and civic pride. The enthusiasm for
classical antiquity was one of the main characteristics of the Renaissance movement and this
allowed the Renaissance tradition to repudiate recent tradition (medieval scholastic
philosophy, for instance) in the name of a more ancient one. However, Peter Burke (2014)
argues that even though contemporary descriptions of the arts generally claimed to be
imitating the ancients and breaking with the recent past, in practice they borrowed from both
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The Italian Renaissance
traditions and followed neither completely. Rather than substituting the old with the new one,
the new was added to the old. Thus, classical gods and goddesses did not replace medieval
saints in Italian art but coexisted and interacted with them. For instance, Botticelli’s
‘Venuses’ are difficult to distinguish from his ‘ Madonnas’, while Michelangelo modelled the
Christ in his Last Judgement on a classical Apollo. ‘Innovation’ rather than ‘change’ is,
therefore, a more apt word to describe the new styles that emerged during the time of the
Renaissance movement.
VISUAL ARTS IN ITALY: Periodization
According to Burke, the arts between 1350 and 1550 were transformed in two ways: through
a return to nature and through a return to antiquity. The former influenced the field of
painting while the latter determined the trends in architecture.
The great era of Renaissance art (painting, sculpture, and architecture) which lasted for nearly
two hundred years is divided into three periods: Early Renaissance (1420–95), High
Renaissance (1495–1520), and Mannerism (also called the Late Renaissance; 1520s–1600).
This is not water-tight periodization as the periods overlapped, depending on the artists and
the places where they worked. The Renaissance art movement began when humanist ideas,
with a human-centred approach, were put into practice by painters, sculptors, and architects
in Florence.
While during the Middle Ages, art had a religious theme and the artist was an anonymous
vehicle for glorifying God, in the Renaissance period, human beings became the central focus
of artistic expression. Portraits of prominent people and their families emerged as a popular
theme, reflecting a dramatic shift from the idea that heavenly figures or saints were the only
worthy subjects of art. In addition, landscape painting became an important new genre. This
marked a significant change because, in medieval art, nature was simply the environment of
human beings and therefore had little significance.
Rome became the artistic capital of Europe during the High Renaissance, i.e. in the first
decade of the sixteenth century especially due to the patronage of Pope Julius II (1443–1513;
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The Italian Renaissance
reigned 1503–13). The High Renaissance was dominated by three artists in particular—
Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael—whose influence overwhelmed the following
generations. During the Late Renaissance, as a reaction against the balanced and majestic
classical forms utilized in the High Renaissance, artists developed Mannerism. Mannerism
emphasized bizarre effects: emotionalism, sense of movement, and personal expression. The
end of the Renaissance merged into the Baroque period, the term used to refer to the art,
literature, music, and philosophy of the seventeenth century.
PAINTINGS
The Theory of Painting
The theory of painting became an important field of study in the early fifteenth century. It
was embodied in the Latin treatise De pictura (1435), by Leon Battista Alberti (1404–
1472). The book marked a significant innovation in thinking about art as Alberti stressed the
creative role of the painter. He pointed out that the artist is not merely a technician who
prepares paint and applies colours to an object. During the Middle Ages artists worked as
artisans, or technicians, belonging to craft guilds along with other workers in such industries
as shoemaking, textiles (making of fabrics), and building (construction). Their main function
was to produce decorative items for the trade in luxury goods. However, Alberti pointed out,
the painter uses his or her intellect to measure, arrange, and harmonize a distinctive
creation—a work of art. Therefore, painting should be considered equal to the liberal arts
(grammar, dialectic, rhetoric, music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy), subjects
identified by classical authors and considered necessary to a civilized life by humanists.
This argument of Alberti prompted a re-evaluation of the artist, and soon the rulers of Europe
began to bring painters to their courts and start collections of works by well-known artists.
This newly-developed respect for the artist led to the productive period known as the High
Renaissance. Literally hundreds of artists were commissioned to do paintings and portraits
that decorated grand palaces and public buildings. A few figures—Leonardo da Vinci,
Michelangelo, Raphael, and Titian—stand out as the great masters of the Renaissance.
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The Italian Renaissance
Giotto di Bondone (1267-1337)
The Early Renaissance was the time of experimentation. During this time painters in Florence
and other Italian city-states such as Urbino, Ferrara, Padua, Mantua, Venice, and Milan began
to break away from the conventional and rigid forms of Byzantine art for a more expressive
form. Byzantine art was purely representational and followed a more symbolic approach
while Renaissance art aimed to mimic reality as close as possible. It is in the works of artists
like Giotto di Bondone of Florence (1267-1337), acknowledged by some scholars as the
father of Renaissance, that beginnings of new styles in Italian paintings can be located.
Though as compared to the later forms of the High Renaissance, Giotto’s block-like figures
did not look very realistic, his paintings displayed his power of expression of human
emotions and that of presenting narrative details. He made his paintings seem lifelike with the
incorporation of powerful figures, use of light, and his ability to give a spatial depth to his
compositions. His important works included Massacre of the Innocents (1306) where he
showed the massacred figures heroically nude.
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The Italian Renaissance
Source:
Massacre
of
the
Innocents
(c.
1306),
by
Giotto
di
Bondone.
http://www.artble.com/imgs/7/c/6/628633/massacre_of_the_innocents.jpg
Tommaso di Ser Giovanni di Simone (1401–1428)
The realistic approach was fully utilized about a century later in the works of the Florentine
painter, commonly known as Masaccio. Even though there is no evidence to suggest that he
was influenced by Giotto but, like the earlier artist, he depicted figures that seemed to come
to life. Unlike Giotto, however, Masaccio used the technique of linear perspective (also
known as one point perspective), devised by the Florentine architect Filippo Brunelleschi
about 1410 to depict space, to achieve the effect of light coming from one direction and
illuminating figures. This interplay of light and shadow, makes the figures seem to have three
dimensions and exist in actual space. Also, this technique gives the viewer a sense of looking
at a scene along with the painter. Masaccio’s most celebrated work is a series of frescoes in
the Brancacci Chapel in the Church of Santa Maria del Camine in Florence.
Source: Tribute Money (c. 1425–27), a fresco at Brancacci Chapel in the Church of Santa Maria del
Camine in Florence, by Masaccio. http://www.artble.com/imgs/1/f/8/123078/tribute_money.jpg
The Trinity, a fresco in the Church of Santa Maria Novella, also presents important pictorial
innovations that embody contemporary concerns and influences. The deep coffered vault is
depicted using a nearly perfect one-point system of linear perspective, in which all the
orthogonals recede to a central vanishing point. Masaccio’s Trinity is the first extant example
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The Italian Renaissance
of the systematic use of one-point perspective in a painting. One-point perspective fixes the
spectator’s viewpoint and determines his relation with the painted space.
Source:
The
Trinity
(sometime
between
c.
