Download The Renaissance - Duluth High School

The Renaissance
What is the Renaissance?
• 1300 – 1600
• “rebirth”
• Great intellectual and artistic creativity
during the Renaissance
• Began in northern Italy while France and
England were fighting the Hundred
Years War
• Marked by a revival or rebirth of interest
in classical Greek and Roman art,
literature, and learning
Conditions that gave rise to the
Renaissance
1.
2.
3.
4.
Northern Italy was a highly urban region –
Venice, Genoa and Florence were major centers
for trade. Venice and Genoa were seaports
Northern Italy was a merchant’s region – they
dominated politics, society and business. Success
depended on wit not inherited social rank – idea of
individual achievement.
Popes no longer had control of Italian city-states
due to the Great Schism
Merchants competed with each other for business,
and as patrons or sponsors for the arts – glory in
helping artists create works of genius.
New Values
• Celebration of the individual was a theme of
the Renaissance
• In the middle ages artists worked for the
glory of God, in the Renaissance artists
wanted to be known as individuals
• Renaissance scholars loved the writings of
Greece and Rome – they were called
humanists
• There was an enjoyment of worldly
pleasures – a person might love and enjoy
life without offending God.
Renaissance Continued
• “The Renaissance Man” – Those who excelled in
many fields (art, architecture, science – like Leonardo
Da Vinci
• The Courtier – Book written that described the
Renaissance ideal for men
• Upper class women were as well educated as men
during the Renaissance, HOWEVER most women
had less political, economic and social influence than
women of the Middle Ages
• Florence was the leading city during the Renaissance
– textiles and banking
• The Medici family ruled Florence during the
Renaissance
The Artists
• Giotto
• Early 1300’s, mastered the
technique known as fresco
painting (painting with
pigments on wet plaster)
• Style was different than the
Middle Ages – figures looked
real and lifelike, created
illusion of depth in his
paintings
• This is Giotto’s Ognissanti
Madonna
Donatello
• Rejected the style of
Medieval
stonecutters.
• Wanted his figures to
appear real and alive
• 1st European since
ancient times to create
a large free standing
human figure in the
nude.
Mazzoco – Emblem of
Florence
Michelangelo - David
• “David” white marble
statue of the biblical
figure.
• 16ft. Tall
• Expresses Renaissance
belief in human
dignity and greatness,
one of the most
famous works of art of
the Renaissance.
Michelangelo – The Sistine
Chapel
• Asked to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in
the Vatican in 1508
• The popes were rebuilding Rome which had
declined while the Popes lived in Avignon
• He painted over 5,800 ft. of ceiling over 3 years –
on his back
• It contains 9 paintings illustrating the Creation, the
birth of Adam, and the story of Noah
Raphael
La Belle
Jardinière
Boticelli – Birth of Venus
Leonardo Da Vinci
• Had a fascination with the human
personality
• He was a painter, inventor, and scientist
among other things.
• Essence of the ideal of the “Renaissance
Man”
Mona Lisa
The Last Supper
The Northern European
Artists of the Renaissance
• Many northern European artists who had
visited Italy brought back the ideas of
classical culture, curiosity in the world and
human potential to their countries.
• Helped spread the Renaissance and
Renaissance ideals throughout Europe.
• Includes painters, sculptors,writers, etc.
Durer
• Produced woodcuts
and engravings that
became very popular
in in Germany
• Emphasis on realism
• Style spread to other
German artists
Hans Holbein the Younger
Specialized in painting portraits that looked
like photographs
Henry
VIII
Bruegel the Elder
• Flemish painter
captured scenes
from everyday
life such as
weddings,
dances, harvest,
and the
changing
seasons. Rich
colors and vivid
details
The Peasant Dance
Writers and Philosophers
• Dante 1265 – 1321
• Poet, Born in Florence
• Used real people in his
poem – used dead friends
and enemies in his poems
and told of their lives.
• Poems comment on the
political events of the time
• Interest in human
personality is key.
• His Divine Comedy is
sometimes called the
“bridge” between the
Middle Ages and the
Renaissance
Petrarch
• Born 1304
• Wrote poems and
letters in Italian and
Latin
• Imitated the classical
style of Cicero
• Strove for simplicity
and purity in his
writings.
Machiavelli
• Wrote during a time period of war in
Italy, Italian city-states were forced to
ally themselves with foreign powers
(like Spain)
• The Prince – Wrote this book while
angry about the invasion of foreigners –
book is about gaining and keeping
power
• Thought most people were selfish,
fickle and corrupt
• Concerned with what was politically
effective – NOT morally correct.
Maintain political power any way
possible. The end justifies the mean.
• By the 1600’s new ideas and artistic
styles appeared which brought an end
to the Renaissance.
• The ideals of the Renaissance
continued to influence Europe and the
ideal of individualism from the
Renaissance will play a major role in
the rise of democratic ideas.