The Renaissance

Renaissance• The word Renaissance, from the

Italian rinascita or rebirth, became widely used in the nineteenth century

• The Renaissance was an age of intellectual exploration, in which the humanist strove to understand in ever more precise and scientific terms the nature of humanity and its relationship to the natural world

• Three of the main city-states that became centers of culture during this period were Florence, Rome, and Venice

Humanism

• The recovery, study, and spread of the art and literature of Greece and Rome

• The application of their principles to education, politics, social life and the arts in general

• Stimulated a new appreciation for the value of the individual

• Each person possessed the capacity for self-determination in the search for truth and morality

• Faith, sacred texts or religious tradition were no longer the only guides available to the inquiring mind

In 1817 the young French novelist Marie-Henri Beyle, better known by his pen name "Stendhal", was overcome by Florence's rich tapestry of art and history on a visit to the city.

He wrote in his diary,

I was in a sort of ecstasy, from the idea of being in Florence, close to the great men whose tombs I had seen. Absorbed in the contemplation of sublime beauty ... I reached the point where one encounters celestial sensations ... Everything spoke so vividly to my soul. Ah, if I could only forget. I had palpitations of the heart, what in Berlin they call 'nerves.' Life was drained from me. I walked with the fear of falling.

In the 1970s, Doctor Graziella Magherini, chief psychiatrist at Florence's Santa Maria Nuova Hospital remembered Stendhal's affliction when she noticed that many tourists to the city were similarly overwhelmed and suffered panic attacks and bouts of madness. She named the condition Stendhal's Syndrome

Rescuing Florence’s masterpieces after the flood of 1966

The Arno River flood of 1966 in Florence

Florence Flood of 1966

Florence

• Florence, the preeminent Italian city-state in the fifteenth century, was home to the powerful Medici family, whose wealth derived from their considerable banking interests

• Although the Medici never ruled Florence outright, over the course of 76 years (1418-1494), they molded and manipulated, controlled and cajoled, persuaded and provoked the citizens of Florence

Florence Cathedral. Begun 1296 on original plan by Arnolfo di Cambio; redesigned 1357

and 1366 by Francesco Talenti, Andrea Orcagna, and Neri di Fioravanti; dome 1420--1436 by Filippo Brunelleschi; baptistery, late

11th--early 12th century; campanile ca. 1334--1350 by Giotto, Andrea Pisano, and Francesco Talenti. Height at bronze ball atop lantern, 350'.

• Legend about site is that a Roman temple to Mars had stood at that location, subsequently rededicated to Saint John the Baptist

• The original doors had fallen into disrepair, so the “Arte della Lana” (Cloth Merchants Guild) was determined to create a new set of doors hoping to bring God’s favor on the city that had been devastated by plague and siege

• Seven artists were charged with creating a bronze relief panel depicting the Hebrew Bible’s story of the Sacrifice of Isaac (Gen. 22) in a 21 17½-inch quatrefoil (a four-leaf clover shape set on a diamond)

• All but two designs, both by little-known 24-year-old goldsmiths—Filippo Brunelleschi and Lorenzo Ghiberti—were eliminated

Florence Baptistery

Lorenzo Ghiberti. Sacrifice of Isaac, 1401-1402. Gilded bronze relief, 21" x 17".

Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence

Filippo Brunelleschi. Sacrifice of Isaac, 1401-1402. Gilded bronze relief, 21" x

17". Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence

foreshortening - a technique used to suggest that forms are sharply advancing

or receding

The Gates of Paradise• The judges selected Ghiberti’s design, and for the next 22 years, he worked on the designs for the north doors, creating 28 panels illustrating the New Testament

• Upon those doors’ completion in 1424, the Cloth Merchants Guild commissioned a second set of doors for the east side, these consisting of ten square panels depicting scenes from the Hebrew Bible; they would take Ghiberti another 27 years to complete

• The east doors are known as the Gates of Paradise because they open onto the paradiso, the area between the baptistery and the entrance to its cathedral

• Ghiberti meant to follow the lead of the ancients in creating realistic figures in realistic space

Lorenzo Ghiberti. Gates of Paradise, east door, Florence Baptistery, 1425-

52. Gilded bronze relief, height over 7'.

Lorenzo Ghiberti. Self-portrait from the Gates of Paradise, east doors of the baptistery, Florence. ca. 1445–1448.

