The Human Body

We have bodies that exist in space, and this has been a fundamental challenge for
artists through history.

The figure
In ancient Greece and Rome, artists embraced the realities of the human body and
the way that our bodies move in space (naturalism). For the next thousand years
though, after Europe transitioned from a pagan culture to a Christian one in the
middle ages, the physical was largely ignored in favor of the heavenly, spiritual realm.
Medieval human figures were still rendered, but they were elongated, flattened and
staticin other words, they were made to function symbolically.

Space

Bonaventura Berlinghieri, Altarpiece of St. Francis, c. 1235 (Church of San Francesco, Pescia,

Italy)Instead

of earthly settings, we often see flat, gold backgrounds. There

were some exceptions along the way, but its not until the end of the 13th
century in Italy that artists began to (re)explore the physical realities of
the human figure in space. Here, they begin the long process of figuring
out how space can become a rational, measurable environment in which
their newly naturalistic figures can sit, stand and move.
Florence & Siena
In Italy, there were two city-states where we can see this renewed interest in the
human figure and space: Florence and Siena. The primary artists in Siena were

Duccio, the Lorenzetti Brothers, and Simone Martini. And in Florence, we look to the
art of Cimabue and Giotto.
Giotto, Lamentation, c. 1305, fresco (Scrovegni Chapel, Padua)Whereas

medieval artists

often preferred a flat, gold background, these artists began to construct earthly
environments for their figures to inhabit. We see landscapes and architecture in their
paintings, though these are often represented schematically. These Florentine and
Sienese artists employed diagonal lines that appear to recede and in this way convey
a simple illusion of space, though that space is far from rational to our eyes. When
we look closely, we can see that the space would be impossible to move through,
and that the scale of the architecture often doesnt match the size of the figures.

A Word of Caution
Be careful here! While it is tempting to think of this movement toward naturalism as
progress it is important to remember that this art is not less good, nor even less
advanced than what comes later in the Renaissance (you might think of Leonardo
or Michelangelo). Art is always a response to the needs of the moment and for the
late 13th and early 14th century, symbols of the spiritual remained potent systems for
understanding.
Essay by Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker