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The High Renaissance and Early Mannerism. 1494-1564. A Period of Genius. da Vinci; Raphael; Michelangelo; Machiavelli High Renaissance (1494-1520) Classical principles Shift of cultural center from Florence to Rome Mannerism Anti-humanistic vision of world
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The High Renaissance and Early Mannerism 1494-1564
A Period of Genius • da Vinci; Raphael; Michelangelo; Machiavelli • High Renaissance (1494-1520) • Classical principles • Shift of cultural center from Florence to Rome • Mannerism • Anti-humanistic vision of world • “Mannered” style adopted by artists/intellectuals
The Rise of the Modern Sovereign State • The Struggle for Italy, 1494-1529 • French invasions • Hapsburg-Valois war (Spain vs. France) • Charles V and the Hapsburg Empire • Goal of united Christendom never realized • Balance of Power Concept
The Struggle for Italy Foreign occupation had an impact on the culture of the Italian Renaissance. Great Schism French domination of Papacy and European intellectual life French and Spanish armies occupied large portions of Italy The Italian city states sought to establish their own civic identities by looking to the models of the classical world. Rome and its cities were Italian inheritance.
The Struggle for Italy, 1494-1529 • Peace of Lodi (1454) shattered by French invasions • 1494: France, under Charles VIII invades Italy in hopes of claiming Milan and Naples; struggle also involves Florence and the Pope • Venice, Pope, Holy Roman Emperor, and Spain ally to drive French out • 1499: France, under Louis XII returns to press claim to Milan; again driven out. • Over next several decades, France intermittently invades Italy
The Struggle for Italy, 1494-1529 • Hapsburg-Valois Rivalry
The Struggle for Italy, 1494-1529 • Hapsburg-Valois Rivalry (1522-1529) • 1522: Full-scale hostilities break out between France (Francis I) and Spain/Holy Roman Empire (Charles V) over Italy’s future; pits new Europe against old • 1527: Spanish under Charles VIII loot Rome • Cast doubt on Rome’s ability to control Italy • Showed that secular rulers no longer respected Papal authority • Ended Papal patronage of arts for almost a decade • Had chilling effect on artistic ideals/contributed to rise of Mannerism
The Struggle for Italy, 1494-1529 • Treaty of Cambrai (1529) • Years of invasions left Italy divided and exhausted • Florence now a puppet state • Venice alone kept political independence; becomes haven for artists and intellectuals for rest of 16th century
Charles V and the Hapsburg Empire Charles V was at the center of Europe’s political storm. In some ways he foreshadowed the modern age marked by sovereign rulers, standing armies, diplomatic agreements, and strong religious differences; in others, he stands as Europe’s last medieval king.
Charles V and the Hapsburg Empire • Struggle shifts to Central Europe • French feel hemmed in by Hapsburg Empire • Hapsburg feel French are blocking a unified Christian empire • Charles V abdicates in 1556, exhausted and disillusioned; succeeded by Ferdinand (German-Austrian region) and Philip (Spain, New World, Netherlands) • End of vision of united Europe and united Christendom
Economic Expansion and Social Developments • Growing population • Increasing prosperity • Shift in center of commerce to Atlantic coast • Age of discovery • Manufacturing innovations
Demographics, Prosperity and the Beginning of a Global World • Population growth • 45mm 1400 > 60mm 1500 > 89mm 1600 • Shift to urban areas • Urban – not rural – prosperity on rise • Excess capital available for reinvestment opens first phase of commercial capitalism • New World resources/agricultural products become available • Slavery emerges
Demographics, Prosperity and the Beginning of a Global World • Technology • Sailing • Ships: Caraval, Galleon • Navigation: Magnetic compass, Astrolabe • Firearm: Cannon • Magellan/Columbus
Demographics, Prosperity and the Beginning of a Global World • Warfare • Shift to bronze cannon • Emergence of arsenals and foundries • Development of field artillery • Advances in strategies and tactics
Demographics, Prosperity and the Beginning of a Global World • Science and Medicine • Dissection/structure of human body • Civic humanism (source: Greek polis) • Public health/Health boards
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism High Renaissance • Visual Arts: Under influence of Classical ideals, High Renaissance filled with images of repose, harmony, and heroism • Literature: Writers adopt secularism and idealism from Classical heritage Mannerism • Following sack of Rome in 1527, artists move away from imitation of nature and Classical ideals • Mannerist aesthetic questions/denies inherent worth of human beings, presenting negative image in an uncertain world
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism • Literature • GasparaStampa (Venetian poet) • Petrarchan sonnets • Female point of view • Camoes (Lusiads) • Castiglione: The Courtier • Machiavelli: The Prince
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism GasparaStampa and LuizVaz de Comoes Baldassare Castiglione and Niccolo Machiavelli
Encounter:Portuguese Exploration Sets the Stage for a New World Starting in the mid-fifteenth century, Portugal led the first wave of Europeans to export their peoples, traditions, and culture overseas. In response to their daring deeds, the poet Luis Vazda Camoes, following the lead of the ancient poet Vergil, wrote an epic poem celebrating his adventurous countrymen and heralding the new Age of Exploration.
