Art History Unit 3

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Pazzi Chapel; Basillica di Santa Croce, Florence, Italy

Architect: Fillippo Brunelleschi c. 1429-1461, masonry

Funded by Pazzi family, second richest family in Florence. They added a secret room for burials in the back

Early Renaissance; rotunda, simple shapes

Size: working with the small space provided to accomodate for the chapel and teachings by munks. VERY simple floorplan

Tondi: small, circular paintings common in Rome, hence the renaissance — reviving Rome

Decorative columns, some structural but for aesthetics — Pilasters: part of the wall strictly for decoration.

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Palazzo Rucellai; Florence, Italy

Architect: Leon Battista Alberti c. 1450, stone masonry

Commissioned by the Rucellai family as a home, business, and servant quarters.

Facade becomes critical for move from Medieval Time

Three tiers divided by entablatures, separated by windows

Doric — Ionic — Corinthian

1st floor: business, 2nd floor: guests, 3rd: home for family, 4th: hidden, for servants

Loggia across the street

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David; 15th c. Florence

Donatello c. 1440-1460, Bronze

Earliest freestanding nude sculpture since antiquity — nudity shows he only needs the strength from God, typical of Greco-Roman — he is a hero

Medici commissioned — bronze is costly

Holds a stone in his left hand, a sword in his right

David is young compared to Goliath

androgynous features to show biblical beauty, Donatello’s sexuality plays a part

Attempted to show Medici Family as non-tyrannical (not true, they killed lots of people)

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Madonna and Child with Two Angels; Florence

Fra Filippo Lippi c. 1465, tempera on wood

New way to view the Virgin Mary and Christ— Naturalism, Christ is a baby, background is very detailed. Halo stays, but thinner

Hands are clasped in prayer, very proportional

Humanism: Mary is mundane, almost human. She isn’t on a throne or above the other people — angels are also human-like, very playful

Mary is pushing the frame, breaking the concept of traditional paintings

Thin veil, traditional of the Renaissance, not what Mary would wear

Competition between city states and artists

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Birth of Venus;

Sandro Botticelli c. 1484-1486, tempera on canvas — true painter isn’t known, could be someone from his guild

Goddess Venus arriving from the Sea to the shore — Father is Neptune

Zephyrus and Aura — wind and Spring — flow her to shore, interpretations of deities vary

Spring represents fertility, cloths her

Title was given in the 1800s, very little is known about the painting

Elongated body, scoliosis — doesn’t follow naturalism or humanism, Venus has gothic features

Hyper Detailed patterns, lots of gold

Neoplatonism: Connected to Contrapposto and mythology — all goodness stems from God. Rare to combined myth with Christianity

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Catacomb of Priscilla; Late antique Europe

Rome, Italy 200-400 CE, Excavated tufu & fresco

Catacomb: underground structure

Earliest Christians and Jews are burried here — Land donated by wealthy Roman woman for her family’s burial — now 40,000 tombs in it

Open now due to grave robbing and relic hunting (some martyrs here)

Wealthy had marble, poor had terracotta

Anchors represent safe harbor, fish represents Christ

Beardless Jesus points to late antique

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The Last Supper; Milan

Leonardo da Vinci 1494-98, oil and tempura

Double layer of fresco — allows color to pop

Depicts the moment Christ reveals that one of his Apostiles will betray him — mixed emotions — Christ is calm

Christ reaches for bread and wine as Judas does — holding the bag of silver

Lots of triangles — people are in groups of three — father, son, holy spirit

Humanism

Linear: positioning of objects are meant to draw you to one point on the horizon

Elimination of unnessesary details — points view only at Christ

Typically Judas is on the opposite side of the table — da Vinci puts him right next to Christ

Vinci studied anatomy — stole dead bodies

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The Sistine Chapel — ceiling and altar frescoes

Vatican City, Michelangelo

Ceiling: 1508-12, altar: 1536-41

Building where cardinals select the Pope

Commissioned by Pope Julius II — opposed by Chamberlain Biagio da Cesena

9 panels of Genesis — painted backward and last judgement on the apse

Prophets that predict Christ

Ignudi (nude youth)

Chiaroscuro: transitioning from light to dark to give the illusion of volume and mass — the creation of the universe

Hand prints from painter — catching his balance

Hyper-humanism

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School of Athens; Vatican City