Lorenzo Ghiberti(c.1381-1455)

The Story of Adam and EveEast Doors of the Baptistery, ca. 1425-37

• The first panel depicts four episodes: the Creation of Adam, the Creation of Eve, the Temptation, and the Expulsion

• The influence of classical antiquity is clear in the portrayal of Eve, a Venus of recognizably Hellenistic origin

• Adam resembles the recumbent god from the east pediment of the Parthenon

Photograph of Ghiberti’s Gates of Paradise, damaged after the 1966 flooding of the Arno River

Florence Cathedral • Known as the Duomo

• Construction began (1296) under the auspices of the Opera del Duomo, which was controlled by the Cloth Merchant’s Guild

• Planned as the most beautiful and grand in all of Tuscany

• Was not finished until some 140 years later

• Panels of architects prepared models of the church and submitted them to the Opera which either accepted or rejected them

Florence Cathedral. Begun 1296 on original plan by Arnolfo di Cambio; redesigned 1357

and 1366 by Francesco Talenti, Andrea Orcagna, and Neri di Fioravanti; dome 1420--1436 by Filippo Brunelleschi; baptistery, late

11th--early 12th century; campanile ca. 1334--1350 by Giotto, Andrea Pisano, and Francesco Talenti. Height at bronze ball atop lantern, 350'.

• Brunelleschi had left Florence for Rome following his loss in the Baptistery doors competition

• He produced the winning design in another competition, this one to create a dome for the Florence Cathedral

• His design guaranteed his reputation as a genius of Renaissance Florence

Design based on his studies of ancient buildings, including the:– Colosseum– Pantheon– Baths of Caracalla– Domus Aurea (Golden Palace)

Brunelleschi, Top: dome and lantern of Florence Cathedral, Dome 1420–1436; lantern,

after 1446

Brunelleschi’s Dome

Brunelleschi’s design:

•eliminated the need for temporary wooden scaffolding

Consisted of:

•eight large ribs, visible on the outside

•alternating with eight pairs of thinner ribs beneath the roof

•These were all tied together by only nine sets of horizontal ties, and would be able to support the dome

The thinner ribs would lie between two shells, the:

outer roofinterior ceiling

• resulting in a dome much lighter in weight than a solid structure

• scaffolding would be cantilevered out from the base of the drum and moved up, horizontal band by horizontal band, as the dome rose up

• additional support could be achieved through the use of lightweight bricks set in an interlocking herringbone pattern

• the dome was a model of visual simplicity and clarity

March 15, 1436 was a day of dedication forthe completed Florence Cathedral, now crowned by Brunelleschi’s dome

• For the consecration of Florence Cathedral, rededicated as Santa Maria del Fiore (Saint Mary of the Flower), Brunelleschi constructed a 1,000’ walkway, 6’ high, and decorated with flowers and herbs, on which to guide celebrated guests into the cathedral

A procession wound its way through the city streets and entered the cathedral

It was led by Pope Eugene IV, seven cardinals, thirty-seven bishops and untold numbers of church officials, civic leaders, artists, scholars and musicians

Once inside, the guests heard a newmusical work, picking up the floral themeof the day, Nuper rosarum flores composed especially for the consecration by French composer Guillaume Dufay

Nuper rosarum flores, Flowers of

the Roses, or Il Duomo motet

• Nuper rosarum flores is a motet, a polyphonic vocal work on a sacred text usually without instrumental accompaniment

• Dufay’s motet introduced a richer, more fuller sonority to the form

• The cantus firmus or fixed melody on which the composition is based is stated in not one but two voices, both moving at different speeds

• Cantus firmus - (Lat., "fixed song") • A preexisting melody used as the

foundation for a polyphonic composition

Guillaume Dufay(c1400-1474)

• The melody derives from a chant traditionally used for the dedication of new churches, Terribilis est locus iste or Awesome is This Place

• The motet also reflects the ideal proportions of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, which, according to I Kings, was laid out in the proportions 6:4:2:3

• 6 length of the building• 4 length of the nave• 2 width• 3 height

• Florence Cathedral followed these same proportions

• Dufay mirrors them in his composition by repeating the cantus firmus four times, successively based on 6, 4, 2 and 3 units per breve (a note equivalent to two whole notes in modern notation)

Nuper rosarum flores

Nuper rosarum flores

• Recently garlands of roses, despite a terrible winter, were given by the Pope to you, heavenly Virgin, as a perpetual adornment, with a temple of great ingenuity, dedicated in a pious and holy fashion.

