Download The Renaissance

The Renaissance
Botticelli’s Birth of Venus
What Was the Renaissance?
• Key period of European history (1350-1550)
• “Rebirth” of ancient Greek/Roman culture
• Began in Italy, spread through Europe
– Urban society, powerful city-states
– Secularism: worldly?
• Period of Recovery – from what?
• New view of humanity
– Individual achievement, free will
– Higher regard for human worth
Italian Renaissance Politics
• Italian States
– Milan, Venice, Florence
• Controlled by merchant families
• Gained massive wealth & power
• Machiavelli
– The Prince
• How to gain & keep political power
• Human nature over ethical principles
• Self-centered approach
Intellectual & Artistic Renaissance
• Humanism
– Based of study of ancient Greece & Rome
– Results in secularism
• appreciation of worldly pleasures
– Humanities
• Philosophy, history, grammar, poetry
– Appreciate the individual, free will
– Emphasize education (path to virtue)
– Felt tension between studies and religion
(Catholics)
Intellectual & Artistic Renaissance
• Humanism (cont.)
– Petrarch (14th c)
• Search for classical manuscripts
• Return to classical Latin
• Intellectual life is one of solitude
– 15th century Humanism
• Intellectual must live for the state
• Contribute to better society
Intellectual & Artistic Renaissance
• Renaissance Art
– Frescoes by Masaccio
• Added depth and 3D
– Study of human anatomy
– Sculpture & architecture inspired by classical
Rome
• Brunelleschi in Florence
Intellectual & Artistic Renaissance
• Renaissance Art (cont.)
– High Renaissance
– Leonardo da Vinci
• Strived to paint perfection of nature and the
individual
– Mona Lisa, The Last Supper
– Raphael
• School of Athens
– Michelangelo
• Sistine Chapel
• David