Late Medieval

Pisa Baptistery Pulpit, Nicola Pisano

• Hexagonal

• Beginning at bottom and moving up

• Base: lions and grotesque figures and animals

• Columns: supported by a central column

  • Six external columns made of different color marble (spoil columns)

  • Topped with leafy, Corinthian capitals

• Trefoil arches = triple carved arches

  • Arch of Constantine Triumphal arch

• Spandrels: Prophets and Evangelists

• Statuettes in corners (identifies in question):

  • Charity

  • Fortitude

  • Temperance

  • Prudence

  • St. John the Baptist

  • Faith

• Reliefs form the sides of the pulpit:

  • Nativity

  • Adoration

  • Presentation

  • Crucifixion

  • Last Judgement

• Eagles supports a little stand where a book or other writings could be placed and the preacher would speak from them

Navity Panel, Nicola Pisano

• Continuous narrative: Annunciation, Nativity, Bathing of the Christ Child, and Adoration of the Shepherds

• Synthesizing style of ancient Roman reliefs with Gothic sensibilities

  • Orator gestures

  • Sarcophagus reliefs

  • Wet drapery

• Context of Pisa Baptistery Pulpit to communicate key moments in Christ’s life

  • Nativity Panel captures beginning of Christ’s human journey, linking it to the sacrament of baptism.

• Highlights themes of humility, divine love, and redemption.

Fortitude (Daniel), Nicola Pisano

• Fortitude → strength

• Allegorical, muscular, athletic figure

• Influenced by classical antiquity and naturalism→ Hercules

• Lion skin wrapped around his left arm

• Lion cub on his right shoulder

• Contrapposto / more naturalistic, though stout

• Inspired by classical sculpture like sarcophagus

• Compared to Doryphoros

Cimabue, Maesta (Madonna and Child Enthroned)

• Tempera → doesn’t blend well and dries quickly

• Commissioned by a confraternity for laypeople that was associated with the Church of Santa Trinita in Florence

  • People who were probably excluded from the most sacred part of the church and were intent on creating a spiritual focus within the more public part of the church that they could occupy

• Mary is seated on a throne with the Christ Child on her lap

  • Gesturing towards him as if saying, “This is our saviour.”

• Mary is the largest figure

  • Reflection of her increasing importance

  • Seen as a bridge to Christ

    • Christ was “too aloof and powerful,” Mary was seen as “more accessible.”

• Christ Child

  • Fingers are in position of blessing

  • Other hand, a scroll. → reference to Old Testament, ancient Judaic tradition

    • To the idea that the Old Testament prophets had prophesied the coming of a savior for mankind

    • Four Old Testament prophets at bottom of painting

      • Recognize them as prophets because they hold scrolls

      • Seems to be closer to the viewer than Mary and Jesus, further enhancing the sense of 3D

      • Jeremiah, Abraham, David, and Isaiah

• Stylization is an adaptation of Byzantine

  • Long fingers and body but increasing interest in bringing the spiritual down to earth

• Throne is somewhat 3D

• Angels move back behind it

  • Larger

  • Stacked as if occupying the same space as Mary and Jesus

  • 6 look at us; 2 look at Jesus

• Gold gives a sense of folds of drapery and creases on the skin

• Set against gold leaf background

Giotto, Ognissanti Madonna (Madonna and Child Enthroned)

• Ognissanti → “all saints”

• Comissioned by the Humiliati, a religious order, and wool merchants.

• Mary now has a sense of her mass and weight

  • Body clearly taking up space

  • Fabric really looks heavy

• No gold representation on Mary except at the hem

  • Indicating the roundness of her body purely through light and shadow → “chiaroscuro”

• Sense of reality

  • Wings of throne seem to come towards us

  • Windows on those wings

    • Old Testament prophets framed by those windows (behind them)

  • Steps move out into space

• Large areas of gold → light of heaven

Arena Chapel, Giotto

• Pigments are mixed with water and become chemically bound to the freshly laid line plaster

• Took approximately 852 days to complete

• A lot of narrative scenes

  • Features personifications of Seven Virtues and Seven Vies and scenes from lives of Christ, Mary, and Mary’s parents, Joachim and Anna.

    • Envy

      • Figure engulfed in flames, clutching a bag but reaching with her other hand for something she does not have.