1425-27),
by
Masacchio.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Trinity_(Masaccio)#mediaviewer/File:Masaccio,_trinit%C3%A0.j
pg
Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Filipepi (1445-1510)
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The Italian Renaissance
Better known as Sandro Botticelli, he was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance.
Belonging to the Florentine School under the patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici, he used
classical symbolism in his paintings. Among his best known works are The Birth of Venus
(c.1486) and Primavera, also known as Allegory of Spring (c. 1482), which are essentially
‘fantasy images’ aimed to bring pleasure to the viewers. Based on the Plutonic idea that
contemplation of physical beauty allowed the mind to better understand spiritual beauty and
neo-platonic symbolism of truth, beauty and humanity, these were painted for the wealthy
house of the Medici.
In the Birth of Venus, the goddess of love (known as Aphrodite in Greek mythology) emerges
from the sea upon a shell aligned with the myth that explains her birth. Her shell is pushed to
the shore from winds being produced by the wind-gods in amongst a shower of roses. As
Venus is about to step onto the shore, a Nymph reaches out to cover her with a cloak.
Botticelli's Venus is one of the first non-biblical female nudes in Italian art and is depicted in
accordance with the classical Venus pudica.
Source:
Birth
of
Venus
(c.
1486),
http://www.artble.com/imgs/9/b/3/416525/birth_of_venus.jpg
11
by
Sandro
Botticelli.
The Italian Renaissance
Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519)
A painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist, Leonardo da Vinci was one of the
greatest figures of High Renaissance art. He mastered the art of depicting human emotions.
At the age of fifteen Leonardo was apprenticed to Andrea del Verrocchio (1435–1488), the
leading artist in Florence. Around 1478 Leonardo set up his own studio. Three years later, he
received a church commission for an altarpiece, the Adoration of the Magi. This unfinished
painting depicts the
Biblical story of the three Magi (kings), also known as the Wise Men
of the East, who travelled to Bethlehem from the East (ancient Persia; present-day Iran) to
pay respect to the new-born Jesus Christ. In his painting, Leonardo demonstrated a new
approach with the depiction of human drama through a sense of continuing movement.
Traditionally, in paintings of this story, Mary and Jesus had appeared at one side of the
picture and the Magi approached from the other side. Leonardo departed from tradition by
placing Mary and Jesus in the centre of the composition, thus illustrating a new sense of
order. He also used linear perspective to depict the ruins in the background.
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The Italian Renaissance
Source:
The
Adoration
of
Magi
(c.
1481),
by
Leonardo
da
Vinci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adoration_of_the_Magi_(Leonardo)#mediaviewer/File:Leonardo_da_Vi
nci_-_Adorazione_dei_Magi_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg
Leonardo produced his greatest works as a court artist to Ludovico Sforza (1452–1508), duke
of Milan. His first Milanese painting was the altarpiece Virgin of the Rocks. In this
composition, he experimented with dimmed light, coming from two sources, one behind the
cave and the other in front of it. The technique highlights the four figures—Mary and Jesus
and another woman and infant—in a soft, shadowy atmosphere and the pyramidal grouping
of the figures, unifies the composition and focuses the eye of the viewer on the central scene.
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The Italian Renaissance
Source:
Virgin
of
the
Rocks
(c.
1483-86),
by
Leonardo
da
Vinci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_of_the_Rocks#mediaviewer/File:Leonardo_da_Vinci__Virgin_of_the_Rocks_(Louvre).jpg
The other surviving painting of Leonardo’s years in Milan is the Last Supper (1495–97)
which was commissioned by the duke for a wall in the refectory (dining hall) of the convent
of Santa Maria delle Grazie. For this painting Leonardo decided to experiment with oil-based
paint rather than to use fresco, which makes areas of colour appear distinct and does not
allow for shading. His efforts resulted in a magnificent work as it depicted a sense of space
through the concept of linear perspective very well, but his experiment with oil-based paint
proved less than successful as the paint did not adhere well to the wall, and within fifty years
the scene had deteriorated significantly. Attempts to restore the painting in the centuries since
have been only partially successful.
Source:
The
Last
Supper
(c.
1495-97),
by
Leonardo
da
Vinci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Supper_(Leonardo_da_Vinci)#mediaviewer/File:%C3%9Alti
ma_Cena_-_Da_Vinci_5.jpg
When the French invaded Milan in 1499, Leonardo left the city-state and returned to
Florence, where he was received as a great man in Florence. During his years in the city
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The Italian Renaissance
(1500–06), he completed more projects than in any other period of his life. For instance, in
1503, Leonardo started painting the much-celebrated Mona Lisa, known for the subject’s
mysterious smile, which is in the process of either appearing or disappearing. Also known as
La Gioconda, it is a portrait of the young wife, Lisa di Anton Giocondo, of the prominent
Florentine citizen Francesco del Giocondo,
Source:
Mona
Lisa
(c.
1503),
by
Leonardo
da
Vinci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mona_Lisa#mediaviewer/File:Mona_Lisa,_by_Leonardo_da_Vinci,_fro
m_C2RMF_retouched.jpg
The last three years of Leonardo’s life were spent at Amboise, France, near the summer
palace of King Francis I (1494–1547; ruled 1515–47) where he lived as an honoured guest of
the king. Given the title of Premier peintre, architecte et méchanicien du Roi (first painter,
architect, and mechanic of the King), he spent his time on his notebooks until his death in
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The Italian Renaissance
1519. Leonardo had considerable influence on artists of his own day and later times. For
instance, in Florence, his compositions were carefully studied by Raphael. He made
contributions to every artistic form, from portraits to religious narratives and gave new
insights into figure grouping, space, individual characterization, and light and shade.
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475–1564)
Commonly known as Michelangelo, the High Renaissance was dominated by him both as a
sculptor and painter. Michelangelo was apprenticed at the age of thirteen to Domenico
Ghirlandaio (1449–1494), the most fashionable painter in Florence. After a year the
apprenticeship was broken off, and Michelangelo was given access to the collection of
ancient Roman sculpture owned by the duke of Florence.
Michelangelo’s career took a new turn in 1508, when Pope Julius II offered him a
commission to decorate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in Rome. A brilliant
representation of his work, the theme of the ceiling painting is the nine stories from the book
of Genesis in the Bible.
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The Italian Renaissance
Source: The Creation of Adam (c. 1511-12), a fresco painting from the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel,
by
Michelangelo.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallery_of_Sistine_Chapel_ceiling#mediaviewer/File:Adam_na_restaura
tie.jpg
The Sistine ceiling set a new standard in ceiling painting. Traditionally, artists would depict
only single figures, but Michelangelo introduced the portrayal of dramatic scenes. His
frescoes included a host of male biblical prophets, female sibyls (prophetesses) of antiquity, a
series of nude youths, lunettes (crescent-shaped decorative objects) with representations of
the ancestors of Jesus Christ, and other figures and decoration. The concept was so successful
that it set the standard for future painters.
