Renaissance Art

1996: Discuss how Renaissance ideas are expressed in the Italian art of the period, referring to specific works and artists.

Humanism

Renaissance Humanism is the idea that instead of painting/writing about biblical texts, the artist would incorporate Greek and Roman mythology, and be more human, and strive less for divinity.

The Birth of Venus by Botticelli

Venus was the Roman goddess of love, beauty and fertility

Two aspects: she was an earthy goddess who aroused humans to physical love or she was a heavenly goddess who inspired intellectual love in them

Triumph of Galatea by Raphael

Greek mythology

The painting shows Galatea surrounded by other sea creatures.

Da Vinci

“Study of a Womb,” “Studies of the Shoulder and Neck,” “Study of Cats and Other Animals,” “Views of a Fetus in the Womb,” and so forth

Drew pictures of the animal and human anatomy

Example of humanist desire to unlock nature’s secret

Secularism

Secularism focuses on the materialistic things rather than the religious ideas.

Mona Lisa by Da Vinci

Doesn’t have anything to do with religion; just a painting of a woman

David by Michelangelo

Although he used a religious figure, there was no adoration of God

Glorified the human body

The School of Athens by Raphael

Shows scholars throughout time gathering in a large, grandiose architecture.

Shows the secular education: grammar, math, and science

Classicism

The principles or styles characteristic of the literature and art of ancient Greece and Rome.

Bramante’s _St. Peter’s Basilica_

Brought back classical antiquity

Dome was shaped as to how the ancient Romans’ domes were.

Brunelleschi’s dome of the Catholic cathedral

Used unique architectural concepts

Studied Pantheon in Rome

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