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism • Painting • Leonardo da Vinci • The Last Supper • Mona Lisa • Michelangelo • The Sistine Chapel • The Last Judgment • Cellini • Perseus and the head of Medusa
Da Vinci: Last Supper This painting (1495-98) is usually used to date the beginning of the High Renaissance. Its simplicity and restraint, as well as its use of perspective, focus the viewer not on “clutter,” but on the human drama unfolding at the table.
Da Vinci: Mona Lisa • The Mona Lisa, a likeness of the wife of the Florentine merchant Giocondo, both illustrates the new status of Italy’s urban middle class, and ushers in a new type of portrait: The half-length view. Note how Leonardo: • blends the likeness of a real person with an ideal • uses landscape to isolate the image in space and time, and • uses a technique called sfumato – made possible by oil-based paints – to soften both Mona Lisa’s features and the background.
Michelangelo: Sistine Chapel In 1508, Michelangelo Buonarotti was asked by Pope Julius II to decorate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, covering some 5,800 square feet. Michelangelo tried to avoid the commission, but ultimately took it on, combining biblical narrative, theology, Neo-Platonist philosophy, and Classical allusion in one of the masterworks of the Renaissance
Michelangelo: Sistine Chapel he paintings on the Sistine Chapel ceiling fall into three broad groups (1) The central section, depicting the history of the world from the creation through Noah; (2) the portraits on both sides and at either end, which depict Biblical prophets and pagan oracles predicting he coming of Christ; and (3) the Old Testament scenes and the corners, all involving violence and death, which had been allegorized as foreshadowing the coming of Christ.
Michelangelo: Sistine Chapel Two of the most famous scenes from the Sistine Chapel, the Libyan Sibyl, and the Creation of Adam.
Michelangelo: Sistine Chapel In the Last Judgment (1536-41), Michelangelo has moved to the Mannerist style, rejecting Classical elements. This painting’s chaotic composition, it focus on large numbers of male nudes, its use of bizarre perspective, and the odd postures of the people in the frame all express an anti-Classical, Mannerist sensibility.
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism • Painting • Raphael • The School of Athens • Madonna Series • The Venetian School: Giorgione and Titian • The School of Parma: Parmigiano
Raphael: The School of Athens The youngest of the three Renaissance masters, Raphael’s works for the stanze of the Papal apartments stand out. In the most famous of these, he follows Da Vinci’s Last Supper, , giving each philosopher a gesture that reveals his inner thoughts
Raphael: Madonna of the Chair Raphael also completed a series of portraits of Mary and Jesus, the most popular of which has long been the Madonna of the Chair. Rather than delivering a sermon, telling a story, or lecturing on theology, this painting simply puts mother and child in a familiar, domestic, and loving setting.
Giorgione: The Tempest Giorgione’s best-known painting creates a dramatic landscape, framed by the soldier on the left and the nursing mother on the right. It does not allude to the Bible or myth – the landscape and the mood of the impending storm are its topics, and in this it blazed the trail for later painters, mainly in the North, who took the landscape as their subject. Along with the landscape, Giorgione made one other major innovation: the female nude.
