Examples of Medieval Art

What do you notice about these pieces of art? Pay careful attention to details, content, perspective and color.

Weingarten Missal, 1210

Illumination on parchment, 29,2 x 20,3

cmPierpont Morgan

Library, New York

Italian Renaissance Art

Giotto: Scenes from the Life of the Virgin: Marriage of the Virgin

1304-06Outstanding as a painter, sculptor, and architect, Giotto was recognized as the first genius of art in the Italian Renaissance. Giotto lived and worked at a time when people's minds and talents were first being freed from the shackles of medieval restraint. He dealt largely in the traditional religious subjects, but he gave these subjects an earthly, full-blooded life and force.

Giotto: Scenes from the Life of St John the Baptist: Feast of Herod

1320

Contest to Design the Baptistery Doors. (1401)

• Florence wool manufacturers guild holds a contest for the leading artists. Spends 20,000 Florins.

Winner Lorenzo Ghiberti.

• 23 year old, highly skilled goldsmith.

• Completes two sets of doors 50 years.

East Doors of the Baptistery of the Cathedral of Florence.Crafted by Lorenzo Ghiberti.Cost: 20,000 Florins.

Brunelleschi: Dome of the Cathedral1420-36 Commissioned by the Medici,

the Church of San Lorenzo (1418-28) Brunelleschi devised an austere, geometric style inspired by the art of ancient Rome. Completely different from the emotional, elaborate Gothic mode that still prevailed in his time, Brunelleschi's style emphasized mathematical rigor in its use of straight lines, flat planes, and cubic spaces. This “wall architecture,” with its flat facades, set the tone for many of the later buildings of the Florentine Renaissance.

Masaccio (1401-1427?), the first great painter of the Italian Renaissance, whose innovations in the use of scientific perspective inaugurated the modern era in painting.

Trinity, 1425-28 Fresco  

Masaccio: The Expulsion from the

Garden of Eden1426-27

In Masaccio's painting man, although a sinner, has not lost his dignity: he appears neither debased nor degraded, and the beauty of his body is a blend of classical archetypes and innovative forms of expression.

Donatello: David, 1430

                                        

                                                                    

Donatello uses the classical ideas of representing a nude and a balanced composition. His Renaissance innovations include the vitality which animates the statue, the thoughtful young face shaded by the winged helmet and the severed head of Goliath.

Sandro Botticelli1445-1510

Epitomizing the Humanist movement, Botticelli’s early paintings moved away from the ecclesiastical subject matter depicted earlier during the High Middle

Ages. Under the patronage of the Medici family, Botticelli freely portrayed Pagan subject matter in his masterworks. In (La) Primavera (1482) Botticelli’s Venus,

centered, announces spring’s arrival.

Botticelli: The Birth of Venusc. 1485

Tempera on canvasGalleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Botticelli’s goddess of love is one of the first non-biblical female nudes in Italian art. Venus’ sensuality garnered the attention of Girolamo Savonarola, a Dominican Friar whose apocalyptic sermons eventually led to the expulsion of Botticelli’s patron, the Medicis, from Florence.

Fra Savonarola (1452-1498)

• Preaches against the vanities of Florence.

• Influences people like Michelangelo, and Botticelli.

Leonardo da Vinci: The Last Supper, 1498Mixed technique, approx. 15 x 29 feet

Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan

Leonardo's painting of the Last Supper was constructed symmetrically according to the laws of central perspective, with a main figure, Jesus, in the center. He is physically and psychologically isolated from the other figures and with his hands, is pointing to the bread and wine, making the introduction of the Eucharist the central event. In Leonardo's conception, the other figures are reacting directly to Jesus, and at the same time, some of them are coming into contact with each other.

