Basic Art HistoryPart 2: Middle Ages to Romanticism

Last Class• Prehistoric Art- Paleolithic vs Neolithic

• Paleolithic- cave paintings (Altamira, Chauvet), Venus of Willendorf

• Neolithic- more symbolic, abstract; settled communities allowing for pottery and Stonehenge, Thinker and Sitting Woman

• Mesopotamian vs Egyptian Art

• Mesopotamian- fertile crescent, chaotic, warring tribes; Ziggurat and Lamassu

• Egyptian- art purpose is religious (reflect death and afterlife) and impose order, stable, unchanging, brief period of change with Akhenaten; Great Pyramids, Nefertiti

• Greek vs Roman

• Greek- Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods- idealized bodies, Spear-Bearer, Parthenon

• Roman- non-idealized bodies, portrait paintings and busts

Early Christian and Middle Ages

•After Emperor Constantine’s conversion, art needed to spread the new official religion

•entirely new art

•human body covered, no effort to depict perfect human form, only symbolic

•Symbolism vs realism

Illuminated Manuscripts• decorated or illustrated texts, often with gold and silver inlay,

often of the Gospels

• Made by monastic scribes who helped retain the written works from antiquity

• Mixing celtic or native north european design with Christian

narrative, often made to impress illiterate rulers and kings

Byzantine Art• region of Byzantium, later Byzantine

Empire

• mixing of Islamic and Christian design

• Hagia Sophia- began as eastern orthodox cathedral

Romanesque Art• mid 11th-mid 12th century style of architecture, first

distinctive style in Europe since Roman empire

• brought back roman architectural elements such as barrel-vaulted ceilings, stone construction

• example: Tower of London

Gothic Art• style of architecture of late Middle Ages, replaced by

Renaissance architecture

• style of the great cathedrals, marked by pointed arches, ribbed vaults, and flying buttresses

• originated in France

Renaissance• Renaissance= French for “rebirth”

• move away from purely spiritual concerns to more human and classical

• mixing of the classical Greek/Roman humanism and rationalism with Christian spirituality

• began in Italy (Florence, Venice) moved into Northern Europe

• realism, chiaroscuro, linear perspective,atmospheric perspective, study of nature, scientific knowledge

• renewed interest in mythological themes and characters

• secular as well as religious art patronage (Medici) due to rise of middle class merchants

• fully regard individual artist as “master” or singular “genius”

Middle Ages Renaissance

Leonardo Da Vinci• epitomized Humanist ideal, archetype of

“Renaissance Man”

• painting, sculpting, science, math, inventor, architect, musician (Polymath)

• discoveries in anatomy, civil and military engineering, optics,

• The Last Supper, Virgin of the Rocks, Mona Lisa, sketchbooks

Michelangelo•considered by his contemporaries the

greatest artist (“The Devine One”)

•painter, sculptor, architect

•Sistine Chapel, David, Pieta, Dome of St. Peter’s Basilica

Other Renaissance Artists

Botticelli’s Birth of Venus Albrecht Durer

Renaissance towards

Modernism• Growing plurality of religious, political ideas, and notions of social order

• The Reformation and Counter Reformation

• The Enlightenment, Scientific Revolution (reason replacing superstition)

• Growing Individualism (democracy, social contract, human rights)

• American and French Revolutions

• Baroque, Rococo, Neoclassical, Romanticism

Baroque Art• roughly 1590-1725, style of art, music,

theatre, architecture

• response to Reformation, more theatrical and dramatic scenes and depictions to attract commoners

• Caravaggio, Bernini, Rubens, Rembrandt

Rubens

Descent From the Cross The Three Graces

Part of Catholic Counter-

Reformation,Highly theatrical,“Painter of skin”,“Rubenesque”

Bernini

Ecstasy of St. Theresa

Leading sculptor of his day, architectWorthy successor to Michelangelo

Michelangelo’s David Bernini’s David

CaravaggioRaw, intense realism, dramatic lightingTenebrism= heightened chiaroscuro

Crucifixion of St PeterJudith Beheading Holofernes

RembrandtDutch Baroque masterPainter, printmaker (etchings)portraits, self-portraits, landscapes

Rococo Art• 18th century style of art, music,

literature, interior design, furniture

• heavily French influenced, known as French style

• smaller, less grand, elegance, lots of curves, ornate, playful

• appealed to wealthy class, nobility

• Boucher, Fragonard, Watteau

The Toilet of Venus, by BoucherFragonard’s The Swing

Neoclassical Art• coincides with 18th Age of Enlightenment to

the early 19th c

• revival of classical styles of antiquity

• reaction against Rococo, later opposed to Romanticism

• order, idealism, rationalism, beauty in nature

• reflected sympathy with French revolution

• David, Ingres, Canova

Jacques- Louis David

Oath of the HoratiiMadame Recamier

Death of Marat

Ingres

Grande OdaliquePrincesse Albert de Broglie

Romanticism• roughly 1800-1850

• reaction against rational age of Enlightenment, against scientific revolution over nature, not against democratic social change

• embraced emotion, exotic, “aesthetic experience”, “the sublime”, originality and imagination

• applied to art and poetry (Wordsworth, Byron, Coleridge)

• Friedrich, Delacroix, Gericault, Goya, JMW Turner

Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog by Casper David Friedrich

Delacroix’s Liberty leading the People

Goya’s Third of May 1808