In 1534, Michelangelo settled in Rome and for the next ten years he produced paintings for
Pope Paul III (1468–1549), the first project being the Last Judgment (1536–41), a vast
painting on the end wall of the Sistine Chapel. The 1530s was the decade when Pope Paul III
had initiated the Catholic Reformation, a wide-ranging effort to revitalize the Roman
Catholic Church. In the Last Judgment Michelangelo used sombre tones which seem to
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The Italian Renaissance
parallel the ideas of the Catholic Reformation, which called for a renewed emphasis on
spirituality. On both sides of the painting, there are angels being directed by Jesus Christ;
some push the damned down to hell on one side and some pull up the saved on the other side.
Source:
The
Last
Judgment
(c.
1536-41);
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Judgment_(Michelangelo)#mediaviewer/File:Michelangelo,_G
iudizio_Universale_02.jpg
Raffaello Sanzio (1483–1520)
The Italian painter and architect, called Raphael, is considered the supreme representative of
the High Renaissance. After the death of his father, who was also a painter and his trainer, in
1494, Raphael joined the workshop of Perugino (also known as Pietro Vannucci; c. 1450–
1523), the most renowned painter in central Italy at the time.
Raphael went to Rome in 1508 to decorate Pope Julius’s apartment, the Stanza della
Segnatura, at the Vatican. His work on philosophy, entitled The School of Athens, consists of
panels representing the four areas of divinely inspired human intellect: theology, poetry,
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The Italian Renaissance
philosophy, and law. Considered one of Raphael’s greatest achievements, the work consists
of two central figures of the idealist Plato, who points heavenward, and the realist Aristotle,
who gestures toward the ground. Around them are grouped many other classical philosophers
and scientists, each indicating clearly by expression and gesture the character of his intellect.
Source:
The
School
of
Athens
(c.
1508-11),
by
Raffaello
Sanzio
(Raphael);
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_School_of_Athens#mediaviewer/File:Sanzio_01.jpg
The precision in Raphael’s painting technique in the School of Athens contributes to a
balanced effect and conveys a sense of quiet grandeur. Soon thereafter, Raphael became
popular with Roman patrons and commissions of all sorts poured into his workshop during
the last six years of his life. As a result, Raphael made major contributions to painting. He
invented new modes of composing a picture, especially in the area of gesture and movement.
Apart from being a master of linear perspective, which was evolving throughout the High
Renaissance, Raphael also invented the concept of modes of colouring, in that he was the first
to select a colour style to match a project. In the traditional workshop of the fifteenth century,
a master typically had only one colour style, which he taught to his apprentices, and
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The Italian Renaissance
therefore, Raphael’s technique was an innovation. As a result, the next generation of painters
was inspired to vary their choice of colours with each commission and to develop new
modes.
Tiziano Vecellio (1488–1576)
Commonly known as Titian, he was a great master of religious art, a portraitist in demand all
over Europe, and the creator of mythological compositions. He achieved fame as an
interpreter of classical mythology with three paintings—Andrians, the Worship of Venus, and
Bacchus and Ariadne—which he composed for the castle of Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara
between 1518 and 1523. One of his best-known early works is the Assumption of the Virgin
(1516–18), whose dynamic three-tier composition and colour scheme established him as the
preeminent painter north of Rome marked the triumph of the High Renaissance in Venice. ws
the Virgin Mary soaring with arms outstretched to heaven. It took Titian two years to
complete his Assunta.
During the 1520s Titian produced masterpieces such as the Madonna and Child with Saints
Francis and Aloysius (1520), the Resurrection (1522), and the Pesaro Madonna (1519–26).
In the Pesaro Madonna, the way he used colour, light, and atmosphere established a new
formula for Venetian altars. The Martyrdom of St. Peter Martyr (c. 1526–30; destroyed
1867), once regarded as Titian’s greatest masterpiece, depicted a new feeling for heroic and
dramatic action. It was influenced by the art of Michelangelo and central Italian painters.
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The Italian Renaissance
Source: The Worship of Venus (c. 1518-19),
an
oil-on-canvas
painting
depicting
a Roman rite of worship conducted in honour
of the goddess Venus. Titian based the image
Source: The Assumption of the Virgin (c.
1516–1518),
by
on
Titian.
the
writings
of
the
Greek sophist Philostratus.
.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titian#mediavie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Worship_of_
wer/File:Tizian_041.jpg
Venus#mediaviewer/File:Ofrenda_a_Venus.jp
g
In 1545 Titian travelled to Rome at the invitation of Pope Paul III and witnessed for the first
time the glories of ancient Rome as well as the masterpieces of Raphael and Michelangelo.
During his brief stay in the city, he painted Paul III and His Grandsons, which depicts a
dramatic encounter between the aged pope and his scheming grandsons. It is considered one
of the most psychologically revealing works in the history of portraiture. Further, Titian
mastered the art of innovative portraits when in 1548 Charles V called him to Augsburg,
Germany. There he painted the celebrated equestrian portrait, Charles V at Mühlberg, which
commemorated the emperor’s victory over the German Protestants in the Battle of Mühlberg
21
The Italian Renaissance
in 1547. In this work Titian presents the ruler as a symbol of power. (1557–64). Titian
continued to explore the depths of human character in his portraits until the end of his life.
Source: Pope Paul III and his Grandsons (c.
Titian.
Source: Charles V at Mühlberg (c. 1548), a
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Paul_III_an
tribute by Titian to Charles V, Holy Roman
d_His_Grandsons#mediaviewer/File:Titian_-
Emperor, following his victory in the Battle of
_Pope_Paul_III_with_his_Grandsons_Alessan
Mühlberg (April 1547) against the Protestant
dro_and_Ottavio_Farnese_-_WGA22985.jpg
armies.
1545-46),
by
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equestrian_Portra
it_of_Charles_V#mediaviewer/File:Carlos_V_
en_M%C3%BChlberg,_by_Titian,_from_Prad
o_in_Google_Earth.jpg
Michelangelo Merisi (or Amerighi) da Caravaggio (1573-1610)
22
The Italian Renaissance
Caravaggio was among the most innovative painters of the Late Renaissance. After serving
an apprenticeship and studying painting in Milan, he appeared in Rome around 1590. He
depicted insolent boys and rough peasants in the guise of Roman gods and Christian saints in
his works. He used a technique known as chiaroscuro (contrasts of light and dark) to portray
these figures as if they were emerging out of darkness, with part of their faces and bodies
illuminated by a bright light. The early works of Caravaggio depict his revolt against both
mannerism and classicism. He rejected the elongated figures and curvilinear shapes of the
mannerists and also ridiculed the concept of the classicists that the subject of a painting
should be idealized. In Bacchus with a Wine Glass (c. 1595), Caravaggio showed not a
Roman god but instead a pudgy, half-naked boy draped in a bed sheet; he is identified as
Bacchus only by the vine leaves in his hair.