• Today Eugenius, the vicar of Jesus Christ and successor of Peter, has deigned to consecrate this same very vast temple with his sacred hands and holy oils.

• Therefore, sweet parent and daughter of your son, virgin, favorite of virgins, your devoted people of Florence pray to you, that they may acquire something in mind and body on earth.

• By your prayer, and by the worth of the crucifixion of your son in the flesh, their Lord, may they deserve to receive kind favors and pardon for their transgressions. Amen."

Music CD Track 7.1(#6 on the Faculty drive)

Dufay, Nuper rosarum flores

The whole space of the temple was filled with such choruses of harmony, and such a concert of diverse instruments, that it seemed (not without reason) as though the symphonies and songs of the angels and of divine paradise had been sent forth from Heaven to whisper in our ears an unbelievable celestial sweetness

Filippo Brunelleschi

Self portrait of Leon Battista Alberti (bronze plaque) c1436, National

Gallery, Washington DC.

Leon Battista Alberti

Principles of Brunelleschi’s Linear, One-Point Perspective

• All parallel lines in a visual field appear to converge at a single vanishing point on horizon

• These parallel lines are realized on the picture plane as diagonal lines called orthogonals

• Forms diminish in scale as they approach along these orthogonals

• The vanishing point is directly opposite the eye of the beholder, who stands at the vantage point

Perspective: 15th Century Techniques (length: 4:02)

Giorgio Vasari

Vasari, Self-portrait (detail), Oil on

canvas, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Masaccio. Holy Trinity, c. 1425. Fresco, 21' 9" x 9' 4". Santa Maria Novella, Florence

Masaccio, The Tribute Money, Fresco, 8' 1¼" 19' 7", 1420s

• Aerial/atmospheric perspective

Masaccio, Tribute Money, from left side of the Brancacci Chapel, Santa Maria del

Carmine, Florence

Giotto. Kiss of Judas (The Betrayal), Arena Chapel, Padua, c. 1305.

Fresco

• First life-sized freestanding male nude sculpted since antiquity

• might represent the virtue of the Florentine republic as a whole

• Stood in courtyard of the Medici palace bearing the following inscription:

The victor is whoever defends the fatherland. All-powerful God crushes

the angry enemy. Behold a boy overcame the great tyrant. Conquer, o citizens.

• contrapposto - principle of the weight shift

Donatello. David, c. 1430-1440. Bronze, 5' 2 1/2" high. Museo

Nazionale del Bargello, Florence

Donatello. David, details, c. 1430-1440. Bronze, 5' 2 1/2" high. Museo

Nazionale del Bargello, Florence

Donatello. David, c. 1430-1440. Bronze, 5' 2 1/2" high. Museo Nazionale del Bargello,

Florence

Polykleitos, Doryphoros (Spear Bearer), c. 450-440 B.C.E. Marble copy of bronze

original, 6' 11 1/2" high. Museo Nazionale Archeologico, Naples.

Medici Family

Michelozzo di Bartolommeo. Palazzo Medici-Ricardi,Florence. Begun 1444.

Leon Battista Alberti. Palazzo Rucellai, Florence. 1446–1451.

