Oil Paintings Reproductions

Renaissance Art in Europe (14th-17th Century)

Around the late Fourteenth Century, beginning in Italy and centered in Florence, a cultural renaissance, or rebirth, began spreading throughout Europe which radically affected society's attitude towards art and the artist.

Because we are so familiar with Botticelli's marvelous Birth of Venus, the Madonna images of Rafael Sanzio, Titian's portraits of noblemen and women, Michaelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling, da Vinci's Mona Lisa and the other great masterpieces of the Renaissance, we forget that paintings weren't always painted that way. The Renaissance produced the basis for all the world art movements to follow.

The Driving Forces
During earlier medieval times painting and drawing were activities mainly confined to the church and took the form of illustrated religious texts and biblical representations. Artists were generally nameless scribes or artisans illuminating hand made books and painting church panels and murals characterized by an ornately decorative flat style, colorful but without shading, depth or perspective.

Without diminishing in any way the quality or the beauty of art produced before the Fourteenth Century, it is now recognized that the far reaching political and social upheavals which took place during the late 14th and early 15th centuries gave rise to a tremendous surge in human artistic endeavor, creating splendid works of art in architecture, painting and sculpture which have never been surpassed before or since.

With the Great Schism of the West (also called the War of the Popes) in Europe, the absolute power of the church was broken. Wealthy and power royal family dynasties, such as the famous Midicis, established powerful city states and made war and competed against one another for influence. Rulers commissioned architects, builders, explorers, traders and artisans to build palaces and ships to show off their wealth and influence.

Scientific inquiry was encouraged, and great advances were made in technology were made during the 15th and 16th centuries. The rise of humanism, the philosophy that human beings had autonomy and choice and were capable of rational thought rather than depending on blind faith in the Church, influenced the way art was perceived and created. Nudes again became acceptable subjects for paintings, as did portraits of real people (other than saints or religious figures).

Techniques and Materials
Renaissance art was first characterized by the use of perspective, the use of newly developed long lasting paints, and a return to classical themes and idealized human forms. Just as advances in science, math, exploration, and technology were changing the way people of all social strata lived throughout Italy and Europe, so too were geometric principles applied to painting and sculpture.

Foreshortening, shadowing, and details to denote expressions and emotions were some of the techniques which began to be used in religious painting as well as in themes from Greek and Roman mythology. Masaccio (1401-1428) is generally credited with introducing perspective to produce three-dimensional effects.

The Artist as Celebrity
Under the generous patronage of wealthy rulers, artists, architects, and scientists became famous and sought after. The general public's perception of the artist as a personality possessing a particular style in painting or sculpture gradually elevated artists to positions of social prominence and celebrity.

Workshops run by artists such as Botticelli in Florence, Donatello, a Florentine sculptor creating figures more lifelike than at any time since Antiquity, and Antonella da Messina in Naples, who is credited with introducing oil painting to the Italian Renaissance, produced unsurpassed paintings on both religious and mythical themes as well as portraits of their wealthy patrons. The students of these workshops and their students after them gave rise in the period known as the High Renaissance (1495-1527) which produced the most famous, Leonardo da Vinci, Michaelangelo, and Rafael.