HISTORY OF ART PROJECT

Name - Sukirti Vaishy

Class - 3rd Year
Department - Applied Art
Section - B
Roll No - 22

TITLE-Development of High Renaissance Art,

Iconography/Architecture in context to
secular Christian Art ?
High Renaissance Art In Rome
(1500 to 1520/27)

- Rise of indivisualism and issues of legitimacy/ humanists cult of

fame and self-promotion/ return to antiquity to find apropriate
models of past greatnesss for this new culture.
- High Renaissance artists utilized and perfected a bevy of techniques
borrowed from Early Renaissance artists. This included the use of
linear perspective to create extreme depth, highly accurate and
scientifically correct depictions of human anatomy, the
foreshortening of figures and subjects within elevated paintings and
sculptures to provide an authentic viewing experience from below,
and trompe l'oeil effects to seamlessly incorporate architectural
elements into a work of art.

- A rise of new styles arose that were groundbreaking for the time.
Leonardo created sfumato, a glazing effect that revolutionized the
blending of tone and color, and quadratura, or ceiling paintings, were
born, meant to rapturously draw the gaze of viewers up into a
heavenly visage.

- The period is noted for infusing ideals of beauty back into art.
Whether depicting religious figures or everyday citizens, in
architecture and in art, the High Renaissance artists' key concerns
were to present pieces of visual, symmetrical, and compositional
perfection.
 Development Of High
Renaissance Art
- It wasn't until 1855 that a French historian named Jules Michelet
first coined the word "Renaissance" to refer to the innovative
painting, architecture, and sculpture in Italy from 1400-1530. His
use of the term was informed by Giorgio Vasari's mention of "rebirth"
to describe the same period in his The Lives of the Most Excellent
Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (also known as Lives of the
Artists) (1568).

- The term was informed by 18th century archeologist and art

historian Johann Joachim Winckelmann's The History of Ancient Art
in Antiquity (also translated as The History of Ancient Art) (1764)
characterizing the classical art of the Greeks as the "High Style.
" Winckelmann's ground-breaking book launched the study of art
history and became foundational to European intellectual life, as well
as reaching a popular audience. He felt that the purpose of art was
beauty, an ideal obtained by the Greeks and in High Renaissance art,
as he wrote, "the Italians alone known how to paint and figure beauty."

- By the early 1800's the term Hochenrenaissance, German for High

Renaissance, was used to refer to the period, defined as beginning
around the time of Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper (1490's) and
ending with the Sack of Rome by the army of Emperor Charles V in
1527. In the last thirty years, some contemporary scholars have
criticized the term as being an oversimplification.
 Leonardo da Vinci
- The High Renaissance began with the works of Leonardo da Vinci as his paintings, The
Virgin of the Rocks (1483-1485), and, most notably, The Last Supper (1490s),
exemplified psychological complexity, the use of perspective for dramatic focus,
symbolism, and scientifically accurate detail. However, both works were created in
Milan, and it wasn't until 1500 when Leonardo moved back to Florence, the thriving
center of art and culture, that his work impacted the city. His study for The Virgin
and Child with St. Anne (c. 1499-1500) was displayed at Santissimi Annunziata
church where many artists went to study it.

- Leonardo's scientific understanding and observation of natural phenomena and his

sense of mathematical proportion were also profoundly influential. His seminal ink
drawing Vitruvian Man (1490) showed ideal human proportions correlating with ideal
architectural proportions advanced by the Roman architect Vitruvius in his De
architectura (30-15 BCE). The drawing is occupied by Leonardo's writing that
illustrates his deep scientific inquiries into anatomy as, for example, "the length of
the outspread arms is equal to the height of a man."

- Leonardo was not only a noted painter, but also a polymath who has been called the
father of architecture, ichnology, and paleontology, among other fields. He was a
noted inventor, cartographer, engineer, and his findings and observations, recorded in
his notebooks, found their way into various collections, called the Codex Arundel
(1480-1518) and Codex Leicester (1510), among others. To some, these
notebooks have become as valued as his artworks.
 The Last Supper
- Da Vinci’s most celebrated painting of the 1490s is The Last Supper, which was painted
for the refectory of the Convent of Santa Maria della Grazie in Milan. The painting
depicts the last meal shared by Jesus and the 12 Apostles where he announces that one
of the them will betray him. When finished, the painting was acclaimed as a masterpiece
of design. This work demonstrates something that da Vinci did very well: taking a very
traditional subject matter, such as the Last Supper, and completely re-inventing it.

- Prior to this moment in art history, every representation of the Last Supper followed
the same visual tradition: Jesus and the Apostles seated at a table.Judas is placed on
the opposite side of the table of everyone else and is effortlessly identified by the viewer .
When da Vinci painted The Last Supper he placed Judas on the same side of the table as
Christ and the Apostles, who are shown reacting to Jesus as he announces that one of
them will betray him.They are depicted as alarmed, upset, and trying to determine who
will commit the act. The viewer also has to determine which figure is Judas, who will
betray Christ. By depicting the scene in this manner, da Vinci has infused psychology into
the work.