Sandro Botticelli

(1445-1510 )

Sandro Botticelli, PrimaveraTempera on panel, 6' 8" 10' 4", early 1480s

Botticelli, Primavera, c. 1482, Tempera on wood, 203 x 314 cm, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Pico della Mirandola

• Humanist philosopher in the court of Lorenzo de Medici

• believed that all intellectual endeavors shared the same purpose, to reveal divine truth

• was inspired by his readings in Hebrew, Arabic, Latin and Greek

• his compilation of 900 theological and philosophical theses were banned by Pope Innocent VII

• wrote, Oration on the Dignity of ManReading 7.2 Pico della Mirandola, Oration on

the Dignity of Man (1486)

Federigo da Montefeltro

• A military strategist and learned duke

• Was a condottiero, a mercenary soldier who was a valuable and highly paid ally and had an army

• Ruled the city-state of Urbino, 70 miles east of Florence

• Surrounded himself with humanists, scholars, poets and artists

• with the money he earned as a condottiero, he paid artists to embellish Urbino

• His court was a magnet for young men who wanted to learn the principles of noble behavior Piero della Francesca. Federigo da

Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino (after cleaning), after 1475. Oil and tempera on panel, 18 1/2" x 13". Galleria degli Uffizi,

Florence.

• Wrote one of the most important books of the age, The Book of the Courtier (1513-1518); published in 1528

• The book consists of recalled conversations, probably imaginary, that took place in 1507 among a group of aristocrats at the Urbino court of Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, the son of Federigo

Baldassare Castiglione

Raphael, Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, 1514-15, Oil on canvas, 82 x

67 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris

• Takes the form of a dialogue in which eloquent courtiers compete with each other to describe the perfect courtier

• courtier – a man or woman whose education and deportment is best fashioned to serve the prince

• Is a nostalgic recreation of Castiglione’s nine years at the Urbino court

• takes place on four successive evenings in the spring of 1507

• The dialogue is in the form of a dialectic

The Book of the Courtier

• the first two books:– The qualities of an ideal

gentleman are debated

A courtier must be:

– a completely well-rounded person, l’uomo universale or universal man

– An accomplished soldier, mastering the martial arts and demonstrating bravery and total loyalty in war

• His education must include:

– Latin and Greek

– Other modern languages such as Spanish and French (necessary for diplomacy)

– Study of great Italian poets and writers such as Petrarch and Boccaccio (so he might imitate their skill in his own prose, both in Latin and in the vernacular

The Book of the Courtier

• The courtier must be able to:

– Draw– Appreciate the arts– Excel in dance and music– Demonstrate a certain grazia or gracefulness

Reading 7.3aBaldassare Castiglione,

The Courtier, Book 1

- grazia must be tempered by gravitas or dignity

- This balanced character trait is obtained, Castiglione explains in the Book of the Courtier, by means of one universal rule:

Flee as much as possible….affectation, and perhaps to coin a word…make use in all things of a certain sprezzatura, which conceals art and presents everything said and done as something brought about without laboriousness and almost without giving it any thought.

• Sprezzatura or undervaluing or setting a small price on something

• Doing things effortlessly, with an attitude of nonchalance

• The ideal gentleman is a construction of absolute artifice, a work of art in his own right who cuts una bella figura , a fine figure that all will seek to emulate

• A state led by such perfect gentlemen would reflect that perfection

• Thus great individuals create the perfect state in the kind of exercise of free will that Pico della Mirandola discussed

The Book of the Courtier

• The proper behavior of ladies at the court is known from the Book of the Courtier

• Part of The Book’s concern with the conduct of the aristocratic gentleman is the gentleman’s expectations of his lady

• Ladies would profit from most of the rules as gentlemen

• In one of the book’s conversations, Giuliano de Medici addresses a gathering of ladies and gentlemen, pointing out what the lady needs beyond the accomplishments of her husband

• The court lady must use her breeding and education to further the perfection of her home

The Book of the Courtier

Reading 7.3 bBaldassare Castiglione, The

Courtier, Book 3

Laura Cereta

• Strove, like many other women, to a level of education beyond the knowledge of letters, music and painting called for by Castiglione

• Was the eldest child from a prominent family from Brescia

• Educated by nuns at a convent school until the age of 11

• Studied reading, writing, embroidery and Latin there

• At age 11, her father called her home to help raise her siblings, but encouraged her to continue her studies

• In his library, she read in Latin, Greek and studied mathematics

• At the age of 15, she married and chose motherhood over her studies

• When her husband died two years later, she returned to her studies

• At nineteen, she published Family Letters, a Latin manuscript containing:

– 82 letters addressed to friends and family, most of them women

– a mock funeral oration in the classical style

Laura Cereta

• Cereta’s, In Defense of Liberal Instruction for Women (1488) - one of the most remarkable 15th century Italian documents

• It is a response to a critic who had praised her a s a prodigy, implying that true women humanist scholars were rare

• The critic implied that perhaps her father had authored the letters

• In the Defense, she explains why so few women were scholars and then defends her own learning

• Her argument parallels that of Pico della Mirandola: women, like men, can exercise their free will in the pursuit of learning

Reading 7.4Laura Cereta, Defense of Liberal Instruction for Women (1488)

In Defense of Liberal Instruction for Women

Reading 7.1Song of Bacchus or

Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne, from Lorenzo de Medici: Selected Poems and

Prose

Vasari, Portrait of Lorenzo the Magnificent, Oil on wood, 90 x 72 cm, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Lorenzo de Medici

Portrait of Girolamo Savonarolac. 1498, Oil on wood, 47 x 31 cm,

Museo di San Marco, Florence

Leonardo da Vinci, Self-Portrait, c. 1512, Red chalk, 33.3 x 21.3 cm (13 1/8 x 8 3/8 in),

Biblioteca Reale, Turin

Leonardo da Vinci

(1452-1519)

Leonardo da Vinci. Vitruvian Man. ca. 1485–1490.13 1/2" 9 5/8"

• Leonardo fuses his subject with the landscape behind her by means of light. He called this technique sfumato (“smokiness”)

• The painting’s hazy effects could only be achieved by building up color with many layers of oil paint—a process called glazing

Leonardo da Vinci. Mona Lisa, c. 1503-1505. Oil on wood, 30 1/4" x

21". Louvre, Paris

Leonardo da Vinci. Mona Lisa, detail, c. 1503-1505. Oil on wood, 30 1/4" x 21". Louvre, Paris

Leonardo da Vinci. Mona Lisa, c. 1503-1505. Oil on wood, 30 1/4" x

21". Louvre, Paris

Duchamp, L..H.O.O.Q., 1919, reproduction of Leonardo’s, Mona Lisa altered with pencil, 7 3/4x4 1/8”, Private

Collection, Paris

Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper, c. 1495-97. mural, 15' 1 1/8" x 28' 10 1/2". Refectory, Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan

Perspective diagrams of Leonardo’s Last Supper

Leonardo da Vinci, Last Supper, 1498, pre-WWII photograph of the refectory of the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie,

Milan

Il refettorio di Santa Maria delle Grazie dopo il bombardamento dell'agosto 1943. E' possibile vedere chiaramente la crocifissione del Monfortano sulla parete corta non crollata. Il Cenacolo di Leonardo gli è esattamente di fronte, non visibile

nella foto

Leonardo da Vinci’s Christ during three stages of restoration

Mary Beth Edelson, Some Living American Women Artists, 1971, Offset print, 26" x 38"

French fashion house Girbaud’s ad showing female version of Leonardo’s Last Supper was censored by the French government (2006)

Rome at the Beginning of the 15th Century

• In the early 15th century, Rome seemed a pitiful place. Its population had shrunk from around 1 million in 100 CE to under 20,000 as the result of the Black Death

• The ancient Colosseum was now in the countryside, the Forum was a pasture for goats and cattle, and the aqueducts had collapsed

• The popes had even abandoned the city when in 1309 Avignon was established as the seat of the Church. When Rome reestablished itself as the titular seat of the Church in 1379, succeeding popes rarely chose to visit the city, let alone live in it

Anonymous, View of RomeOil on canvas, ca. 1550

Vitruvius

• Ancient, architectural historian

• Believed the circle and the square were the ideal shapes

• These shapes originated from the ideal human figure

• They also mirrored the symmetry of the body and the proportional coherence of all its parts

• Vitruvius’ explanation of the human proportions is believed to be taken from the lost Canon of the sculptor, Polykleitos

• The layout of these proportions was the figurative equivalent of Pythagoras’ theory of the music of the spheres:– Each planet produces a musical

sound fixed mathematically by its velocity and distance from the earth

– The sound harmonized with those produced by other planets and was audible, but not recognized on earth

