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Early Renaissance
janson summary Notes: B.C = before christ A.D. Anno Domini the year of our lordRenaissance = rebirth. A revival of arts and sciences of antiquity.Individualism emerges. Remember: the middle ages discouraged individualism as insolent impiety.Not just duplicating ancient works but surpassing them, creating something original.the revival of antiquity meant absolute realism. p385 Florence: portraying itself as the 'new athens'. Competitions for doors, domes. Liberal arts(Plato): math, grammer, rhetoric, philosophy, and fine arts. p388 R artists viewed as people of ideas rather than mere manipulators of materials. Works of art seen as as the visible record of creative minds. Library of Congress Vatican(link):"The great intellectual movement of Renaissance Italy was humanism. The humanists believed that the Greek and Latin classics contained both all the lessons one needed to lead a moral and effective life and the best models for a powerful Latin style. They developed a new, rigorous kind of classical scholarship, with which they corrected and tried to understand the works of the Greeks and Romans, whichseemed so vital to them."
Donatello/David_p_389
Image and bioSt Mark - 1st statue to recapture contrapostoDavid - 1st freestanding lifesize nude statue since antiquity. See desc p 393 Janson
Ghiberti/Gates_of_Paradise
Image
and biocompare to p 329 death of the virgin
Florence_Cathedral dome/Brunelleschi Image and biop 396 Began as jeweler, sculpter. Developed linear/scientific perspective. See standardized forms and space blocks p 398
Masaccio/The Tribute Money
Image
and bioImage
Tribute MoneyMasaccio (1401-1427?), the first great painter
of the Italian Renaissance, whose innovations in the use of scientific
perspective inaugurated the modern era in painting. Masaccio, originally
named Tommaso Cassai, was born in San Giovanni Valdarno, near Florence,
on December 21, 1401. He joined the painters guild in Florence
in 1422. His remarkably individual style owed little to other painters,
except possibly the great 14th-century master Giotto. He was more
strongly influenced by the architect Brunelleschi and the sculptor
Donatello, both of whom were his contemporaries in Florence. From
Brunelleschi he acquired a knowledge of mathematical proportion
that was crucial to his revival of the principles of scientific
perspective. From Donatello he imbibed a knowledge of classical
art that led him away from the prevailing Gothic style. He inaugurated
a new naturalistic approach to painting that was concerned less
with details and ornamentation than with simplicity and unity,
less with flat surfaces than with the illusion of three dimensionality.
Together with Brunelleschi and Donatello, he was a founder of the
Renaissance
Botticelli/The_Birth_of_Venus
Image and bioFavorite painter of medici circle. p 420shallow modeling emphasis on outline little concern for deep space bodies drained of weight and muscular power Quasi-religious/see neo-platonism p 420pg 22 DK Annotated Guide
Bellini/Madonna_and_Saints
Image and bioMantegna's brother in law.growth of Flemish tradition in the south - every detail important in its symbolismdesc p 427-28 contours less brittle and colors softer, light more glowing than mantegnacompare to Giotto(link)+-1500 >
High Renaissance
Artists seen as genuises rather than artisans (see plato's concept of genius, grace) p430Inspiration as divine, immortal, creative.Before 1500 artists made things, they didn't create them - creation was for GodFaith in the divine origin of inspiration led artists to rely on subjective standards of truth and beauty...eraly renaissance was bound by rules - linear perspective, ratios. High renaissance more concerned with visual effectiveness than order. p 430cult of the genius
Leonardo_da_Vinci/Last_Supper
Image and bioLeonardo da Vinci was a Florentine artist, one of the great masters of the High Renaissance, who was also celebrated as a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist. His profound love of knowledge and research was the keynote of both his artistic and scientific endeavors. His innovations in the field of painting influenced the course of Italian art for more than a century after his death, and his scientific studies—particularly in the fields of anatomy, optics, and hydraulics—anticipated many of the developments of modern science. (see bio link)virgin of the rocks linksee mona lisa desc, archaic smile p 434Mona Lisa pg 26 DK Annotated Guide
Michelangelo/Misc
Image_and_bio p437 pieta 437 david 438 sistine ceiling 440-46 last judgement Michelangelo (1475-1564), arguably one of the most inspired creators in the history of art and, with Leonardo da Vinci, the most potent force in the Italian High Renaissance. As a sculptor, architect, painter, and poet, he exerted a tremendous influence on his contemporaries and on subsequent Western art in general. A Florentine — although born March 6, 1475, in the small village of Caprese near Arezzo — Michelangelo continued to have a deep attachment to his city, its art, and its culture throughout his long life. He spent the greater part of his adulthood in Rome, employed by the popes; characteristically, however, he left instructions that he be buried in Florence, and his body was placed there in a fine monument in the church of Santa Croce. (see bio link)
naive desc of last judgement - w/images
Sistine Chapel pg 30 DK Annotated Guide
Raphael/The_School_of_Athens
Image and bio p450-51Italian painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance, his full name is Raffaello Sanzio. Raphael is best known for his Madonnas and for his large figure compositions in the Vatican in Rome. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Raphael died on his 37th birthday. His funeral mass was celebrated at the Vatican, his Transfiguration was placed at the head of the bier, and his body was buried in the Pantheon in Rome. School of Athens p 32 DK Annotated Guide