- Unfortunately, this masterpiece of the Renaissance began to deteriorate immediately

after da Vinci finished painting, due largely to the painting technique that he had chosen.
Instead of using the technique of fresco , da Vinci had used tempera over a ground that
was mainly gesso in an attempt to bring the subtle effects of oil paint to fresco. His new
technique was not successful, and resulted in a surface that was subject to mold and flaking.
 Architecture in High
Renaaissnace
- Architecture during the High Renaissance represents a culmination of the
architectural developments that were made during the Renaissance.

- The Renaissance is divided into the Early Renaissance (c. 1400–1490) and the
High Renaissance (c. 1490–1527). During the Early Renaissance, theories on art
were developed, new advancements in painting and architecture were made, and the
style was defined. The High Renaissance denotes a period that is seen as the
culmination of the Renaissance period, when artists and architects implemented
these ideas and artistic principles in harmonious and beautiful ways.

- Renaissance architecture is characterized by symmetry and proportion, and is

directly influenced by the study of antiquity. While Renaissance architecture was
defined in the Early Renaissance by figures such as Filippo Brunelleschi
(1377–1446) and Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472), the architects most
representative of the High Renaissance are Donato Bramante (1444–1514) and
Andrea Palladio (1508–1580).
 Andrea Palladio
Andrea Palladio (1508–1580) was the Chief Architect in the Republic of Venice in the 16th
century. Deeply inspired by Roman and Greek architecture, Palladio is widely considered one
of the most influential individuals in the history of Western architecture. All of his buildings
are located in what was the Venetian Republic, but his teachings, summarized in the
architectural treatise, The Four Books of Architecture, gained him wide recognition beyond
Italy. Palladian Architecture , named after him, adhered to classical Roman principles that
Palladio rediscovered, applied, and explained in his works. Palladio designed many palaces,
villas, and churches, but his reputation has been founded on his skill as a designer of villas.
Palladian villas are located mainly in the province of Vicenza.

Villas
Palladio established an influential new building format for the agricultural villas of the
Venetian aristocracy. His designs were based on practicality and employed fewer reliefs . He
consolidated the various standalone farm outbuildings into a single impressive structure
and arranged as a highly organized whole, dominated by a strong center and symmetrical
side wings, as illustrated at Villa Barbaro. The Palladian villa configuration often consists of
a centralized block raised on an elevated podium, accessed by grand steps and flanked by
lower service wings. This format, with the quarters of the owner at the elevated center of
his own world, found resonance as a prototype for Italian villas and later for the country
estates of the British nobility. Palladio developed his own more flexible prototype for the
plan of the villas to moderate scale and function.
 Raphael

- Raphael was an Italian Renaissance painter and architect whose work is admired for its
clarity of form and ease of composition.

- Raphael (1483–1520) was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance.
His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual
achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Together with Michelangelo and
Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period.
He was enormously productive, running an unusually large workshop; despite his death at
30, a large body of his work remains among the most famous of High Renaissance art.

- Some of Raphael’s most striking artistic influences come from the paintings of Leonardo
da Vinci. In response to da Vinci’s work, in some of Raphael’s earlier compositions he gave
his figures more dynamic and complex positions.
For example, Raphael’s Saint Catherine of Alexandria (1507) borrows from the
contrapposto pose of da Vinci’s Leda and the Swans. While Raphael was also aware of
Michelangelo’s works, he deviates from his style . In his Deposition of Christ, Raphael
draws on classical sarcophagi to spread the figures across the front of the picture space
in a complex and not wholly successful arrangement.
 The Stanze Rooms and
the Loggia

- In 1511, Raphael began work on the famous Stanze paintings, which made a stunning
impact on Roman art, and are generally regarded as his greatest masterpieces. The
Stanza della Segnatura contains The School of Athens, Poetry, Disputa, and Law. The
School of Athens, depicting Plato and Aristotle, is one of his best known works. These
very large and complex compositions have been regarded ever since as among the supreme
works of the High Renaissance, and the “classic art” of the post-antique West. They give
a highly idealized depiction of the forms represented, and the compositions—though
very carefully conceived in drawings—achieve sprezzatura, a term invented by Raphael’s
friend Castiglione, who defined it as “a certain nonchalance that conceals all artistry and
makes whatever one says or does seem uncontrived and effortless.”

- In the later phase of Raphael’s career, he designed and painted the Loggia at the Vatican,
a long thin gallery that was open to a courtyard on one side and decorated with Roman
style grottesche. He also produced a number of significant altarpieces , including
The Ecstasy of St. Cecilia and the Sistine Madonna. His last work, on which he was
working until his death, was a arge Transfiguration which, together with Il Spasimo,
shows the direction his art was taking in his final years, becoming more proto-Baroque
than Mannerist .