Leonardo, Vitruvius Man

• According to Vitruvius, if:

• the human head is 1/8th of the height of an idealized figure

• then, the human body itself fits into the ideal musical interval of the octave, the interval that gives the impression of duplicating the original note at a higher or lower pitch

• Leonardo illustrated how the human figure generates both the circle and the square

• Donato Bramante (1445-1514) was commissioned by Pope Julius II to renovate the Vatican Palaces and serve as chief architect of a plan to replace Saint Peter’s Basilica with a new church

• Applied ideas of geometrical perfection inspired by Vitruvius to one of his earliest commissions, the Tempietto

Donato Bramante, Tempietto1502

• Bramante’s Tempietto (Little Temple), built directly over what was revered as the site of Saint Peter’s Martyrdom, is modeled after a classical temple

• The 16 exterior columns are Doric, their shafts spolia, original ancient Roman granite columns

Donato Bramante, Tempietto1502

Diameter of the shaft defines the entire plan. Each shaft is spaced four diameters from the next, and the colonnade they form is two diameters from the circular walls

The frieze above the columns is decorated with a relief relating to objects of the Christian liturgy

The Tempietto embodies Italian humanist architecture in the Renaissance in its:

classical referenceproportional coherence of its

partsDonato Bramante, Tempietto

1502

Raphael. Pope Julius ll, 1511-1512. Oil on panel, 3' 6 1/2" x 2' 7 !/2". Uffizi,

Florence

• Julius II wanted to finance the construction of a new St. Peter’s

• He financed the project through the sale of indulgences, dispensations granted by the Church to shorten an individual’s stay in purgatory

• Purgatory – the place where sinners temporary resided after death as punishment for their sins

• In Bramante’s plan for a new St. Peter’s, he adopted the Vitruvian square, placing inside it a Greek cross (upright and transverse shafts are of equal length and intersect at their middles)

• He topped it by a central dome recalling the giant dome of the Pantheon

• The resultant central plan is essentially a circle, inscribed within a square

• In Renaissance thought, the central plan and dome symbolized the perfection of God

• Construction began in 1506

Plans for Saint Peter’s, Rome by Donato

Bramante.

• The project was temporarily halted:– Pope Julius II died in1513 and

Bramante died in 1514 - Rome was sacked by the troops of the Habsburg Emperor, Charles V

• Pope Paul III employed Michelangelo as architect

• Michelangelo developed the church its final plan (1546) who added:– more support for the dome– thicker walls– a portico of ten columns in the second

row and four in the front, creating the feeling of a Latin cross

– massive flight of steps rising to the main portal

Plans for Saint Peter’s, Rome by Michelangelo.

Portrait of Girolamo Savonarolac. 1498, Oil on wood, 47 x 31 cm,

Museo di San Marco, Florence

Girolamo Savonarola(1452-98)

• Dominican friar

• Abbot of the monastery of San Marco

• Wielded much political power

• Appealed to a moralistic faction of the populace that saw, in the behavior of Florence’s upper classes, and in their humanistic attraction to classical Greek and Roman culture, evidence of moral decadence

• Railed against the Florentine nobility, especially the Medici

• Organized troops of children to collect the city’s “vanities” (everything from cosmetics, to books and paintings) and burn them in giant bonfires

• Pope Alexander VI excommunicated him (1497) for his antipapal preaches and for disobeying his directives for the administration of the monastery of San Marco

• He was commanded not to preach, but he ignored this order

• In 1498 he was:- forcibly removed from San Marco

-tortured as a heretic along with two fellow friars

- hanged until he was nearly dead

- burned at the stake

- his ashes were thrown into the Arno River

Florence felt freed from tyranny

Marcello Venusti, Portrait of Michelangelo, c1504-06, oil/panel, Uffizzi, Florence

MichelangeloBuonarroti

(1475-1564)

Michelangelo, David, 1501-1504. Marble, 14' h,Galleria dell'Accademia, Florence.