Titian/Bacchus and Ariadne
Image and bio Image and bio Christ Crowned w Thorns"Forms gradually lose their solidity, partially dissolving into hazy paint textures and vibrant brushstrokes, while color becomes more intense, so that a universe seems to be on the verge of disintegrating into flame. A climax is reached in the ferocious Death of Actaeon (c. 1561, National Gallery, London) with its bronzy tonality and phosphorescent textures. Still more profound are the Flaying of Marsyas (circa 1570-76, Kromèrí", Czech Republic) and the Nymph and Shepherd (circa 1574, Kunsthistorisches Museum). Here colors are more subdued, but the turbulence of the brushwork, hardly matched again until 20th-century painting, almost submerges the form entirely." see bio linkBacchus and Ariadne p 36 DK Annotated Guide
+-1530 > Mannerism
Janson_summary: (1) world exploration (Columbus, Magellan) brings back knowledge of new world (2) by 1650 ancient science replaced by new body of learning. (3) reformation (Luther) and counter reformation (catholics) High Mannersim (see influence of plague and invasion) pure aesthetics, formulaic abstraction "grace, variety and virtuoso display at the xpense of content, clarity, unity." Inner vison, private or fantastic. mannered elegance, bizarre conceits (see michelangelo - also note his mannered figures in the sistine ceiling. A reaction against High renaissance? Anti-classisicm, anti-naturalism "the subjectivism of Mannerism came to be valued for its visionary power as part of a larger shift in religious outlook." p 463 "Having absorbed the lessons of the leading artists at one remove, the first generation of Mannerists was free to apply High Renaissance formulas to a new aesthetic divorced from its previous content." An aesthetic divorced from its content becomes what?...
Parmigianino/Madonna_dal_Collo_Lungo
Image and biosee self portrait. sfumato: the definition of form in painting without abrupt outline by the blending of one tone into another Parmigianino (Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola), Italian painter of the Mannerist school. He was born in Parma and studied there with Correggio. One of the chief disciples of Correggio's sensuous style, he blended it with the classical style of the Roman painter Raphael. About 1523 Parmigianino went to Rome, from which he fled to Bologna in 1527, after the sack of Rome by the armies of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. In Bologna he painted some of his finest works, including the Madonna and Child with St. Margaret and Other Saints (Academy of Bologna). See bio link for moresee also Rosso(p463), the most eccentric, and Pontormo(464), strange, introspective, headstrong and shy
Tintoretto/Last_Supper
Image and bio Venetian Mannerist painter, one of the foremost artists of the later 16th century. His work inspired the development of baroque art. Tintoretto, originally named Jacopo Robusti, was called Il Tintoretto (“the little dyer”) in allusion to his father's profession. As a young man he studied briefly with Titian, who soon discharged him from his studio; the animosity between these two great painters lasted throughout their careers. Unlike Titian, Tintoretto lived and worked exclusively in Venice. His immense output was produced entirely for the churches, confraternities, and rulers of Venice and for the Venetian state... Tintoretto's penchant for diagonal compositions plunging or zigzagging into deep space, as well as the commanding theatricality of his lighting and the overall dynamism and expansiveness of his style, was taken up by the work of such pioneers of the baroque style as the Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens and the Carracci family
El_Greco/The_Burial_of_Count_Orgaz Image and biofrom Crete to Venice to Spain Mystical quality/vision. spiritual realitydesc p 472The_Burial_of_Count_Orgaz pg 43 DK Annotated Guide
Late Gothic +-1400 >
Janson_summary: Northern European artists of the 15th century followed a different path than their Italian counterparts. While both groups sought a new visual language to describe the world they saw around them, the northern artists recreated this reality in precisely descriptive terms using oil paint. During the same period that the Italian artists perfected the perspective system to create an ideal setting for figures, northern painters continued the use of symbolism in the Gothic tradition. The great achievements in northern painting were at first centered in Flanders before spreading to other parts of Europe. The increasing popularity of the oil medium was coupled with another northern invention, that of printmaking. Using the woodcut and engraving techniques, artists created an independent medium that would revolutionize the visual arts. By the end of the 15th century, the northern "Late Gothic" style was represented in every medium, and exerted as great an influence as early Renaissance art. Both styles would eventually merge in the works of selected artists at the beginning of the 16th century.
Campin/Merode_AltarpieceImage and biounlimited depth, stability, continuityenchanting quality of fairy talesHonors Joseph by depiction of carpenter. Flowers associated with the virgin: roses charity, violets humility, lillys chastity. basin and towel - Mary as the vessel most clean and well of living waters. candle snuffed - divinity gone as human (jesus) appears? Mousetrap: the cross of the lord was the devil's mousetrap, God appears in human form to fool satan.