Source: Bacchus with a Wine Glass (c. 1595)
by
Caravaggio.
http://www.artble.com/imgs/8/d/0/821051/bac
chus.jpg
23
The Italian Renaissance
Source: Crucifixion of St. Peter (c. 1601), by
Caravaggio.
http://www.artble.com/imgs/d/d/9/816561/cruc
ifixion_of_saint_peter.jpg
Caravaggio was able to make a scene look as if it is taking place before the viewer’s eyes.
For instance, in his Crucifixion of St. Peter, for example, the saint is depicted at the moment
when the executioners are beginning to raise up the cross to which he has been nailed upside
down. His bare feet are thrust toward the viewer and the aged but powerful apostle lifts his
head up from the cross in defiance. Such scenes reflect the efforts of the Catholic
Reformation to appeal directly to the masses through their emotions.
Women Painters
Among the women artists who emerged during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in
Italy were the painters Sofonisba Anguissola and Artemisia Gentileschi, both of whom
gained equal stature with male artists by breaking out of the tradition that discouraged
achievement by women.
Sofonisba Anguissola (1532–1625)
24
The Italian Renaissance
The Italian painter Sofonisba Anguissola was the first woman to establish an artistic identity
and produce a substantial body of work. She experimented with narrative portraits, each of
them telling a story, which proved to be ahead of their time at the end of the sixteenth
century, when nature scenes and genre scenes (such as crucifixion, Resurrection, still life)
were the main interests of Italian art. Her specialization in portraits and self-portraits were
shaped by the restraints placed on women at the time. Women artists were not allowed to
study anatomy or male models, thereby preventing them from gaining access to large-scale
history paintings. Her trademark style is the depiction of animated faces, firmly drawn within
a delicate surrounding. Her earliest known works are the Portrait of a Nun (1515) and the
Self-Portrait of 1554. Portrait painting did not receive much respect at the time, but
Anguissola used it as a metaphor for artistic achievement. In The Chess Game (1555), she
depicted her sisters Lucia, Europa, and Minerva at the chess board. This painting, meant to
demonstrate female excellence at an intellectual game, also hinted at the sisters’ shared
history as aspiring artists who competed with and learned from one another.
Source: Sofonisba Anguissola, The Chess
Game (c. 1555) by Sofonisba Anguissola.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofonisba_Anguis
sola#mediaviewer/File:The_Chess_Game__Sofonisba_Anguissola.jpg
Source: The Penitent Magdalen (c. 1617–20)
by
Artemisia
Gentileschi.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arte
misia_Gentileschi_-
25
The Italian Renaissance
_The_Penitent_Mary_Magdalen_-
_WGA8567.jpg
Artemisia Gentileschi (1592–1653)
Gentileschi was born in Rome and trained as a painter by her father, Orazio Gentileschi.
When she was seventeen she was allegedly raped by Orazio’s colleague, the painter Agostino
Tassi and in 1611 Orazio brought legal action against Tassi for the same. Gentileschi’s family
quickly arranged her marriage to a Florentine artist in 1612. But eventually she separated
from him and led an unusually independent life, in Florence, for a woman of her time. As a
result of these events, she was portrayed as a sexual libertine in the eighteenth century,
though there is no firm evidence to support this view. By the time of her marriage she had
already become an accomplished artist and during her stay in Florence, she received many
commissions from Michelangelo and Duke Cosimo II de’ Medici (1590–1621). Nearly all of
her pictures portray women in the central role. The characterizations are emotional without
being sentimental, concentrating on psychology and action. Her works feature attractive
figures and sparkling costumes painted in a crisp style. Scholars note that her father Orazio
may have contributed to the paintings, which also reflect the influence of the Caravaggio
school in the use of sharp contrasts between light and shadow. Nevertheless, the pictures
show some distinctive traits of Gentileschi’s own style, such as the depiction of authentic
emotions as evidenced in one of her masterpieces, The Penitent Magdalen (1617–20).
SCULPTURE
The Italian Renaissance sculpture can be categorised into three periods. The first marks the
transition from the later Middle Ages, ending around 1400, at which time sculptors were
incorporating numerous trends that were beginning to emerge in the late medieval period,
such as more realistic figures, dramatic expression, and intense movement. With the humanist
movement gaining momentum in Florence, sculptors were also becoming more aware of
ancient Roman art. Renaissance sculpture really began during the second phase, as most
26
The Italian Renaissance
historians would agree, which took place in the 1400s and was dominated by the activity of
artists in Florence.
The single event that many consider the beginning of the Renaissance sculpture is the
competition for a second set of bronze doors for the Baptistery of Florence in 1402. The
winner was the prominent sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti, but his student, Donatello, is regarded
as the first true Renaissance sculptor. The career of Donatello marked the peak of the High
Renaissance in sculpture. This period reflects intense artistic activity and portrayed the civic
pride of Florence, which was linked to the democratic values of the Roman Republic.
Autocratic leaders who were strengthening their rule used sculpture as a display of wealth.
The third phase covers the sixteenth century when the depiction of grandeur and power
increasingly assumed a major role, influencing sculptors’ interpretations of human bodies and
actions. This approach is known as the mannerist style, which often featured free-standing
statues with elongated bodies depicting dramatic movement.
Lorenzo Ghiberti (1378–1455)
Best known for his doors for the baptistery of Florence Cathedral (Gates of Paradise; 1425–
52), Ghiberti is considered one of the greatest Italian sculptors in the Quattrocento. He
presented stories from the New Testament and the Old Testament on the bronze doors of the
baptistery by using a new technique of linear perspective and created a sense of space in his
figures. These panels became so famous that they were described by Michelangelo as ‘the
Doors of Paradise.’ Ghiberti succeeded in securing the commission for this work by ousting
another famous sculptor, Fillipo Brunelleschi, who left sculpture to become the greatest
architect of the Renaissance period.
27
The Italian Renaissance
Source: The Story of Adam and Eve, a panel from the Gates of Paradise, by Lorenzo Ghiberti.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Baptistery#mediaviewer/File:AdamEveGhiberti.jpg
Donatello (1386-1466)
The Italian sculptor Donatello was the most influential Florentine sculptor before
Michelangelo. He was apprenticed to Lorenzo Ghiberti, the most prominent sculptor in
Florence at that time. The life-sized marble statue David (1408), set up in the Palazzo
Vecchio, the city hall, in 1414 as a symbol of the Florentine republic, was one of his earlier
significant works. In his work the forms seemed to emerge from atmosphere and light.
Donatello was probably influenced by the one-point perspective studies of the architect
Filippo Brunelleschi.