Raphael, 1509-1511, Fresco

Reception Room of the Apostolic Palace — originally a library

¼ paintings dedicated to human knowldge— Philosophy, Theology, Poetry, and Juris

Commissioned by Julius II — same time as the Sistine

One Point Perspective — barrel coffered vaulting

Depicts famous Philosophers — dichotomy— left shows the divine, right shows the earthly — highlights the point of the School of Athens! Every best mind is talking to each other

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Entombment of Christ

Jacopo da Pontormo 1525-1528, oil on wood

Colors are uncomfortable, almost neon — so much ‘wrong’ with the painting

Mannerism: pushes the boundaries of fantasy, using art as inspiration rather than nature — elongation: everyone is stretched, hypermasculinity, intellectual puzzles — comes from the term Maniera or stylish

Voyeurism — porn

Council of Trent (1545-1563) banned Mannerism in religious art — can’t confuse people about their faith

figures are swirling — puzzle is we don’t even know what this depicts. It could be disposition, entombment — supposed to feel grief and anguish

Are we leaving the Renaissance?

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Venus of Urbino

Titian c. 1538, oil on canvas (first one of 250)

10-15 layers of paint

Emphasis of color and contrast — slightly shortened

Servants in the background

Generic, idealized female form — hand placement alludes to modesty but suggests masterbation

Commemorates the marraige or their sexual maturity — dog represets responsibility and innosence — wearing a flower crown and blonde hair represents a marraige tradition

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II Gesu and Triumph in the Name of Jesus; Rome, Italy

Renaissance: No transept — too expensive. lots of circles and sqauares. Apse and domes — engaged corinthean columns, pediments and rounded arches

Giacomo de Vignola; archicect, 16th c Giocomo della Porta; architect of facade (1568-84)
Giovanni Batista Gauii; fresco & stucco (1676=79) — marble, brick, fresco, stucco

Stucco: fine plaster used for coating surfaces with designs — easy to use

Created in response to the Protestant Reformation — counter reformation: Church of the Jesuits, Church Triumphant

The border between the Renaissance and Baroque — Barrel vaulting, fluted columns, domes, pilasters. Interior paintings 100 years later — Boroque

6 rooms dignified with different purposes

Super detailed painting, use of fake shadows — Boroque

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Annunciation Triptych (Merode Altarpiece)

Workshop of Robert Campin 1427-1432, oil on wood

Left: Commissioners of the art kneeling in the garden — Center: Annunciation to Mary — Right: Saint Joseph as carpenters

Settings that viewer is familar with — Belguan city, traditional home setting

Likely that inner panel was by Campin and his guild made the other two panels

Perspective is off

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Arnolfini Portrait

Jan van Eyck 1434, oil on wood

Depicts wealthy merchant and his potential bride — her shoes are off + dog — possibly pregnant

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Adam and Eve

Albrecht Durer 1504, engraving

Can be reprinted across the world — fame

Garden of Eden — more rugged, overgrown — looks like Germany, where the artist is from

Calm before the storm

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Basilica of Santa Sabina

Rome, Italy. Late Antique Europe, 422-432. Brick and stone with wooden roof

Lacks a Transept, showing this is an early form of a large church

Has large wooden doors in front that may have the earliest scene of Christ’s crucifixion

Columns that divided the nave and aisle are spolia from pagan temples

Hold an arcade of arches with inlay stone
depictions of the eucharist

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Folia of the Vienna Genesis

Early Byzantine Europe, Early 6th c, Illuminated Manuscript (tempera, gold and silver on purple vellum)

Illuminated Manuscript: Handwritten books with decoration, usually golds and silvers

Tempera- Permanent, fast drying paint
medium that is pigments mixed with a
water soluble binding agent like egg yolk

Vellum- Calfskin parchment

depict Rebecca and Eliezer at the Well and Jacob Wrestling the Angel

Text written in silver so it would gleam, and
then surface dyed purple suggesting a
royal commission

Attempts to tell a narrative in a confined
space, incorporating of classical and
medieval elements

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Isehelm Altarpiece

Matthias Grunewald 1512-1516, Oil on wood 8’ 9”, 10’, 7’

Three layers of work (triptych three times), only opened up during religious ceremonies and festivals

Dedicated to Saint Anthony — cured
ergotism — many references to Christ’s
wounds emulates ergots — christ is dead
dead and in extreme pain

Juxtaposed with inner layer — blinded by
his holy light

Focus on emotion, not realism — figures are
mutilated and distorted — elongated

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Allegory of Law and Grace