1. Renaissance Art and Architecture
The word “renaissance” means “rebirth,” and as Europe moved out of the Middle Ages, many people felt as if the world was indeed being born again. The period witnessed a rethinking and remaking of society’s institutions. It was also a time when leading thinkers revisited the “great ideas” of ancient Greece and Rome and found new ways in which to apply these ideas.
Renaissance Art and Architecture

2. Essential Questions
What factors made Italy the site for the creative flowering of Renaissance artists and writers in the 14th and 15th centuries?
Why did Renaissance thinkers find it so attractive to turn to classical models from ancient Rome and Greece as guides in forming their own ideas and carrying out their own creative efforts?
Who were the greatest artists, architects, and writers of the Renaissance, and how did they get the support they needed to carry out their projects?
What key features of Renaissance art made it such a dramatic and innovative time for the arts in Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries?
In what ways was humanism a departure from ways of thinking about human experience more typical of the Middle Ages?
In what ways did the Renaissance spirit shift as it moved north of Italy into other parts of Europe?

3. Giovanni Bellini, Sacra Conversazione
Background
1050–1350
Population growth
Economic development
City-states
1200–late 1500s
Artistic achievements
From roughly 1050 to 1300, Europe experienced population growth, economic development, and a rise in the political power of some independent city-states. These changes set the stage for a remarkable period of creativity that lasted from the late 1200s to about the late 1500s. During this time, Europe witnessed an incredible explosion of artistic achievement that began in Italy and eventually spread throughout the continent.
Giovanni Bellini, Sacra Conversazione

4. Intellectual Developments
Humanism
Revival of antiquity
Importance of the individual
Celebration of humanity
Secular/worldly focus
At the core of the Italian Renaissance lay an intellectual movement known as “humanism.” It was based on the study of classical culture—Greece and Rome—and focused on secular or worldly subjects, rather than religious ones. Humanists stressed education as a stimulant to creativity and believed that the subjects taught in ancient Greek and Roman schools— grammar, poetry, and history—should be revived. Many of the important figures of the Italian Renaissance considered themselves the direct inheritors of the classical tradition.
Recognition of the importance of the individual—something which happened rarely, if at all, in the medieval era—was a critical aspect of the Renaissance. Much of Renaissance artwork reveals a glorification of humanity and a celebration of the beauty of the human body.
The Renaissance focused less on religion and the afterlife and more on enjoying the pleasures of life in the here and now. Humanists wanted to expand the focus of Christianity beyond sin and redemption to include the full range of human experience—a desire which often led to conflict with the Catholic Church.
Titian, Assumption of the Virgin

5. Renaissance Italy
The Renaissance started in Italy and, over the next 200 years or so, spread north into other parts of Europe. At the beginning of the 1400s, Italy was not a unified nation but consisted instead of a series of relatively independent city-states. Each city-state had its own ruler: for example, the Pope in Rome presided over the Papal States, the Medici family dominated the Republic of Florence, the Doge ruled the Republic of Venice, the Sforza family was preeminent in the Duchy of Milan, and the Este family governed Ferrara. Relations between the city-states were characterized by an intense rivalry that most often took the form of economic and artistic competition but sometimes erupted into open warfare.

6. Florence
Probably the most important of the Italian city-states during the Renaissance was Florence, a center of commerce, trade, banking, and textiles. Many Florentine businessmen and political leaders financed the artists of the Renaissance. Merchant guilds and religious orders looking to increase their power or prestige would also commission artists to create works. The picture on the right of this slide shows the emblem of the city of Florence as rendered by Donatello, one of the most important artists of the Renaissance.

7. Renaissance Art: Techniques and Themes
Increasing focus on secular rather than religious subjects
Realistic-looking figures and scenes
Perspective/depth
Sense of movement, activity
Symmetry/proportionality
The painting in this slide, by Renaissance artist Domenico Ghirlandaio, illustrates several key techniques and themes of Renaissance art. Medieval art had focused almost exclusively on religious subjects; this painting, which shows wealthy Florentine merchants, offers an example of how Renaissance artists began to branch out and center their works around secular subjects. Note in the painting how the faces are distinct from one another and portray realistic emotions. In addition, the use of light and shadow—as evidenced by the folds in the robes and the contrast of the darker figures against the lighter background— gives the image depth. Next, take a look at how the various positions of the merchants’ bodies create a sense of movement and activity. Finally, note the symmetry of the painting, with the central figure (in brown) flanked on either side by two other figures.

8. Comparing Medieval Art and Renaissance Art
Medieval art often appeared flat and lifeless. Faces tended to look alike, and the paintings were two-dimensional, lacking in proportion and perspective. The picture on the left was painted in Note that all of the people in this painting are the same size regardless of their distance from the front.
In addition, most art of the Middle Ages centered on religious themes. Renaissance artists began to move away from this religious emphasis, focusing instead on the humanist themes of glorification of humanity and respect for the individual.
Compare the painting on the right (also by Ghirlandaio) to the painting on the left. Note how the Renaissance work has depth and movement. The figures have distinct facial features and realistic-looking expressions; they also appear to be having a conversation. Through its representations of movement, implied conversation, and natural human emotions and responses, this and other art of the Renaissance looks much more alive and active than medieval art.
Middle Ages
Renaissance

9. Giotto de Bondone, The Mourning of Christ
The so-called Florentine school of painting began in the Middle Ages and reached its height during the Renaissance. Giotto de Bondone (1266–1337) was one of the great early innovators of the Florentine school. He pioneered the technique of fresco painting (i.e., painting directly onto wet plaster), which was used often for Renaissance murals. He was also one of the first to try for a more realistic look to the figures in his paintings, giving them a feel of three-dimensionality and authenticity that made them appear much more human and lifelike than figures in medieval paintings. In The Mourning of Christ, Giotto makes each figure a distinct individual whose face displays a different expression of grief. Though the painting does not show the mathematical three-dimensional perspective later Renaissance art would, it does seem much less flat than the medieval painting we viewed in the previous slide.

10. Masaccio, Tribute Money
Masaccio (1401–1428) was the first artist of the Florentine school to really develop the technique of perspective, which is the use of lines, light and shadow, and relative sizing to bring depth and realism to a picture. His work influenced a generation of painters to come. The image in this slide shows a scene from a fresco series that Masaccio painted for the Brancacci Chapel in Florence.