Between 1415 and 1435 Donatello and his pupils completed eight life-sized marble
representations of the Hebrew prophets (wise men in the Old Testament), portraying
psychological tension and deliberately emphasized physical ugliness, for the cathedral in
Florence. Much of Donatello’s later work revealed his understanding of classical art. An
example is the bronze statue David in the Bargello, featuring a young boy clothed only in
28
The Italian Renaissance
boots and a pointed hat. This enigmatic figure is in all probability the earliest existing
freestanding nude since antiquity.
Source: David (c. 1440s), by Donatello.
http://www.artble.com/imgs/5/7/d/34976/5582
23.jpg
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475–1564)
It is with sculpture that Michelangelo began his career, and then went on to also become a
renowned artist and architect. He obtained his first important commission in 1498, the largerthan-life Pietà, which is now in Saint Peter’s Basilica. With the Pietà, he began to be
recognized as the most talented sculptor in central Italy, in which he made hard polished
marble resemble soft flesh. He was then commissioned to do the marble sculpture, David,
one of his best-known works, which was placed in front of the Palazzo Vecchio. Pope Julius
29
The Italian Renaissance
II called him to Rome in 1505 to offer a commission to design the pope’s tomb, which was to
include about forty life-size statues. This project occupied Michelangelo off and on for the
next forty years.
Source: Pietà (c. 1498–99), St Peter's Basilica, by Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni
(Michelangelo).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelangelo#mediaviewer/File:Michelangelo%27s_Pieta_5450_cut_out
_black.jpg
Michelangelo was commissioned in 1520 to execute a tomb chapel for two young Medici
dukes. The Medici Chapel (1520–34), is the most nearly complete large sculptural project of
Michelangelo’s career and is considered a Renaissance model. The two tombs, each with an
image of the deceased and two allegorical figures, are placed against elaborately decorated
walls. On the tomb titled ‘Day and Night’ the figures of day and night recline on a curved lid,
as do the figures of Dawn and Dusk on the tomb titled ‘Dawn and Dusk’. Political leaders
were becoming more powerful at the time, and Michelangelo’s statues were often used as
30
The Italian Renaissance
models for portraits that depicted emperors, popes, kings, and dukes. In 1534 Michelangelo
left Florence for the last time and settled in Rome.
Source: The Medici Chapel (c. 1520–34), tomb of Giulino de Medici, depicting Dawn and Dusk.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medici_Chapel#mediaviewer/File:Life_of_Michael_Angelo,_1912__Tomb_of_Giulino_de_Medici.jpg
Other sculptors
Of the sculptors of mid-sixteenth century, Benvenuto Cellini (c. 1500–1571), who was
trained as a goldsmith, emerges as the most prominent. He made monumental sculptures such
31
The Italian Renaissance
as the gigantic bronze Perseus (completed 1554), which stands in the Loggia dei Lanzi in
Florence.
In the latter part of the sixteenth century, the French-born sculptor Giovanni da Bologna
(1529–1608), who worked in Italy, created monumental figure groups, amongst whom the
Rape of the Sabines (completed 1583) and Hercules Fighting a Centaur (completed 1599),
are the most famous. The autocratic leaders made effective use of sculpture to promote
themselves and their luxurious way of life. For instance, Bologna’s equestrian bronze portrait
of Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici (1519–1574) was completed in 1595 and placed in the Piazza
della Signoria in Florence. Sculptural decorations of buildings also became prominent as
Jacopo Sansovino, the architect for the city of Venice, made his architecture appear more
luxurious by freely integrating sculpture into the design. Eventually, sixteenth-century Italian
sculpture influenced the baroque style of the seventeenth century and had an impact on the
rest of Europe.
ARCHITECTURE
As part of the humanist-influenced effort to revive classical culture, many architects were
active in Italy during the Renaissance. Involved in refurbishing old buildings and
constructing new ones according to the style found in Roman ruins thus reviving the glories
of the ancient Roman Republic, architects also designed structures to symbolize the growing
power of their wealthy patrons, primarily political leaders and popes from prominent
families. Features of this style included simple but impressive building shapes, columns from
the three basic classical orders (Corinthian, Doric, and Ionic), porticos (entrance porches),
and loggias (roofed open galleries overlooking courtyards).
The rebirth of classical architecture took place during the fifteenth century. In the sixteenth
century there was an increasing trend toward Mannerism in the late Renaissance where
Mannerist architects rejected the classical style and emphasized unusual treatment of space,
wall surfaces, and decorative details. Among the most prominent Renaissance architects were
Filippo Brunelleschi in the Early Renaissance, Bramante in the High Renaissance and
Michelangelo in the Mannerist period. One of the best-known Renaissance architects was
32
The Italian Renaissance
Andrea Palladio, who worked during the mannerist period but sought to restore the style of
the High Renaissance.
Architectural Theory
The Renaissance artists in all media were interested in reviving the forms of classical
antiquity and using these as the inspiration for new work. For inspiration, the sculptors
looked to the corpus of extant statues from antiquity, and the poets, to the libraries of
classical literature. But the architects had only one ancient text that focused exclusively on
their discipline: Marcus Vitruvius Pollio’s, De Architectura Libri Decem, a Roman treatise
written at the end of the first century B.C.E. Vitruvius wrote De Architectura in an age when
public monuments and civic improvements were being constructed on a vast scale. In the
book, Vitruvius has asserted that a structure must exhibit the three qualities of being solid,
useful and beautiful. For him, architecture is an imitation of nature: as birds and bees built
their nests, so humans constructed housing from natural materials, to protect themselves
against the elements. He further stated that the Greeks invented the architectural
orders: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian, which gave them a sense of proportion, culminating in
understanding the proportions of the greatest work of art: the human body. This was how the
Greeks perfected the art of building.
With the invention of the printing press in the mid-fifteenth century, many architectural
books began to emerge which served the architects as primary means of communicating ideas
and vehicles to explore theoretical as well as practical aspects. These books were structured
around Vitruvius’s book, as their authors sought to match the buildings described in the
ancient text with the ruins of those buildings before them in the present, to compare ancient
ruins with contemporary architectural designs, and to adapt Vitruvius’s prescriptions for
building to the practicalities of building in a modern world. Vitruvius’s ancient text,
therefore, became not only the inspiration but also the primary model for the first
architectural books of the Renaissance.
Carolyn Yerkes (2013) shows how the treatise on architecture by the Renaissance architect,
Andrea Palladio (c. 1508-80), I Quattro Libri Dell’architettura (Four Books on Architecture),
33
The Italian Renaissance
first published in 1570, served as an effective medium for clarifying, preserving, and
circulating theoretical ideas. Palladio drew inspiration from surviving Roman buildings and
Roman authors, especially Vitruvius. Palladio’s greatest architectural work, the Villa
Rotonda, is as much an expression of his architectural theory as his books.
Filippo Brunelleschi (1377–1446)
Brunelleschi was an architect, goldsmith, and sculptor. Considered the first Renaissance
architect, he formulated the concept of linear perspective, which influenced the depiction of
space in painting and sculpture until the late nineteenth century. His refined classical style
was inspired by twelfth-century Tuscan architecture and by the buildings of ancient Rome.
