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GREAT RENAISSANCE PAINTERS
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Great Renaissance Painters
The period of 1400–1600 is known as the Renaissance. The scholars and artists of
this period “rediscovered the culture and thought of ancient Greece and Rome. That is
why the period is referred to as the Renaissance (which means the rebirth), alluding to
this new point of departure after centuries of slumber during the Middle Ages” (Canto 5).
Giorgia Vasari, in his book Lives of the Painters, Sculptors and Architects, first published
in 1550, divided the Renaissance into three periods. The first period, roughly 1250–1400,
he described as “the first Lights, glimmering out of the darkness of the Middle Ages”
(Witcombe 3). The second period, the 1400s, was called the Early Renaissance. The
1500s made up the third period, which was known as the High Renaissance.
Duirng the Renaisance, many innavations influenced painters and theirwork. Oil
paint was invented. Linear and atmospheric perspectives were introduced and made
paintings more realistic. DUring the 1400s, painters were trained in anatomy,
mathematical perspective, geo metry, and optics (witcombe 1).
Three important painters of the Renaissance were Jan van Eyck, Leonardo da
Vinci, and Michelangelo. Jan van Eyck painted in Holland and what is now Belgium and
France during the Early Renaissance. He is credited with inventing oil paints, which
allowed painters to show much more detail than they could with earlier types of paint.
There is a dispute about some of Jan van Eyck’s early works. Some of them are thought
to have been painted by his older brother, Hubert, who died in 1426, or by both of them.
The brothers were the first painters to fully utilize atmospheric perspective, which is the
use of a hazy background to achieve depth. They alternated translucent and opaque paint
layers to give their paintings a radiant glow (Janson 245).
Leonardo da Vinci was the first High Renaissance master. He was born in Vinci, a
small town in Tuscany, and was trained in Florence, Italy, by Verrocchio. In one of his
first works, he painted a small angel in the corner of one of Verrocchio’s paintings. After
seeing how wonderful it was, Verrocchio was said to have stopped painting. In addition
to being a very talented painter, Leonardo was also a military engineer, an architect, an
inventor, and a sculptor.
Leonardo is known for his use of sfumato, a fine haze of paint that gives the
impression of a foggy atmosphere. Sfumato gives his paintings warmth and makes the
scenes seem dreamlike. He perfected the technique in his most famous portrait, the Mona
Lisa. Many thin layers of fine haze make the painting appear to glow from within. The
Mona Lisa is famous for her mysterious smile. Until recently, her identity was a mystery
too. But it is now known that “she was the wife of a Florentine merchant who was born in
1479 and died before 1556” (Janson 290).
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, who is known by his first name,
was considered to be a genius by everyone, including himself. He felt that his genius was
a curse at times. He had a difficult personality, with violent mood swings. However, his
customers tolerated his bad behavior because of his great talent.
Michelangelo was a sculptor as well as a painter. His most famous sculpture is
David, the first major sculpture of the High Renaissance. The huge figure was sculpted in
1501 as a patriotic symbol of the Florentine Republic (Janson 293). In 1508,
Michelangelo started a new project—painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome.
It took him until 1512 to finish it. After four years of lying on his back painting the
ceiling, he had a permanent neck ache. He used a technique called fresco, which means
painting on a wet coat of plaster. He worked in sections, and each section had to be
completed in one day, before the plaster dried. The fresco technique makes the paint
colors chemically bond with the plaster so the paint will never peel off. Michelangelo’s
work can still be seen because he used this long-lasting technique.
These three painters played important roles in the development of painting during
the Renaissance. Their outstanding work with new mediums and techniques helped
change art and artists forever.