Leonardo da Vinci: Mona Lisa (La Gioconda) 1503-5

Oil on panel, 2 1/2 x 1 ¾ ftMusée du Louvre, Paris

From the beginning it was greatly admired and much copied, and it came to be considered the prototype of the Renaissance portrait. This figure of a woman, dressed in the Florentine fashion of her day and seated in a visionary, mountainous landscape, is a remarkable instance of Leonardo's sfumato technique of soft, heavily shaded modeling. The Mona Lisa's enigmatic expression, which seems both alluring and aloof, has given the portrait universal fame.

Leonardo 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. He is considered a true “Renaissance Man”.

Multi-barrelled Gun Vitruvian Man Studies of Embryos

Michelangelo, Pietà, 1499Marble, height 5 1/2 feet, width at the base approx. 6ft.

Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican

“Pity”; Mary’s proportions are about twice Jesus’ to make her appear to be holding a child.

Michelangelo: David, 1504 Just over 14 feet tall; example of contrapposto

Popes were Patrons of the Arts.

• Popes rebuilt Rome after Great Schism. They funded numerous projects.

• Extravagant spending by the Church led to the Reformation.

Pope Julius II - Projects (1503-1513)

• Tore down the basilica of St. Peter and rebuilt it.

• Sistine Chapel Ceiling - Michelangelo.

• “School of Athens” in a Vatican Palace office - Raphael.

Michelangelo: Sistine Chapel Ceiling, 1508-1512

Dissatisfied with the normal working methods and with the abilities of the assistants he had engaged, Michelangelo determined to execute the whole of this vast work virtually alone. Working under appalling difficulties, most of the time leaning backwards and never able to get far enough away from the ceiling to be able to see what he was doing, he completed the first half (the part nearer to the door) in 1510. The whole enormous undertaking was completed in 1512, Michelangelo being by then so practiced that he was able to execute the second half more rapidly and freely. It was at once recognized as a supreme work of art.

Michelangelo: Creation of Adam, 1510 (detail from Sistine Chapel)

Michelangelo: Tomb of Giuliano de' Medici,1526-33

Raphael: The Annunciation 1502-03Oil on canvas, approx. 1 x 1 ½ feet

Pinacoteca, Vatican

Raphael: Spozalizio (The Engagement of Virgin Mary)

1504Oil on roundheaded panel, approx. 5 1/2 x 4ft

Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan

Raphael (his full name Raffaello Sanzi or Santi), Italian painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance. 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 classical

ideal of human grandeur.

Raphael: The Sistine Madonna

1513-14Oil on canvas, 8 ½ x 6 ½ ftGemäldegalerie, Dresden

Generations of visitors to the Gemäldegalerie in Dresden have been deeply impressed by the way in which Raphael portrayed the Madonna in this painting. It has been reproduced over and over again, and almost everyone is familiar with the cherubs leaning on the balustrade. The Madonna appears from behind a curtain, confident and yet hesitant. The curtain gives the illusion of hiding her figure from the eyes of the onlooker and at the same time of being able to protect Raphael's painting.

Raphael: The School of Athens, 1509Fresco, width at the base approx. 25 ft.

Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican

Raphael used the faces of his friends, including Leonardo and Michelangelo in this painting.

Sofonisba Anguissola: Self-Portrait, 1554Oil on canvas

Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Italian portrait painter, one of six painter sisters from Cremona. She was the first woman artist to achieve international renown, being called to Spain by Philip II and visited by Van Eyck in Genoa in 1623, when she was in her nineties. Her self-portraits and portraits of her family are considered her finest works; they are somewhat stiff, but can have great charm.

Artemesia Gentileschi: Judith and her Maidservant

1612-1613Oil on canvas, approx. 3 ¾ x 3ftGalleria Palatina (Palazzo Pitti),

FlorenceArtemesia Gentileschi, the daughter of Orazio Gentileschi (1563-1639). She was precociously gifted, built up a European reputation, and lived a life of independence rare for a woman of the time. Born in Rome, she worked mainly there and in Florence until she settled in Naples in 1630.

Gentileschi’s Judith Slaying Holofernes

Caravaggio's Judith Beheading Holofernes