He used the Corinthian style, the most ornate of the three ancient Greek architectural orders,
almost exclusively, which is characterized by large capitals (caps on the tops of columns)
decorated with acanthus (a prickly herb) leaves.
In 1420 Brunelleschi was employed to complete the cathedral of Florence, a Gothic structure.
The Florentines had wanted their cathedral to be crowned by an imposing cupola, a duomo,
which was a rather difficult task and one which no artist had been able to achieve.
Brunelleschi successfully devised a new style by using stone and iron chains serving as barrel
hoops, embedded within the inner dome. He used classical forms such as columns and
pediments to achieve harmony and beauty. He is said to have travelled to Rome and
personally studied the ruins of the temples and palaces and made sketches of their
ornamentation and forms.
In the meantime Brunelleschi was consulted on projects in Pisa, Mantua, and Ferrara, and in
1433 he was again in Rome to study the antiquities. After returning to Florence in 1434
Brunelleschi worked on central plan churches. Considered the ideal design during the
Renaissance, this type of church is in the shape of a Greek cross, with four equal wings
extending from a central circle. In 1436 Brunelleschi designed a basilican church in Florence,
Santo Spirito (constructed 1444–82), which shows great concern for a unified composition.
The interior is carefully organized to create a very harmonious space that is the ideal of
34
The Italian Renaissance
Renaissance architecture. Brunelleschi’s architecture remained influential in Florence
through the sixteenth century.
Source: The Basilica of Santa Maria del Santo
Spirito,
Florence,
Italy,
designed
by
Brunelleschi. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sa
nto_Spirito,_Florence#mediaviewer/File:Santo
_Spirito_Firenze_interno.jpg
Donato Bramante (1444–1514)
Bramante was the first High Renaissance architect as he transformed the classical
architecture initiated by Brunelleschi into a grave and monumental style that represented the
ideal for later architects. He became the court architect for the Sforza family, the rulers of
Lombardy (the region that includes Milan) around 1481. His first important commission
began in 1482 with the reconstruction of the church of Santa Maria presso San Satiro in
Milan. He encountered a challenge with this project because it was a basilica church with
transept (part that crosses the nave) and dome over the crossing not allowing enough space
for a deep choir (the part of the church where the service is performed). Through the
ingenious use of perspective in sculptural and painted relief, Bramante gave the illusion of a
35
The Italian Renaissance
deep choir space when in fact the area was quite shallow. When the French captured Milan in
1499, Bramante fled to Rome.
Bramante explored ancient Roman monuments to seek inspiration for his designs. The impact
of Roman architecture is evident in his cloister of Santa Maria della Pace in Rome (1500–04).
Source: Santa Maria della Pace (c. 1500–04),
Rome.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Maria_dell
a_Pace
In 1503, after the election of Pope Julius II, Bramante became the official papal architect. He
did extensive work in the Vatican Palace. In 1513, he was bestowed the office of Piombatore,
or sealer of the papal briefs, by the pope.
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475–1564)
The great Renaissance painter and sculptor, Michelangelo, was an equally accomplished
architect. He was appointed to direct construction of Saint Peter’s Basilica, in 1547, by Pope
Paul III. Saint Peter’s Basilica is the largest church in the Christian world and the symbol of
papal authority. Its design being altered by many artists, the Church it is now considered the
crowning achievement of Renaissance architecture.
During the reign of Pope Pius IV (reigned 1559–65), Michelangelo designed the Porta Pia,
converted the Roman Baths of Diocletian into the Christian church of Santa Maria segli
Angeli, and designed the Sforza Chapel in Santa Maria Maggiore. Thus, as an urban planner
and an architect, Michelangelo helped to transform the appearance of Rome.
36
The Italian Renaissance
Source: Designed principally by Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno and Gian Lorenzo
Bernini,
St.
Peter's
is
the
most
renowned
work
of Renaissance
architecture.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Peter's_Basilica
Andrea Palladio (1508–1580)
Palladio is one of the important architects most closely associated with the Renaissance. He
was greatly influenced by Gian Giorgio Trissino (1478–1550), a humanist and aristocrat.
Through Trissino, he was first exposed to humanist education, learned Latin, and was
introduced to the treatise on architecture by Marcellus Vitruvius Pollio (Vitruvius; first
century B.C.), the ancient Roman architect and engineer. Palladio spent much of his time in
Rome studying and surveying the Roman ruins as evident from his preserved drawings. The
breakthrough in his career as an architect came in the late 1540s, when the city council of
Vicenza commissioned him to complete the facade of the Basilica, the city’s public palace.
Palladio’s contribution to Renaissance architecture was his popularization of the classical
villa, or large country house. Villas functioned as homes for noblemen on agricultural estates.
Palladio’s most famous structure was the Villa Rotonda, known also as Villa Capra, which
was built for the retired papal secretary Paolo Almerico in the late 1560s. During the latter
part of his career he began working on churches, the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore, which
was started in 1566, being his greatest ecclesiastical building. Palladio succeeded Jacopo
Sansovino (1486–1570) as the main architectural adviser for the Venetian republic. The ten
years from this appointment until his death in 1580 were marked by one grand project, the
votive church of Redentore. Many scholars consider Palladio to be the foremost Renaissance
architect. His Four Books on Architecture is an important treatise that shifts focus from
theory to practice by showing how classical ideas were used in Renaissance buildings.
37
The Italian Renaissance
Source: Villa La Rotonda, a Renaissance villa just outside Vicenza, northern Italy, designed
by Andrea
Palladio.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Capra_%22La_Rotonda%22#mediaviewer/File:Larotonda2009.JP
G
Palladio had an immense influence on architects not only in Italy but across Europe. Interest
in his work was kept alive by architects even in the twentieth century, when they were again
revisiting Palladio’s use of details from the classical orders.
ARTISTS AND PATRONS
The Renaissance period propelled a major shift in the position of the artistes on the social
ladder. On the changing social status of the Renaissance artist, Arnold Hauser (1962)
commented that the increased demands for works of art in the Renaissance led to the ascent
of the artist from the level of the petty bourgeois artisan to that of the free intellectual worker,
a class which had previously never had any roots but which now had begun to develop into
an economically secure and socially consolidated, even though by no means uniform, group.
From being technicians, such as ‘goldsmiths’ or ‘stonemasons’ in the Middle Ages, the
artistes emerge as ‘grand masters’ depending on their individual geniuses.
38
The Italian Renaissance
Similarly, Geraldine A. Johnson (2005) has pointed out that whereas in past centuries, artists’
names had generally not been recorded for posterity except accidentally in contracts and
similar workaday documents and had almost never appeared on individual works of art, by
the fifteenth century some artists had begun trying to distinguish themselves from their
artisan and craftsmen brethren by signing some of their works. An example is Jan van Eyck’s
boldly scrawled name on the back wall of the Arnolfini Portrait. This trend became even
more apparent in the sixteenth century, when signatures began to appear much more
frequently on paintings, sculptures, prints, and sometimes even drawings.