      • Not content with what. shehas

      • Huge ears → attuned to what she does not have

      • Snake from mouth to eyes

        • Doubles back on itself because it’s what she sees that bites her

    • Things that decide at the day of judgement we got to heaven or hell

    • Hope

      • Reaching upward, floating

      • Upper right figure, handing her a crown.

      • Looking up towards Last Judgement

      • Same pose as the elect on Last Judgement

  • In between are trompe l’oell faux marble panels

  • Star-studded blue sky with images of Christ, Mary, and other saints and figures

  • Narrative cycle begins on the right altar side in the top register

    1. Introduce Joachim and Anna

    2. Joachim thrown out of the temple for his childlessness

       • From a book called “The Golden Legend”

    3. Meeting at the Golden Gate

    4. Birth of Mary

    5. Presentation of Mary in the Temple

    6. Mary’s Marriage

    7. Annunciation

    8. Circumcision

    9. Flight into Edypt

    10. Massacre of the Innocents

    11. Ministry of Christ and his Miracles

    12. Arrest of Christ (Kiss of Judas)

    13. Lamentation

  • Jesus often show in profile → derived from the Roman tradition of coinage

    • Most noble way of representing a figure

    • Shown moving left to right → the way that we’re meant to read the scenes

  • Giotto does not care to depict every single one of the 12 apostles

    • 3 or 4 faces

    • Others are an accumulation of halos

  • Old Testament scene being paired with the New Testament

    • Old Testament scenes that prefigured the life of Christ

• ALL painting

• Small private chapel that was connected to a palace owned by Scrovegni family

  • Scrovegni family commissioned Giotto to decorate chapel with frescoes

• Called Arena Chapel because it’s next to an ancient Roman arena

• Taller than expect

• Apex of the triumphal arch on the opposite wall

  • Impetus for the entire cycle

  • God on a panel painting, so it’s not a fresco.

• Two scenes below the Annunciation are empty architectural spaces

  • Rooms that have oil latterns, hanging from the ceiling.

  • Giotto’s interest in the world, present, and physical space that humanity occupies.

• Quatrefoil

  • Jonah being swallowed by the whale and we see water or at least a giant fish

    • Jonah prays for forgiveness having betrayed God and is delivered from this whale / fish

    • Analogy to New Testament story of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection

Joachim and Anna Meeting at the Golden Gate, Giotto

• Joachim and Anna prayed to God, wanting a child.

• They’ve both been visited and told there is hope

• They’ve shown coming together for the first time in front of the Golden Gate, Jerusalem

  • Both of them are aware that their wish has been fulfilled

  • Giotto had no idea what the architecture of Jerusalem looked like → stage set

• Humanism

  • Faces are together, kissing → intimate and personal

  • Almost becoming a single-face

  • Sense the warmth of their embrace, the warmth of the figures around them who watch

    • Have mass and volume to their bodies

    • No more elongated, swaying, ethereal bodies

    • Taken together with the emotion in their faces → almost like we have human beings in art for the first time

    • Giotto wants figures to be front and center

Nativity, Giotto

• Life of Virgin Mary and Jesus

• Naturalism and human emotion

• Composed to draw the viewer’s attention to the central figures of Mary, Jesus, and Joseph.

  • Focal point: Mary → depicted with tender and protective gestures

    • Body language expresses maternal love and tenderness

    • Embodying both human vulnerability and role as Mother of God

    • Her clock is deep blue which contrasts with Jesus’ lighter wrappings, drawing attention to the mother-child bond.

  • Jesus

  • Wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying on a simple bed of straws.

    • Emphasizing humanity

  • Joseph

    • Seated to the side

    • Deep. inthough

    • Symbolizing quiet acceptance of his role in this divine event

• Takes place in a simple, rustic stable with a wooden roof

  • Christ’s humble birth

  • Stable’s slanting roof draws gaze downward to Mary and Jesus

  • Foreshadowing teachings on compassion and poverty

• Rock formation on the left directs the eye towards the holy family

• Angels

  • Hovering above stable

  • Additional emotional layer

  • Express sorrow as they anticipate Jesus

  • Blend of joy and sorrow, birth and foreshadowed sacrifice.

  • Lighter and etheral colors, differentiating them from the earthly figures below.

• Chiaroscuro

  • Gives figures volume and sense of 3D, making them appear more lifelike.