Titian: Martyrdom of St. Lawrence Titian, perhaps the greatest of Europe’s painters, worked within the High Renaissance style, but was dissatisfied with its rule on symmetry…and broke them. Here, the temple’s columns recede along a diagonal line, creating a sense of deep space in the foreground; within this space, he arranged objects n a triangular outline with a celestial light source at the apex. By using diagonal and triangular lines, Titian was able to achieve dramatic, emotional effects without sacrificing coherence or meaning. The subtle modulations of color in this work also create a sense of harmony, and his mastery of this technique made Titian a leading “colorist,” someone concerned as much or more with color as with form.
Parmigianino: Madonna with the Long Neck Parma was another leading center of the High Renaissance, and Parmigianino was a founder of Mannerism. Note the contradictions in this painting: the mix of the sacred and the sensual in the depiction of Mary, a Jesus who appears more dead than alive, , invoking the pieta along with the Madonna. The five people on the left are all looking in different directions…and what are the unfinished columns and the man reading a scroll (lower right) doing there? With its multiple focuses and blend of sexuality, the sacred, and death, the painting is an enigma, quite the opposite of readily understood Renaissance art
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism • Sculpture • Pietà • David • Architecture • High Renaissance: Bramante • Mannerist style: Palladio • Music
Michelangelo: Battle of the Cenaturs The Battle of the Centaurs, complete when Michelangelo was only 17, bears many of his hallmarks: facility, economy, energy…and the fact that it is unfinished.
Cellini: Perseus and the Head of Medusa Cellini’s great bronze may be the best documented Renaissance work of art, for the artist describes its conception and fabrication in considerable detail in his autobiography…which the hot-blooded artist wrote in prison, not for murder (for which he was arrested twice), but for sodomy.
Bramante: Early Work Some of Bramante’s works include the church of Santa Maria della Grazie in Milan, the Abbey of Sant’Ambrogio in Mila, and the original plan for the dome of St. Peter’s in Rome.
Bramante: TempiettodiSant’Andrea Designed as both a small church (seating only 10 worshippers) and as a building marking the site of the martyrdom of St. Peter, the Tempietto is the earliest surviving High Renaissance building, and a great example of the style. It’s devoid of decoration, and its separate parts (dome, drum, columns, and base) are brought into a single, harmonious whole. Clearly, Bramante rejected the then-reigning building style – called scenographic, in which buildings were composed of separate and discrete units – in favor of a much more sculptural approach.
Michelangelo: Dome of St. Peter’s Bramante had originally been commissioned by Pope Julius II to rebuild St. Peter’s Basilica, but he died before his plans could be carried out. The project fell to other architects, and eventually to Michelangelo, who worked on it from 1546 until his death in 1564. Key project was the dome (cp. Brunelleschi). To integrate the dome with the existing structure, Michelangelo used double Corinthian columns. Note that as an architect – unlike his painting and sculpture – Michelangelo clung to Classical principles and never adopted the Mannerist style.
Palladio: Villa Rotonda Palladio’s Villa Rotonda is Classical in spirit, but contains a number of Mannerist surprises, including four identical porches, elongated stairways, and statues on the rooftop – an Etruscan element. This villa as the inspiration for any number of English and ante-bellum American homes.
Dossi: Apollo and Daphne This painting – clearly influenced by Giorgione, Titian, and Raphael – may be the first to feature the violin, and instrument which had appeared only in 1510. By the 1570s, Andrea Amati was making violins in Cremona; Stradivari and Guarneri were apprenticed to Niccolo Amati, Andrea’s grandson.
From High Renaissance to Early Mannerism • Music • Josquin des Prez • Adrian Willaert
Slice of Life:Artists and Their Critics: Michelangelo’s Strategy The writer Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) actually studied painting with Michelangelo, but he is known today primarily for his accounts of the lives of Renaissance artists, sculptors, and architects. Medieval artists had been categorized with guild members, who were little more than skilled craftspeople and not high up in the social hierarchy. In an excerpt from his Life of Michelangelo, Vasari shows Michelangelo as a full-blown Renaissance artist: proud, confident, and ready to take on critics, even the head of the Florentine republic.
The Legacy of the High Renaissance and Early Mannerism • Golden Age of the West • Visual arts • Machiavelli: founder of modern political thought • Beginning of modern secular state • New code of behavior • First stirrings of multiculturalism • Belief that free expression is both a social and private good