1. RENAISSANCE
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that profoundly affected European intellectual life in the early
modern period. Beginning in Italy, and spreading to the rest of Europe by the 16th century, its influence was
felt in literature, philosophy, art, music, politics, science, religion, and other aspects of intellectual inquiry.
Renaissance scholars employed the humanist method in study, and searched for realism and human emotion in
art.
Renaissance humanists such as Poggio Bracciolini sought out in Europe's monastic libraries the Latin literary,
historical, and oratorical texts of Antiquity, while the Fall of Constantinople (1453) generated a wave of émigré
Greek scholars bringing precious manuscripts in ancient Greek, many of which had fallen into obscurity in the
West. It is in their new focus on literary and historical texts that Renaissance scholars differed so markedly
from the medieval scholars of the Renaissance of the 12th century, who had focused on studying Greek and
Arabic works of natural sciences, philosophy and mathematics, rather than on such cultural texts.
Florence, the center of Renaissance
Giotto, Lamentation, Cappella degli Scrovegni.
Sandro Botticelli, Magnificat, 1480–81,
tempera on panel, Uffizi Gallery, Florence
2. BAROQUE AND ROCOCO
The Baroque (US /bəˈroʊk/ or UK /bəˈrɒk/) is often thought of as a period of artistic style that used
exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur
in sculpture, painting, architecture, literature, dance, and music. The style began around 1600
in Rome, Italy and spread to most of Europe.
The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Catholic Church, which had decided at
the time of the Council of Trent, in response to the Protestant Reformation, that the arts should communicate
religious themes in direct and emotional involvement. The aristocracy also saw the dramatic style of Baroque
architecture and art as a means of impressing visitors and expressing triumph, power and control. Baroque
palaces are built around an entrance of courts, grand staircases and reception rooms of sequentially increasing
opulence.
Though Rococo (Late Baroque) originated in the purely decorative arts, the style showed clearly in painting.
These painters used delicate colors and curving forms, decorating their canvases with cherubs and myths of
love. Portraiture was also popular among Rococo painters. Some works show a sort of naughtiness or impurity
in the behavior of their subjects, showing the historical trend of departing away from the Baroque's
church/state orientation. Landscapes were pastoral and often depicted the leisurely outings of aristocratic
couples.
The Church ofSant'Andrea al Quirinale,
designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Antoine Watteau, Pilgrimage on the Isle of
Cythera (1717, Louvre)
François Boucher, Le Déjeuner,
(1739, Louvre)
