Renaissance Art

As we move into the “Renaissance” period, artists of the fifteenth-century represented a variety of textures, shapes, and spaces that they experienced around them in their lives. They developed a style of painting called “linear perspective” which would allow them to reflect simulations of three-dimensional forms arranged in space. This would give the painting a depth and realism not seen until now in the different eras. There was a heavy emphasis placed on the realistic portrait-like paintings giving a life-like sense to the images. This Humanist style of painting placed great value on science reason, and the individual while keeping an unwavering religious faith style. One of the techniques developed in Northern Europe was “oil painting”, unlike the Italian artist, the northern artists painted in oil on canvas. Oil paint takes much longer to dry allowing the painter time to easily make changes. The long drying process would allow the paint to dry smooth erasing the brush strokes. More importantly, oil paint is translucent when applied in thin layers, known as glazes. This method of built up glazes would let the light penetrate to the lower layers and then reflect back which would create the appearance of an interior glow, giving viewers the illusion that they were looking at real objects rather than painted imitations.

Italian artists favored tempera, the method of suspending powered pigments in oils like linseed or sometimes walnut. One large difference from the Northern oils was that tempera had to be precisely applied as it dried almost immediately. Also, tempera has an opaque finish which did not allow light to penetrate to the lower layers not allowing the reflections, this resulted in a matte or dull finish unless a layer of varnish is applied to give the painting a sheen.

As we notice in figure 12-4 below, we see that the artists stay with some of the Christian features so well known in the Gothic and Romanesque periods except for a much more real or

Cited: Stokstad, Marilyn. Cothren, Michael W. “Art: A Brief History.” Fifth Edition. College Art. (2012) http://www.architecturecourses.org/ziggurat-ur. Figure 12-4. Windows Internet Explorer. Google Images. (02/02/2014). “Ghent Altarpiece.” https://www.google.com/search/ghent/altarpiece/. Figure 12-7. Windows Internet Explorer. Google Images. (02/02/2014). “Portinari Altarpiece.” https://www.google.com/search/portinari/altarpiece/. Figure 13-9. Windows Internet Explorer. Google Images. (02/02/2014). “David.” https://www.google.com/search/david/. Figure 13-10. Windows Internet Explorer. Google Images. (02/02/2014). “Interior, Sistine Chapel.” https://www.google.com/search/interior/sistine/chapel/. Figure 13-12. Windows Internet Explorer. Google Images. (02/02/2014). “Creation of Adam.” https://www.google.com/search/creation/of/adam/.