This change in the social status of the artistes was mainly due to the increase in the varied
kinds of patronage extended to them. Peter Burke has distinguished three main motives for
art patronage in the period: piety, prestige and pleasure. He further classifies patrons in
various ways. The Church was traditionally the great patron of art, and this is one of the
reasons for the predominance of religious paintings in Europe during the period.
Alternatively, most paintings were also commissioned by laymen (non-ordained member of a
Church). They could order a painting for a church (for their family chapel, for example) or to
hang in their own homes (the Medici family did this). A second kind of patronage was
extended to the artistes was the guild patronage as guilds were interested in both paintings
and sculptures. For instance, the wool guild of Florence, the Arte della Lana, was responsible
for the upkeep of the cathedral, involving new commissions; one to Donatello for the statue
of the Prophet Jeremiah, another to Michelangelo for his David.
The fraternities were another kind of corporate patrons. A fraternity was, in effect, a religious
and social club, usually attached to a particular club, which performed works of charity, and
sometimes also acted as a bank. Leonardo’s Virgin of the Rocks was commissioned by a
fraternity in Milan. The membership of these fraternities extended to men and women, nobles
and commoners. Burke highlights the importance of these organizations in the history of art
because they made possible the participation in patronage of people who did not have the
money to commission works individually.
Another kind of corporate patronage was the state, whether republic or principality. For
instance, the Signoria, the government of Florence, commissioned Leonardo’s Battle of
Anghiari. Such patronage was extended to enhance the urban aesthetics of the states. Princely
states too patronised works of art as the prestige acquired by art patronage could be of
39
The Italian Renaissance
political value to the ruler. The Renaissance architect and sculptor, Filarete (c. 1400-69), is
known to have remarked, ‘In the end, when a large building is completed there is neither
more nor less money in the country, but the building does remain in the country or city
together with its reputation or honour.’
Lastly, individuals having attained humanist education are also known to have harboured the
desire for procuring works for art for their own sake. For instance, the children of the ruling
house of Este at Ferrara became patrons of the arts after having been educated by the
humanisi, Guarino of Verona. Thus, the study of humanities, with its human-centred
approach, seems to have encouraged a taste for paintings and statues.
The social preconditions thus cannot be ruled out. In an important study of the economic and
social foundations of the fifteenth-century art, Michael Baxandall (1972) argued that the
concept of the Renaissance painter’s style developed out of the particular social context of
fifteenth-century Florence, where skill or virtuosity was valued above all other characteristics
of the visual culture. It was in Florence, that the intimate connection between the individual
style of a named artist and the technological conditions of a work of art was established that
became so important for the history of western art. Thus, according to Baxandall, a particular
historical situation created generated a concept of style based on skill.
VISUAL ARTS OUTSIDE ITALY
Historians have often debated on whether a simultaneous cultural movement developed
across the Alps which was either divorced from or impacted by the Renaissance in Italy. The
Dutch historian, Johan Huizinga, in his famous book, Autumn of the Middle Ages (1919),
evoked the idea of an Italian cultural world coexisting with the Franco-Flemish world. J.R.
Hale (2000) also speaks of ‘two Renaissance’ in the fifteenth century, with their respective
centres in the most urbanised regions in Europe at this time: Northern Italy and southern
Netherlands.
The court of Burgundy, for example, associated with cultural innovations, was a cultural
model for much of Europe in the fifteenth century. For instance, oil painting like the use of
canvas instead of wood is attributed to Jan van Eyck, a leading painter at the Burgundian
40
The Italian Renaissance
court. In fact, the art of painting on canvas was introduced to Italy from the Netherlands in
the 1470s. In fact, Gordon Kipling (1977) has argued that the English Renaissance owed
more to Burgundy than it did to Italy as Henry VII of England was a patron of French and
Flemish artists and writers.
Peter Burke finds the idea of two parallel renaissances in the north and the south quite
interesting. Yet, he points out two things: one, unlike the circle of innovators in early
fifteenth-century Florence, the Burgundian artists and writers did not make any sharp break
with what went before them. For instance, Claus Sluter, a northern Netherlander sculptor, like
Donatello is known for the individuality of his figures and the expression of his emotions.
But unlike Donatello, he was not inspired by classical statues and thus his work looks more
traditional. Burke, therefore, looks at Burgundian art in terms of continuity rather than
change, the elaboration of medieval traditions rather than the pursuit of innovation.
Second, the independence of the two renaissances from each other should not be
overemphasized, according to Burke. The concern for the revival of the classical tradition
was not confined to Italy even in the fourteenth century. For example, Charles, the Bold,
Duke of Burgundy, was educated by a tutor with humanist values. Thus, Italy had no
monopoly over classical tradition in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Yet, it was in Italy
that this tradition affected the arts, especially the visual arts more deeply. One cannot,
therefore, ignore the importance of the spread of ideas and cultural forms from Florence,
Rome, Venice, Milan and other parts of Italy to Europe across the Alps. Cultural exchanges
between the north, especially the Netherlands, and the south, especially Italy became
important in shaping the Renaissance in Europe.
Dissemination of Renaissance Art:
The universities, from the middle of the fifteenth century, became important sites for the
reception of ideas from Italy as some Italian emigrants were employed as lecturers there.
Examples are Filippo Beroaldo and Fausto Andrelini, both of whom taught at the University
of Paris. The chanceries and courts too acted as important sites of the reception of the
Renaissance. For instance, Petrarch, the Italian scholar and poet in Renaissance Italy and also
known as the ‘father of humanism’ is said to have advised the King of Hungary to employ
41
The Italian Renaissance
someone in the chancery who could write good Latin. King Rene´ of Anjou discovered
Italian culture and became acquainted with Italian scholars and artists while he besieged
Naples from 1438 to 1441. Cultural exchanges also took place with the French invasion of
Italy in 1494. Charles VIII is known to have taken with him the artist, Guido Mazzoni, as
early as 1495, together with the paintings, statues and tapestries as part of the loot. Francis I
was also impressed by Italian art when he invaded Italy in 1515. He saw the Last Supper at
Milan and invited its creator Leonardo da Vinci to France. Michelangelo was also invited to
France by the King.
Margareta of Austria was a patron of painters, sculptors and architects. Italian artists spent
time in her courts. They were in demand in other parts of Europe too. For instance, in
England, Torrigiano made the tomb of King Henry VII while Maiano and Rovezzano worked
for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the English statesman.
