Download High Renaissnce continued

Introduction to the
High Renaissance … continued.
What is Ideal beauty ?
Today we are looking at
Idealisation
• Antiquity: the notion of Ancient Greek and
Roman sculpture &
• Antique: Philosophy: (Plato and Neo-Platonist
) - thinking from the past.
• The notion of the Renaissance Man
• The notion of Restraint
Idealisation
Idealisation refers to `perfection’ in both form
and the physical environment. The Philosophy
of Plato established the belief that everything
had a perfect form in the mind of God.
(Despite the fact this was not the Christian God)
• Idela
Ideal beauty
means the highest form of beauty
Idealism in Art has Two distinct meanings
• The origins of Ideal Beauty is from Antiquity
• `Idealism’ is also from Antique Philosophy; namely the philosophy of Plato (428 – 348 B.C.)
Plato ( 428-348 B.C.) Greek Philosopher
Ideal beauty is a theme stemming from Antiquity and
of deep interest to the Renaissance
•
Aristotle ( 384 – 322 B.C). - (a student of Plato) – in Poetics, his essay on drama
noted that dramatists of his time, either imitated people above or below average.
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•
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Aristotle used the example of a Greek painters from his time. Polygnotus was a
Greek painter who used to paint people above their average, (Idealism) and this
was preferred mode. The other artists, painted people below their average, and
others painted people exactly they way they were.
Pliny the Elder, (b. 24 - d. 79, first century A.D.) –was a Roman Encyclopaedist,- he
mentions the legend of the Greek painter Zuexis, (5th century B.C.) when he was
commissioned to paint a picture of Helen of Troy for the temple of Hera in the city
of Croton. ( B.C). Zeuxis held a red carpet line up of the 5 top models in the city
and chose their best bits from their best features and made up a single composite
picture of ideal beauty.
This method was referred to by Alberti in the Quattrocento 15th century in, De
Picturra ( 1436) .
Renaissance interest was in the
rediscovery of Antique Sculptures
The Belvedere Torso
•
•
&
&
The Belvedere Apollo
Antiquity and Antique sculpture
• Antique forms become a canon of `perfection’ for
Renaissance artists to study. Belvedere Apollo,
Belvedere Torso, and the Laocoon (rediscovered 1506).
• Artists felt they had a connection with the Ideal.
Reconsiderations and rediscovery of Antique sculptures
became an Ideal in the 16th century. Artists and scholars
found in classical sculpture a key to reality, awakening
the awareness of human body and its expressive
potentialities. They feature Ideal proportion and
musculature which seemed superhuman in their time.
Ideal Beauty (Plato’s Philosophy)
• Plato’s theory of Ideas. Everything we see is an imperfect copy or
corruption, approximating `Ideal forms’ that are imperceptible to us on
earth, and that these are` Ideas’ that are not found on earth, but only in
the mind of God. ( Plato argued that painting was two removes from
reality, because it is just a representation of an `appearance,’ or
approximation of reality.) Some believed these Ideas or Forms ultimately
reside in the mind of god.
• Later Neo – Platonists like Plotinus, maintained that the work of Art
can directly mirror the Idea itself. That is what the Renaissance was
driving for. Some believed that artists could directly access the Ideal forms
in the mind of God. (Michelangleo etc). This is what Neo Platonism
proposed.
• Consider the Idealism of Michelangelo and Raphael.
HuHumanism
Humanism and Renaissance. Renaissance man and education:
The Renaissance re-iterated the value of self education.
From Medieval Times The Seven Liberal Arts was core subjects their Universities.
If you were going to do a Bachelor of Arts in those days you would have to study these
subjects.
Music, astronomy, geometry, mathematics. (Quadrivium) - Upper division
Rhetoric, Grammar, Poetry. (Trivium ) - Lower division
• Key Question. `What do the subjects in the
upper division have in common ?
•
Music, astronomy,
geometry, mathematics ?
ANSWER
Harmony, Proportion, Order, Proportion
Note: Proportion is based on the idea that two same
things are compared together. From this there is derived
ratios. Eg. 2:1 1.2, Pi, 3.1…. etc this is used in study of
anatomyand in measurement of how things recede from
the human eye in regards to the human eye.
Arguments for the quality of
Restraint.
Arguments for the quality of
RESTRAINT
• Baldassar Castiglione (1478 – 1529). Italian writer and
Courtier/ a member of ancient aristocratic family he received a
thorough Humanistic education, and acquired and refined a learned appreciation
of art. He produced The Book of the Courtier (1561). It is a dialogue set in the court
of Urbino in 1507 (not Rome) and contains discussions in the court the qualities
that outline the courtier as cultivated Renaissance man. Deeply valued is the Idea
of being highly learned and educated. Apart from the topics of courting ladies and
the affairs of writing of love letters, the courtier was supposed to learn several
languages and play musical instruments and paint as well as conducting their
professional affairs. But there was something far more important the courtier was
supposed to do all these things he was supposed to conduct these things with
restraint. He studies learns and practises this things with restraint not into a
boastful of awkward or forceful way. That is a distinction of a courtier and the
same for Renaissance artists as well. And should demonstrate these things with
ease. Italian. Sprezzatura + = nonchalance. def. not being boastful or being done
with difficultly but done with ease.