Proto Renaissance Post

Cimabue (c. 1280) and Giotto (c. 1308) with Madonna’s Enthroned

CIMABUE
(b. ca. 1240, Firenze, d. ca. 1302, Firenze)

Florentine painter. His nickname means 'Ox-head'. He was a contemporary of Dante, who refers to him in The Divine Comedy (Purg. xi. 94-6) as an artist who was 'believed to hold the field in painting' only to be eclipsed by Giotto's fame. Ironically enough this passage, meant to illustrate the vanity of short-lived earthly glory, has become the basis for Cimabue's fame; for, embroidering on this reference, later writers made him into the discoverer and teacher of Giotto and regarded him as the first in the long line of great Italian painters. He was said to have worked in the 'Greek' (i.e. Byzantine) manner, but to have begun the movement towards greater realism which culminated in the Renaissance.
Documentary evidence is insufficient to confirm or deny this estimate of Cimabue's art. The only work that can be proved to be by his hand is a St John forming part of a larger mosaic in Pisa Cathedral (1302), but tradition has tended to attribute to Cimabue many works of outstanding quality from the end of the 13th century, such as the Madonna of Santa Trinità (Uffizi, Florence), a cycle of frescos in the Upper Church of San Francesco in Assisi, and a majestic Crucifix in Santa Croce (badly damaged in the Florence flood of 1966). If these highly plausible attributions are correct, Cimabue was indeed the outstanding master of the generation before Giotto. The movement towards greater naturalism, however, may owe more to contemporary Roman painters and mosaicists (Cavallini,Torriti) than to him; he is documented in Rome in 1272 and could have known their work.
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/bio/c/cimabue/biograph.html

Cimabue, detail

Cimabue (c. 1280) and Giotto (c. 1308) with Madonna’s Enthroned

Giotto diBondone (c. 1267 - 1337). Florentine painter and architect. Outstanding as a painter, sculptor, and architect, Giotto was recognized as the first genius of art in the Italian Renaissance. Giotto lived and worked at a time when people's minds and talents were first being freed from the shackles of medieval restraint. He dealt largely in the traditional religious subjects, but he gave these subjects an earthly, full-blooded life and force.
Giotto is regarded as the founder of the central tradition of Western painting because his work broke free from the stylizations of Byzantine art, introducing new ideals of naturalism and creating a convincing sense of pictorial space. His momentous achievement was recognized by his contemporaries (Dante praised him in a famous passage of The Divine Comedy, where he said he had surpassed his master Cimabue), and in about 1400 CenninoCennini wrote `Giotto translated the art of painting from Greek to Latin.‘
In the generation after his death he had an overwhelming influence on Florentine painting; it declined with the growth of International Gothic, but his work was later an inspiration to Masaccio, and even to Michelangelo. These two giants were his true spiritual heirs.
http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/giotto/

Press to link to site with a history of the Arena, or Scrovegni Chapel painted with a series of frescoes by Giotto
c. 1305

Interior of the Arena Chapel facing the entrance and the Last Judgment fresco

Lamentation, fresco panel from the Arena Chapel

Lamentation, detail

Early or Proto-Renaissance

Petrarch 1304 - 1374
The father of “Humanism”
Big Fan of Cicero and classical antiquity, especially literature
Originally from Florence
Invented the modern ideal of the “autonomous individual”
Sought to define of the Virtuous Life
Began the debate on the contemplative vs. the active life
Perfected the sonnet
Unleashed the obsessive recovery of ancient texts in early Renaissance

Early Influences (outside the role of Antiquity)
Clement V begins the Avignon papacy in 1308, leading to Great Schism of 1378 and the period of “3 Popes” until 1409
The Black Death; Plague in 1348
The Introduction of Gunpowder and the changing role of the Nobility (from warrior to dilettante)
The rise of the Merchant Class and Capitalism
Overseas conquests, migration and colonization
A growing Interest in the Natural World and the fidelity of depiction as opposed to symbolism

Duccio, Maestà(center panel, Madonna with Angels and Saints)
1308-11Tempera on wood,

Sienese School of Painting
Duccio, Maestà1308-11
Mary as Queen of Heaven surrounded by angels and saints
Most opulent and complex altarpiece of its time
Mournful gaze characteristic of Duccio
Almond eyes and rosebud mouth of the Mary are typical of Byzantine art
Throne opens up for all to see
Figures arranged in a hierarchy, however formal frontality of figures relaxed a bit

Duccio's famous Maestà was commissioned by the Siena Cathedral in 138 and it was completed in 1311. Today most of this elaborate double-sided altarpiece is in the cathedral museum but several of the predella panels are scattered outside Italy in various museums. It is probably the most important panel ever painted in Italy; it is certainly among the most beautiful. Compressed within the compass of an altarpiece is the equivalent of an entire programme for the fresco painting of a church.
The whole of the front of the main panel is occupied by a scene of the Virgin and Child in majesty surrounded by angels and saints, and corresponding to this on the back there are twenty-six scenes from Christ's Passion. Originally there were subsidiary scenes from Christ's life above and below the main panel. The whole work is a superb standard of craftsmanship, and the exquisite colouring and supple draughtsmanship create effects of great beauty.

Digital reproduction of original, front

Digital reproduction of Maesta, back
Note the predella (small panel) above

Simone Martini, Annunciation, 1333
International Style
Elegant shapes, swaying figures
Radiant color
Fluttering drapery
Courtly ritual, courtly dress
Angel: white and gold brocade with floating plaid-lined mantle
Virgin: mantle lined with deep gold lines
No recession of space, only relationship of two main figures
Vase of white lilies symbolizes Virgin’s purity
Dove of Holy Spirit surrounded by Cherubim

Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin
Birth of Mary, mother of Jesus, at home
A midwife holds a fan to cool Saint Anne
Everyday items of the Gothic period on display in the home
Mary’s father, Joachim, is waiting outside to hear the news of the birth
Wooden frame
Cutaway cross-section allows viewer to look directly into a typical middle class home
Pioneering attempt at building a consistent interior space
Single vanishing point suggested
Palpable sense of three-dimensionality on a two-dimensional surface
Suggestion of great depth on left
Local women bring gifts of bread and wine to symbolize the Eucharist

Singing and dancing in the streets of the ideal republic (actually against Sienese law)
Crafts, professions, trades are highlighted as thriving
Bountiful harvests: a good city feeds its people
Aspects of leisure: hunters and falconers leave the city unafraid of their safety
Dark blue sky in contrast with well lit scenery
Aristocratic elegance of figures
Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Allegory of Good Government, 1338 -40
Painting done in the chief council chamber of Siena, the Hall of Peace
Panoramic view of the city of Siena with walls and countryside
Security in center has a banner that proclaims everyone can walk freely because justice reigns

Andrea Pisano,
Baptistery Doors
“Life of St. John the Baptist”
1330 – 36 – south entrance

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Proto Renaissance Post

by bassmanb on Dec 06, 2009

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