Donatello. David, c. 1430-1440. Bronze, 5' 2 1/2" high. Museo

Nazionale del Bargello, Florence

• Michelangelo represents David before, not after, his triumph, confident, ready to take on whatever challenge faces him

• Each night, as workers installed the statue in the Piazza della Signoria, supporters of the exiled Medici hurled stones at it

• Others objected to the statue’s nudity, and before it was even in place, a skirt of copper leaves was prepared to spare the general public any possible offense

Raphael. Pope Julius ll, 1511-1512. Oil on panel, 3' 6 1/2" x 2' 7 !/2". Uffizi,

Florence

Michelangelo, Studies for the Libyan Sibyl, Red Chalk, 11-3/8" 8-7/26", ca. 1520

Michelangelo, Libyan SibylFresco, 1512

Michelangelo. Creation of Adam, Sistine Chapel, Vatican, Rome. 1510.

Michelangelo, Laurentian Library StaircaseDesigned beginning 1524; completed 1559

• Michelangelo’s most original contribution to the Laurentian library, which was designed to house the Medici’s book collection, is the large triple stairway

• The cascading waterfall effect suggests that Michelangelo was becoming increasingly interested in exploring realms of the imagination beyond the humanist vision of a rational world governed by structural logic

Raphael(Raffaelo Santi)

(1483-1520)

Raphael, Self-Portrait

Raphael

• As Michelangelo was beginning work on the Sistine ceiling, the young painter Raphael arrived in Rome and quickly secured a commission

• from Julius II to paint the pope’s private rooms in the Vatican Palace

• The first of these rooms was the Stanza della Segnature, Room of the Signature, which Julius used as a library

• On each of the four walls Raphael was to paint one of the four major areas of human learning: Law and Justice, to be represented by the Cardinal Virtues; the Arts, to be represented by Mount Parnassus; Theology, to be represented by the Disputà, or Dispute over the Sacrament; and Philosophy, to be represented by the School of Athens. Two scenes had classical themes, the other two Christian

Raphael, School of AthensFresco, 19' 27', 1510-11

 1. Plato (portrait of Leonardo) 7. Heraclitus (portrait of Michelangelo)

2.  Aristotle 8. Pythagoras

3. Diogenes 9. Apollo

4. Euclid (portrait of Bramante) 10. Socrates

5. Ptolemy 11. Minerva

6. Raphael (self-portrait)

Raphael, detail of Plato (portrait of Leonardo) and Aristotle, The School of Athens, 1510-11, fresco, Vatican, Stanza della Segnatura, Rome

Raphael, detail of Heracleitus (features of Michelangelo) The School of Athens, 1510-11, fresco, Vatican, Stanza della Segnatura, Rome

Raphael, detail of Euclid (features of Bramante) The School of Athens, 1510-11, fresco, Vatican, Stanza della Segnatura, Rome

Raphael, detail of Zoroaster, Ptolemy, Raphael (wearing dark cap), Sodoma, The School of Athens, 1510-11, fresco, Vatican, Stanza della

Segnatura, Rome

Pantheon, exterior, 118-125 C.E. Rome Raphael’s tomb, Pantheon

Raphael, Pope Leo X with Cardinals Giulio de’ Medici and Luigi de’ Rossi

Panel, 60½" 47", 1517

• After Julius died in 1513, the new pope, Leo X, son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, quickly hired Raphael for other commissions

• His portrait of Leo suggests a new direction in Raphael’s art. The lighting is more somber, and there is greater emphasis on the material reality of the scene

• The painting creates a sense of drama, as if the viewer is witness to an important historical moment

Josquin des Pres(1440-1521)

Flanders• In music, as in the visual arts,

composers of the Renaissance valued unity of design

• Josquin achieved a homogenous musical texture by the use of imitation

• imitation a technique whereby a melodic fragment introduced in the first voice is repeated closely (though usually at a different pitch) in the second, third and fourth voices, so that one overlaps the next

Score for the opening bars of Josquin des Prez’s Pange Lingua Mass. 16th century.