• Ox and monkey

  • Behind Jesus

  • Traditional symbols in nativity scenes

  • Representing the Gentiles and Jews

  • Emphasizes Jesus’ birth is a gift to all humanity

Betrayal of Judas, Giotto

• Moment where Judas leads the Romans to Christ and they arrest him and take him away and torture him

• Judas is one of the 12 apostles

  • Betrays Jesus for 30 pieces of silver

• Judas betraying Jesus not by pointing at him from afar but with. a kiss

• In almost every scene, we have noticed JEsus moving from left to right in profile.

  • Judas is an impediment

  • Jesus’ progress is stopped

  • This is literally arresting his movement forward

• Sense of violence

  • Full sensory exp[erience

  • Reserving half the painting, sky, just for lances, touches, clubs, and way in which they’re not held in an orderly way. → crossing at angles

  • Violent, chaotic visual rhythm that draws our eye down to Jesus and Judas

  • Crowd multiplied → numerous helmets (originally silver)

    • Sense of crowd pressing in

  • One man on a horn who’s blowing creating this sense of energy

    • Audio goes with the painting, finishing the whole scene in its chaos and drama

Lamentation, Giotto

• One of the most powerful scenes

• Jesus has been crucified, taken down off the cross, and being mourned by his mother and followers.

• Lament → “to grieve”

• Right across the Nativity

• Mary holds Jesus on her lap, the way she does as a mother when he’s a child.

• Idea of representing Christ as dead, putting emphasis on Christ as human is a modern idea

• Simplicity of the composition

  • Placing all emphasis on figures

  • Simplified background

  • Jesus moved to the left, not center.

  • Rocky hill forms a landscape that moves our eye down to Mary and Jesus

    • At the top, there’s a tree that doesn’t have leaves because it’s winter, but the leaves will grown again in the spring. → analogy to Jesus and his resurrection

    • Allow viewers to move out the pictures

    • As we move to the next image, the mountain continues, making our eyes move down, so there is visual relationship drawn between Jesus’ death, mourning, and resurrection.

• Mary Magdalane

  • Red hair

  • Attending to Jesus’ feet → anointed Jesus’ feet before

• Naturalism

  • Willing to show figures where we only see the backs

  • Don’t provide information to the narrative

  • Frame Jesus and Mary

  • Some are sad and resigned and keep to themselves

  • Others throw their arms out

  • Interest in individuality

    • Different ways that people experience emotion

• Angels

  • Mourning, rending their clothing, tearing at themselves, and pulling their hair.

  • In agony

  • Create. anillusion of space

The Last Judgement, Giotto

• Elect with hands in positions of prayer, looking up toward the Jesus, the largest figure in the chapel.

  • People that are going to heaven

  • Accompanied by angels

    • Shepherding them into heaven

    • Feet not on the ground

    • Levitating slightly

  • Below the elect, naked children, coming out. ofcoffins. and tombs.

    • Sould that are to be judged by Jesus

  • Jesus

    • Judge should being awakened from the dead

    • Cross carried by two angels

  • Heaven

    • Court of saints

    • Around mandorla, angels blowing trumpets.

  • Images that come right out of the Apocalypse

    • Angels announcing the end of time

    • Angels rolling up the sky as if it were a scroll

  • Lower right, scene of hell

    • Large blue figure → Satan

    • Surrounding Satan are souls being tortured in hell

    • Imagery inspired by Dante

    • Urserers → figures being hung with bags of money

      • Mortal sin

      • Judas

  • Enrico Scrovegni offering the chapel to the Three Marys

Vocabulary

• Spolia / spoil columns

  • Reusing architectural or decorative elements from older structures in new buildings or monuments

  • “Spoils” or “booty”

  • A way to legitimize new constructions by connecting them to the past

  • Response to limitations of technology or resources

• Pulpit

  • Elevated platform in a Christian church where a preacher or reader would deliver a sermon or read from the Bible

  • Made of stone or wood

  • Elaborately carved and brightly colored

  • Octagonal or hexagonal

  • Had book stands to rest notes and Bible

  • Had a canopy

    • Helped to project preacher’s voice

  • Accessed by steps or ladder

  • Pulpitum → “platform” or “staging”

• Lectern

  • Pedestal-based reading desk with a slanted top used to support liturgical books during religious services

  • Lectrum → legere → “to read”

  • Made of wood or metal

  • Decorated with intricate carving and designs

  • Popular type is the eagle lectern

    • Symbol of Saint John the Evangelist

    • Represent the word of God

• Trefoil arches

  • Pointed arch with cusps on either side of the apex, shaped like three overlapping circles.

