Art History Lecture 1 Giorgio Vasari 1511 1574 Rhetorics of praise and blame humanistic movement Renaissance Art history as humanistic biography Heinrich W lfflin 1864 1945 Introduced idea of comparison Formal analysis analysis of visual forms including composition color figural style realism naturalism idealization abstraction Understanding cultural forms and historical context Aby Warburg 1866 1929 Started art history library became intellectual center Studied cultures of Southwest America Mexico Iconography Erwin Panofsky 1892 1968 Refined iconography philosophically Understood what symbols meant in art Iconology connection to culture Psychology of perception Social history T J Clark b 1943 Marxism social and economic history politics Linda Nochlin b 1931 Restored women artists to deserved status Women were previously written out of art history Feminism and art history 1970s biological determinism 1980s onwards gender as performance TIMELINE The Early Renaissance 1402 1494 The High Renaissance 1495 1520 The Late Renaissance 1521 1597 15th Century Italian Art Early Renaissance 1402 1494 Painting During the Middle Ages painting was a mechanical art guild system master apprentice requests from patrons work done at a shop bottega Mechanical vs liberal art mechanical art held in lower esteem Mechanical art done without theory Liberal art has theory behind it ex grammar logic arithmetic astronomy Painting elevated to liberal art during Early Renaissance by Leon Battista Alberti in De pictura 1435 Humanists studied ancient Greek and Roman literature humanism literally means study of Greek and Latin letters popularity rises in late 13th 14th c began to see painting as liberal art campaign to elevate painting to liberal art and recover art theory drew upon study of perspective done by ancients which used geometry and other mathematical principles study of proportion from proportional mathematics geometrical optics mythology in ancient art was also portrayed with artist s interpretation In 15th century began studying ancient mythology and literature to create art according to own literary interpretations Renaissance art is an imaginative reconstruction Byzantines did not like paintings religious images in church waves of iconoclasm painters migrate to Northern and Western Europe Gothic tradition naturalism comes from France No concept of complementary colors during the Renaissance Masaccio 15th c Florentine painter The Holy Trinity c 1428 in Santa Maria Novella patrons Lenzi for family mausoleum Altarpiece located above behind altar to help visualize divine being Holy trinity father God son and the Holy Spirit represented as a dove memento mori a command to remember death As you are now I once was as I am now you will be style realistic appropriate proportions of the body natural musculature the first painting to show perspective one point perspective the construction around a single point at eye level point called infinity where parallel lines come together Tribute Money c 1427 true fresco water based paint on fresh plaster paint turns into crystals of lime lasts for centuries unless damaged by moisture aerial perspective colors shift with distance Piero della Francesca Madonna and Child With Saints Adored c 1472 commissioned by Federico da Montefeltro suspended figure from shell may represent a pearl theme of sexual purity a pearl is created without sexual act The Flagellation of Christ c 1455 portrays event during the Passion of Christ Sandro Boticelli The Birth of Venus c 1428 ideal of beauty in the portrayal of Venus Quattrocento artistic and cultural events in 15th century Italy late Middle Ages Early Renaissance Patron wealthy powerful supporter of the artist viewed as the art creators since they provided the idea and the money Franciscan monks religious group following teachings of St Francis of Assisi started movement towards Italian Gothic style in the later Middle Ages 13th 14th c most important Italian Gothic monument church at Assisi Dominican monks struggled against Renaissance movement Fra Bartolomeo Renaissance painter of religious figures good at shading his figures tend to be small and draped Tempera mineral and organic pigments bound with egg yolk Fresco secco fresco on already dried plaster that has been moistened using pigments in egg yolk medium to simulate fresh plaster Coffers sunken square panels or rectangle octagonal in a ceiling or vault earliest samples found in ancient Greece and Rome Barrel vault simplest type of vault a series of arches one after another Hue pure color no tint or shade Saturation intensity of color is it intense or more muted Value relative lightness darkness of the color useful tool in defining form and creating spatial illusions Primary colors red yellow blue Vanishing point point on horizon where parallel lines appear to converge Guilds Early Renaissance artists belonged to guilds professional trade organizations responsible for inspecting art and materials used and giving artists their commissions for their works Apprenticeship learning the craft involving living with a master artist beginning between 7 and 15 years of age Isocephallic composition one that has all the heads of the figures on approximately the same level Rhetorical gestures visual accompaniment to speech often draw attention to person statue or building nearby express emotion Continuous narrative snapshots of a story in one painting often with climactic scene in center Mitre hat worn by Catholic bishop Cope long mantle cloak open in front and fastened at breast worn by clergy Crosier stylized staff of high ranking clergy Holy Conversation sacra conversazione holy Virgin and child surrounded by saints St John the Evangelist one of the 12 original apostles only one not killed for his faith i e not a martyr Martyr in Christianity one who brings a testimony written or verbal of faith with the knowledge that their action will most likely result in imminent death and is killed for maintaining the belief Virgin Mary conceived Jesus through the Holy Spirit which was announced by the angel Gabriel she is not considered divine but blessed central to Catholic Christian faith in particular St John the Baptist often portrayed with long hair like Jesus himself beheading of St John is a common art theme was beheaded by king Herod as ordered by the king s daughter and the head put on a platter St Zenobius first bishop of Florence said to have been able to revive the dead often shown