Music CD Track 7.2(#7 on the Faculty drive)

De Prez, Pangue lingua Mass

Santi di Tito, Niccolò Machiavellica. 1510

• A humanist scholar, Machiavelli (1469-1527) had studied the behavior of ancient Roman rulers and citizens at great length

• In 1512, Machiavelli was dismissed from his post as second chancellor, wrongfully accused of being involved in a plot to overthrow the new heads of state, imprisoned, tortured, and finally exiled permanently to a country home in the hills above Florence

• There, beginning in 1513, he wrote The Prince, his essay on political power

Niccolo Machiavelli

Reading 7.5aNiccolo Machiavelli,

The Prince, Chapter 14 (1513)

Reading 7.5bNiccolo Machiavelli,

The Prince, Chapter 5 (1513)

The High Renaissance in Venice

• Of all the Italian cities, Venice alone could claim invincibility because it possessed the natural fortification of being surrounded on all sides by water

• Venice considered itself blessed by Saint Mark, whose relics resided in the cathedral of Saint Mark’s

• A center of fashion, Venice provided the continent with satins, velvets, and brocades

• During the Renaissance, an elaborate, sensuous style of architecture would develop in Venice

View of the Doge’s Palace, with Saint Mark’s Cathedral to the Left

Masters of the Venetian High Renaissance:Giorgione and Titian

• The two great masters of painting in the Venetian High Renaissance were Giorgione da Castelfranco, known simply as Giorgione (ca. 1478-1510), and Tiziano Vecelli, known as Titian (ca. 1489-1576)

• Giorgione especially had been inspired by Leonardo’s visit to Venice in 1500. As did Leonardo in his landscapes, Giorgione and Titian built up color on their canvases by means of glazing

• Their paintings, like the great palaces of Venice whose reflections shimmered on the Grand Canal, demonstrate an exquisite sensitivity to the play of light and shadow, to the luxurious display of detail and design, and to an opulent variety of pattern and texture

Giorgionegiorgio da castelfranco

(1478-1510)

Giorgione, Copy of a lost Self-Portrait, Paper on wood, 31,5 x 21,5 cmMuseum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Giorgione, TempestOil on canvas, 31¼" 28¾", ca. 1509

• Nothing about this painting could be called controlled. The landscape is overgrown and weedy—just as the man and woman are disheveled and disrobed

• Lightning has revealed to the viewer a scene not meant to be witnessed

• Sensuality, even outright sexuality, would become a primary subject of Venetian art

Pastoral Concert

• A harmony of opposites: male and female, clothed and nude, the nobleman and the peasant, court music and folk song, city and country, and so on

• Musical instruments (the lute and the flute)—metaphors for parts of male and female anatomy, a usage common in both the art and the literature of the period

• Narrative presents a purposefully mysterious dream world, giving the viewer’s imagination the freedom to play

Giorgione, Pastoral ConcertOil on canvas, 43¼" 54-3/8", ca. 1510

titianTiziano Vecello(c1478-1576)

Titian, Self-Portrait, c. 1562Oil on canvas, 96 x 75 cmStaatliche Museen, Berlin

Titian, Sacred and Profane LoveOil on canvas, 46½" 109-7/8", ca. 1514

Two female figures—nude is sacred love and luxuriously clothed is earthly or profane love—probably represent two aspects of the same woman.

Titian, Reclining Nude (Venus of Urbino)

Oil on canvas, 47" 65", ca. 1538

More real woman than ethereal goddess, this “Venus” stares out at the viewer with matter-of-factness, suggesting she is totally comfortable with her nudity.

Veronese (Paolo Caliari) , c1575, Portrait of Veronica Franco, Worcester

Art Museum, Massachusetts

Reading 7.6Veronica Franco, Terze

Rime, Capitolio 13

Solomon and ShebaEast Doors of the Baptistery, ca. 1425-37

• The only panel to represent a single event in its space

• The reunification of the eastern Orthodox church (Sheba) and the western Catholic church (Solomon)

• Reunification of the two branches of the church would have restored symmetry and balance to a divided church just as Ghiberti had achieved balance and symmetry in his art

• Dufay’s compositions include:

– Nuper rosarum flores (“Flowers of the Roses”) also known as Il Duomo (motet)

– L’homme arme (“The Man in Armor”) (mass)– Alma redemptoris mater (motet)

• fuses medieval polyphony with a newer Italian form• multi-melodic, rather than only multi-voiced • more lyrical, less chant-like melodies

• polyphony – simultaneous singing of several voices– each voice independent of the others