Jan_Van_Eyck/The_Arnolfini_Portrait
Image and biocontributed to the development of oil painting. He used the oil medium to represent a variety of subjects with striking realism in microscopic detail; for example, he infused painted jewels and precious metals with a glowing inner light by means of subtle glazes over the highlights. see bio linkdesc Arnolfini p 15 DK annotated Guide
Hieronymus_Bosch/The_Garden_of_Delights
Image and bioBrilliant and original northern European painter of the late Middle Ages whose work reveals an unusual iconography of a complex and individual style. His real name was Jerome van Aeken (also spelled Aken or Aquen). Although at first recognized as a highly imaginative "creator of devils" and a powerful inventor of seeming nonsense full of satirical meaning, Bosch demonstrated insight into the depths of the mind and an ability to depict symbols of life and creation. see bio linkdesc Garden p 25 DK annotated Guide
Northern Renaissance+-1500
Janson summaryItalian influence replaces Late Gothic in the North
Durer/Self_Portrait_in_Fur_Collared_Robe
Concerning the christ-like pose above: "But this was no gesture of arrogance or blasphemy. It was a statement of faith: Christ was the son of God and God had created Man. For Dürer, the painting was an acknowledgment that artistic skills were a God-given talent." LinkImage and bioDürer began his training as a draughtsman in the goldsmith's workshop of his father. His precocious skill is evidenced by a remarkable self-portrait done in 1484, when he was 13 years old . In 1486, Dürer's father arranged for his apprenticeship to the painter and woodcut illustrator Michael Wohlgemut, whose portrait Dürer would paint in 1516. After three years in Wohlgemuth's workshop, he left for a period of travel. see bio link...4 apostles link
Hans_Holbein_the_Younger/Henry_the_VIII
Image and bioGerman painter, draftsman, and designer renowned for the precise rendering of his drawings and the compelling realism of his portraits, particularly those recording the court of King Henry VIII of England. see bio linkthe ambassadors link desc p 38 DK annotated Guide
Peter_Bruegel/The_Blind_Leading_the_Blind
Image and bioPieter Bruegel the Elder (byname Peasant Bruegel, also spelled Brueghel or Breughel), the greatest Flemish painter of the 16th century, whose landscapes and vigorous, often witty scenes of peasant life are particularly renowned. He spelled his name Brueghel until 1559, and his sons retained the "h" in the spelling of their names. Since Bruegel signed and dated many of his works, his artistic evolution can be traced from the early landscapes, in which he shows affinity with the Flemish 16th-century landscape tradition, to his last works, which are Italianate. He exerted a strong influence on painting in the Low Countries, and through his sons Jan and Pieter he became the ancestor of a dynasty of painters that survived into the 18th century. see bio linkHe used to disguise himself and join the peasants in their revelriesNetherlandish Proverbs desc p 41 DK annotated Guide+-1600 / 17th century
Baroque
Janson_summary_Italy_Spain Janson_summary_Netherlands Janson_summary_France
Baroque: originally coined to disparage the style it designates (see Fauvism) - meaning irregular, contorted, grotesque Time of contradictions and paradoxes, Catholics vs Protostants, continuous warfare...p 528-529 Janson
Caravaggio/The Supper at Emmaus
Image and bio Image and bio The Calling of St Matthew"The details of the first Roman years are unknown, but after the time of the Contarelli project Caravaggio had many encounters with the law. In 1600 he was accused of blows by a fellow painter, and the following year he wounded a soldier. In 1603 he was imprisoned on the complaint of another painter and released only through the intercession of the French ambassador. In April 1604 he was accused of throwing a plate of artichokes in the face of a waiter, and in October he was arrested for throwing stones at the Roman Guards. In May 1605 he was seized for misuse of arms, and on July 29 he had to flee Rome for a time because he had wounded a man in defense of his mistress. Within a year, on May 29, 1606, again in Rome, during a furious brawl over a disputed score in a game of tennis, Caravaggio killed one Ranuccio Tomassoni." see bio link for more Conversion / link / chiaroscuroSupper at Emmaus link / desc pg 45 DK Annotated Guide
Velazquez/The_Maids_of_Honor
Image
and biodesc p 551 jansonpoerful grasp of character and dignity...scenes
of people eating and drinking...court
"
painter...knighted.desc las meninas p 57 DK Annotated Guide
Rubens/Samson_and_DelilahImage and bio Venus in Fur Coat
Rembrandt/Belshazzar's Feast Image and biodesc DK Annotated Guide p 48
Vermeer/The_Artist's_Studio Image and bio | desc DK Annotated Guide p 5818th century
Rococo
End of Baroque, decadent twilight, fantasy, eroticism, playful, whimsy, wistful...Neoclassicim and the Enlightenment will end it
Watteau/A_Journey_to_Cythera
Image and bio "He was notorious for his irritable and restless temperament and died early of tuberculosis, and it is felt that the constant reminder of his own mortality that his illness entailed 'infected' his pictures with a melancholic mood. " see bio linkdesc pg 61 DK Annotated Guide
Gainsborough_Robert_Andrews and His Wife
Image
and bio