Conversely, artists as well as humanists from the rest of Europe went to Italy to study during
this time. The great German painter, Albrecht Dürer, is known to have visited Venice twice to
gained inspiration from the Italians. In return, he himself influenced them through his
engravings and woodcuts; his landscapes especially inspiring several Italian painters. Dürer
was known for his experimental methods and beautiful water colour paintings of animals and
plant life. He borrowed the use of perspective from the Italian artists and like them he
displayed a fascination for human nude forms. Interestingly, his nudes were depicted with fig
leaves
depicting
the
conservative
traditions
of
northern
Europe
(perhaps, being inspired by the ideals of Erasmus who suspected classical forms as
expressions of paganism), thus portraying his art as a blend of northern and southern
traditions. The woodcut technique which was already popular in Germany reached new
heights of expressiveness in the works of Dürer as his figures had a three-dimensional thrust
which was not seen in earlier woodcuts.
42
The Italian Renaissance
Source: Adam and Eve (c. 1507), by Albrecht
Dürer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albrecht_D%C3
%BCrer
Thus, even though art outside of Italy was inspired by Italian Renaissance, it was unique in its
content as emulation sometimes took different and opposite forms. For example, King
Manuel I of Portugal sent two artists to study in Italy. Yet, the consequent ‘Manueline’ style
in architecture, named so in the nineteenth century after the King, is distinguished by
exuberant ornamentation, a style which is different from both the classical and Gothic. This is
exemplified by the Jeronimite monastery at Bele´m, just outside Lisbon, where the
ornaments’ playful reference to the Portuguese sea-borne empire, including seaweed, coral,
lotuses and crocodiles, make a remarkable declaration of independence from both traditional
and contemporary models.
43
The Italian Renaissance
Source: The Western portal of the Jeronimite Monastery (c. 1517), by sculptor Nicolau Chanterene.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jer%C3%B3nimos_Monastery#mediaviewer/File:Westernportal_jeronim
osmonastery.JPG
SUMMARY
The Renaissance, essentially meaning ‘rebirth’ or revisiting and redefining classical arts and
values, as a cultural trend spread over more than two centuries, was influenced by the humancentred intellectual movement known as Humanism. It began and flourished in Italy, due to
its urban life and proximity to Roman antiquities, with cultural consequences in the rest of
Europe. In the sphere of the visual arts, several contributions were made by the artists, such
as painters, sculptors and architects, to enhance the cultural activity of their respective
regions. One particular innovation was the use of ‘linear perspective’ in all media which
helped the artist in creating a sense of space in their work. That the invention of perspective
led to the beginning of the history of art has been argued by Hubert Damisch (1987). The
Renaissance also enabled the artists to rise on the social ladder as an increase in patronage
from either church, guilds, fraternities, states or individuals enhanced their prestige in the
society. The Italian Renaissance also impacted and influenced the art world across the Alps
through various kinds of cultural exchanges. Yet, the art of each area was able to keep intact
its distinct characteristics.
44
The Italian Renaissance
Did you Know?
The process of painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was a physically gruelling one for
Michelangelo, who was required to lie on a scaffold with arms outstretched for hours at a
time. An accomplished and prolific poet, he composed a sonnet in which he described the
ways he had to contort his body in order to paint the ceiling. Given below is an excerpt:
A goiter it seems I got from this backward craning
like the cats get there in Lombardy, or wherever
--bad water, they say, from lapping their fetid river.
My belly, tugged under my chin's all out of whack.
Beard points like a finger at heaven ...
~John Frederick Nims
(Translated from Italian)
Source: http://harvardmagazine.com/1997/05/poetry.html
Exercise/Practice Questions
1. What were the reasons for the emergence of the Renaissance as a cultural movement
in Italy?
2. Why is Giotto di Bondone known as the father of Renaissance?
3. What is meant by Linear Perspective? How was it used by Renaissance artists?
Discuss with some examples.
4. Who were the women Renaissance painters and what were the dominant themes in
their paintings?
5. Discuss the changing social status of the artistes during the Renaissance period.
6. What are Michelangelo’s contributions to visual culture of the Renaissance period?
7. How is Caravaggio’s work different from those of the artists of the High
Renaissance?
8. What were the motives behind the patronage given to Renaissance artists?
9. Enumerate various sources of patronage extended to the Renaissance artists.
10. Was art outside Italy exact emulation of Italian Renaissance Art? Give examples.
45
The Italian Renaissance
Glossary
Altarpiece: A work of art that decorates the space above an altar, a table used as the centre of
a worship service
Baptistery: A building used for baptism in a Church
Craft guilds: Organizations that trained apprentices and supervised the quality of products
Fresco: A wall painting made by first spreading moist lime plaster on the wall and then
applying paint
Linear perspective: Invented by the Florentine architect Filippo Brunelleschi, linear
perspective is a system derived from mathematics in which all elements of a composition are
measured and arranged from a single point of view, or perspective.
Pietà: The term pietà refers to a popular image in which Mary supports the dead Jesus Christ
across her knees.
Tempera: A water-based paint made with egg yolks and colour pigments, that is, substances
containing colour derived from plant or animal matter.
Bibliography:
Alfred von Martin, Sociology of the Renaissance, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd.,
London, 1944
Arnold Hauser, The Social History of Art, Renaissance, Mannerism and Baroque, vol. II,
Routledge, London, 1962
Babette Bohn and James M. Saslow (ed.), A Companion to Renaissance and Baroque Art,
Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, 2013
Geraldine A. Johnson, Renaissance Art: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press,
New York, 2005
46
The Italian Renaissance
Hans Baron, The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance: Civic Humanism and Republican
Liberty in an Age of Classicism and Tyranny, revised edition, Princeton University Press,
Princeton, 1966
Harold Bloom, The Italian Renaissance, Chelsea House Publishers, New York, 2005
Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy, 1860, translated by S.G.C.
Middlemore, New York, 1958
John Harold Plumb and Morris Bishop, The Italian Renaissance, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Trade & Reference Publishers, 2001
John R. Hale, Renaissance Europe 1480-1520, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford and Malden,
Massachusetts, 2000
Jonathan Woolfson (ed.), Palgrave Advances in Renaissance Historiography, Palgrave
Macmillan, New York, 2005
Lilian H. Zirpolo, Historical Dictionary of Renaissance Art, Scarecrow Press, Maryland,
2008
Michael Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-century Italy: A Primer in the
Social History of Pictorial Style, Oxford and New York, 1972
Peggy Saari and Aaron Saari (ed.), Renaissance and Reformation Almanac, vol. 2, Thomson
Gale, USA, 2002
Peter Burke, The European Renaissance: Centres and Peripheries, John Wiley & Sons,
Cambridge, 1998
Peter Burke, The Italian Renaissance: Culture and Society in Italy, John Wiley & Sons,
Cambridge, 2014
Robert Black (ed.), Renaissance Thought, Routledge, London and New York, 2001
Robert S. Lopez, ‘Hard Times and Investment in Culture,’ in Karl H. Dannenfeldt (ed.), The
Renaissance: Medieval or Modern?, D.C. Heath and Company, Boston, 1959
47