Renaissance Art

Discusses the milestones and political, social, military, scientific, and cultural aspects of the Renaissance.

Provides and overview of the artistic diversity of the Italian Renaissance written by renowned authors from the fields of history, architecture and art history.

Focuses on the use of light and the natural representation of elements in early Italian Renaissance painting.

Discover the secret symbols and meaning behind 62 featured paintings in this unique volume. Ranging from Giotto's 14th-century painting of the Last Judgment to the 19th-century symbolist Gustave Moreau's depiction of Jupiter and Semele, each work has been selected for its own symbolic enigma. This book's innovative design pairs each painting with a page of die-cut windows that help the reader focus on specific aspects of each painting and features captions that highlight the most important symbols. Other works in this unique and fascinating book include Renaissance masterpieces such as Botticelli's Primavera and The Birth of Venus, Da Vinci's Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, and Michelangelo's The Last Judgment.

Packed with facts, attributions, and entertaining anecdotes about his contemporaries, Vasari's collection of biographical accounts also presents a highly influential theory of the development of Renaissance art.Beginning with Cimabue and Giotto, who represent the infancy of art, Vasari considers the period of youthful vigour, shaped by Donatello, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, and Masaccio, before discussing the mature period of perfection, dominated by the titanic figures of Leonardo, Raphael, and Michelangelo.This specially commissioned translation contains thirty-six of the most important lives as well as an introduction and explanatory notes.

The history of Giotto and his lasting influence from the 14th to the 20th century.

Focuses on the works, techniques, and lasting traditions of the masters Titian, Veronese, and Tintoretto in cinquecento Venice.

A look at the powerful patrons of Renaissance artists and their craft.

In 1508, despite strong advice to the contrary, the powerful Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the newly restored Sistine Chapel. With little experience as a painter (though famed for his sculpture David), Michelangelo was reluctant to begin the massive project. Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling recounts the four extraordinary years Michelangelo spent laboring over the vast ceiling while the power politics and personal rivalries that abounded in Rome swirled around him. Battling against ill health, financial difficulties, domestic problems, the pope's impatience, and a bitter rivalry with the brilliant young painter Raphael, Michelangelo created scenes so beautiful that they are considered to be among the greatest masterpieces of all time.

Although there is a vast specialized literature on the Nuremberg master, The Essential Dürer fills the need for a foundational book that covers the major aspects of his career. The essays included in this book, written by leading scholars from the United States and Germany, provide an accessible, up-to-date examination of Dürer's art and person as well as his posthumous fame. The essays address an array of topics, from separate and detailed studies of his paintings, drawings, printmaking, and sculpture, to broader concerns such as his visits to and interactions with Venice and the Netherlands, his personal relationships, and his relationships with other artists. Collectively these stimulating essays explore the brilliance of Dürer's creativity and the impact he had on his world, exposing him as an artist fully engaged with the tumultuous intellectual and religious challenges of his time.

A picture universally recognized, endlessly scrutinized and described, incessantly copied, adapted, lampooned: does Leonardo's near-ruined Last Supper still offer anything new to be seen or to be said? This book is a resounding Yes to both questions. With direct perception -- -and with attention paid to the work of earlier scholars and to the criticism embodied in the production of copyists over the past five hundred years -- Leo Steinberg demonstrates that Leonardo's mural has been consistently oversimplified.

This book is not conceived as a history of painting during the period, nor as a specialist analysis of the paintings, though the latest finding have been incorporated. Rather, it sets out to give an intelligible and accurate account of the subject. The works discussed here were created in the period between c. 1420 and 1498. This time-span, as well as the subjects, genres and types, has been chosen so that the overview provides a highly representative but also exemplary cross-section of painting in that century. It examines ecclestical and profane works, altarpieces and portraits, an epitaph and devotional diptch for private use, a full-length marriage portrait and a 'justice scene'. The two real tours de force are the retable altarpieces: the Lamb of God by Van Eyck and the Descent from the Cross by Van der Weyden, which were created at more or less the same time.