  • Used for decoration and portals

  • Symbolize the trinity

• Giorgio Vasari

  • Italian painter, architect, poet, and biographer who is often called the first art historian.

  • Work helped establish discipline of Western European art history and considered the foundation of modern art history

    • Some of his work contains factual errors

• Virtues

  • Stable qualities of a person’s character that were expressed through their actions

  • Combination of intellectual and affective components

  • Four cardinal virtues

    • Prudence, temperance, fortitude, and justice.

  • Three theological virtues:

    • Faith, hope, and love.

    • Imparted by God, rather than originating from humanity.

  • Tree of virtues was a diagram used to show relationships between virtues

    • Paired with trees of vices

    • Showed relationships between vices

• Buon fresco

  • Painting technique for decoration of churches and cathedrals

  • Apply multiple coats of plaster to a wall then traces the design onto the fresh plaster

  • Paint the image in water-based pigments on the wet plaster

  • Chemical reaction between pigment and plaster creates a durable, vibrant, and protective crystalline mesh.

  • Must work quickly because plaster dries quickly

  • Create vivid imagery that enhanced spiritual and aesthetic appeal of churches and cathedrals

• Giornate

  • Section of a fresco that was painted in one session

• Dante Alighieri

  • Italian poet, writer, and philosopher

  • Author of Divine Comedy

• Usury/usurer

  • Charging excessive interest on a loan

  • Illegal and a sin

• The Divine Comedy

  • Spiritual journey through hell, purgatory, and paradise.

• Enrico Scrovegni

  • Wealthy Paduan banker and patron of great painter Giotto

  • Comissioned Arena Chapel

• Chiaroscuro

  • Use of light and shadow to create illusion of volume and mass

• Intuitive perspective

  • Drawing method that uses the artist’s observation skills and “eye” to create a sense of perspective for the viewer

• Maesta

  • Type of Italian painting that depicts Virgin and Mary and infant Jesus enthroned as Queen of Heaven surrounded by angels and saints

  • Italian for majesty

  • Devotional representation that emphasizes doctrinal or sentimental significance

• Tempera

  • Painting technique that involves mixing pigments with a water-soluble binder and egg yolk to create a permanent, fast-drying paint. Temperare → “to combine”

  • Vibrant colors, detailed textures, and luminosity.

  • Applied to wood panels and ivory

  • Create wall paintings

• Sacra conversazione

  • Italian Renaissance art genre that depicts the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus surrounded by saints in a unified space

  • Virgin and Mary

  • Saints shown half-length

• Altarpiece

  • Common form of Christian art that enhanced the Mass ritual and were a key part of church life

  • Made of wood, stone, or metal.

  • Placed behind the altar in a church

  • Single work of art such as painting or sculpture or a set of works

  • Winged altarpieces

    • Hinged doors that opened and closed to regulate viewing of the central sculpture

    • Sculpture was only exposed on the most important Christian holidays

  • German altarpieces

    • Combined sculpted figures with an architectural enacsement

  • French altarpieces

    • Elaborate polyptychs with spiky pinnacles and late Gothic tracery

    • Depicted Passion and resurrection of Jesus

• Polyptych

  • Painting or sculpture made up of multiple panels that was often used as an altarpiece

  • Poluptuchon → “something folded many times”

  • Typically has at least four panels

  • Main panel is the largest

  • Other panels are called “side” panels or “wings”

• Guild(s)

  • Associations of merchants and craftsmen that served as important social and economic institutions

  • Protected the interests of their members, set standards for their products, and controlled the production and sale of certain goods and services.

  • Provided a sense of community and belonging, and offered opportunities for social interaction and mutual support.

  • Supported secular schools which provided opportunities for members to climb the social ladder

  • Represented members’ political interests

• Lay confraternity

  • Voluntary Christian organization of laypeople who engaged in charitable and devotional activities

  • Created to promote Christian piety and charity

  • Approved by Church hierarchy

  • Performed a variety of charitable and devotional activities

  • Present in every city, village, and parish, and were sometimes organized. by profession or guild.

  • Millions of male and female members

  • Members could receive sacraments, fulfill ritual and charitable observances, and access spiritual resources.

  • Way for laypeople to engage with the Church and act out of their faith