Eighth module for GNED 1201 (Aesthetic Experience and Ideas). This one mainly covers the Northern Renaissance, and then moves back to Italy to look at the art of the later 15th century. It also has an extended digression on changing representations of the human body over the 15th century. This course is a required general education course for all first-year students at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Canada. My version of the course is structured as a kind of Art History and Culture course. Some of the content overlaps with my other Gen Ed course.

1. Lecture 8
MID +
NORTHERN
RENAISSANCE
AESTHETIC
EXPERIENCE
AND
IDEAS

2. The Medici Family in Florence
Was a political dynasty, banking family and
later royal house. They produced four
popes, two queens of France, and
eventually became the unofficial rulers of
the Republic of Florence.

3. Còsimo di Mèdici
1389-1464
In 1434, after a brief time in exile Cosimo
was returned to Florence by popular
demand and became the de facto leader
of the city.

4. Cosimo was a committed republican and
though he manipulated the political
system to ensure his family maintained
their political power.
He also worked to create a lasting peace
treaty in 1454 between Florence, Milan,
Rome, Venice, and Naples, a peace which
lasted until the French invaded in 1494.

5. Cosimo was a great patronage of arts and
scholarship and used his great wealth to
improve Florence.

6. Cosimo was succeeded
by his son Piero from
1464-1469.
Piero in turn was
succeeded by his son
Lorenzo.
Piero di Medici (the Gouty)

7. Lorenzo de' Medici (The Magnificent)
1449-1492
His life coincided with the high point of
the mature phase of the Italian
Renaissance and his death coincided with
the end of the Golden Age of Florence.
He was also a poet and scholar and spent
vast sums of money on cultural projects
in Florence.
In 1478, Pope Sixtus IV hired assassins
(including a priest) to kill Lorenzo while
he was at mass. His brother was killed
but Lorenzo eventually survived a stab
wound to the throat.

8. Piero succeeded Lorenzo in 1492 but was an
Piero de' Medici
(The Unfortunate)
ineffectual leader and was soon displaced when
the French invaded Italy in 1494.
Eventually the Medici’s returned to power in
Florence by 1512.

9. Piero de' Medici
(The Unfortunate)
Pope Leo X
l
Lorenzo de' Medici (The Magnificent)
Pope Clement VII

10. Art under the Medici’s
From the 1440s-1490s, the innovations of
Masaccio, Brunelleschi, and Donatello
were expanded upon, first in Florence and
then throughout the rest of Italy.

11. Piero della Francesca [1415-1492]
The Baptism of Christ
1450s

12. Piero della Francesca, Portrait of Federico da Montefeltro 1465

13. Federico da Montefeltro was the
prince of the small Italian city of
Urbino, and was an ideal
Renaissance prince: a scholar, a
scientist, a supporter of culture,
the builder of one of Europe’s best
libraries, and a mercenary general
who never lost a battle.
He lost his eye in a jousting
accident and had part of his nose
amputated to provide a better
field of vision.

14. Filippo Lippi [1406-1469]
Virgin and Child with
scenes from the life of
St. Anne
1456

15. Filippo Lippi
Madonna and Child
1465

17. Sandro Botticelli [1445 – 1510]
Apprenticed to Filippo Lippi, he continued
his style and use of line.
His most famous works are commissions
for the Medici’s using themes from
classical antiquity and which contain a
variety of allusions and allegories.

18. Sandro Botticelli, Primavera, c. 1482.

19. Was commissioned by Lorenzo Medici as a
wedding present for his cousin, and would have
hung in the couple’s bedroom.
This might seem a strange gift given the subject
matter: the rape of Chloris and her subsequent
transformation into Flora, the embodiment of
spring.

20. 7 golden apples
(Medici symbol)
p Cupid 7 apples
Zephyr
(desire)
Chloris
(beauty)
Flora
Venus
(their child)
G
Mercury
(Commerce
and reason)
Graces (fulfilment)
(embodiments of
the 3 stages of
love: beauty,
desire,
fulfilment)
The painting is a neo-Platonic allegory on love: how desire and beauty can provoke passion and
violence or when wedded to reason, it can provoke transcendance and contemplation on the spiritual
and divine.

21. Botticelli, Birth of Venus, c. 1480

22. Venus’s nudity is front and center and
she is seen right at the moment
before being covered up.
The work is a fusion of classical and
Christian ideals.

24. Botticelli, Mars and Venus, c. 1475.
This painting was most likely part of a bed headboard, which would have created the illustration
of the two gods lying on the actual physical bed it was above.

25. The same female model (Simonetta Vespucci) was
used for these three paintings, and was considered
the most beautiful woman in Florence and was
reportedly the lover of the “ruler” of Florence,
Giuliano de Medici.
She died at age of 22 and thousands attended her
funeral.
Botticelli later asked to be buried at her feet in the
Franciscan Church of Ognissanti.

26. Girolamo Savonarola (1452 –1498) was
an Italian Dominican friar and an influential
contributor to the politics of Florence from
1494 until his execution in 1498.
He was known for his book burning,
destruction of what he considered immoral
art, and his vehement preaching against
the moral corruption of much of the clergy
at the time.
He also argued that the nude image is
sinful and depraved.

27. Some Florentine artists responded to
Savaronola’s sermons by transforming their
visual style and returning to a more pietistic
style …

28. David, by Donatello, c. 1430-1440 vs
The Penitent Magdalene, by Donatello, c. 1453-55.

29. Botticelli’s late works, post Savonarola,
demonstrate a very noticeable rejection of the
classically-inspired worldview of his earlier
works. He even destroyed a number of his
works that included nudity.
Shown here:
Lamentation over the Dead Christ with Saints (1490)
Mystic Nativity (1501)

31. Botticelli’s “classical” paintings were only
saved because they were owned by rich
patrons who were unmoved by
Savonarola.

32. Execution of Savonarola and his
Companions in Piazza Della Signoria,
Florence, 1498

33. The Spread of the Renaissance
The civic humanist ideals along with the
artistic innovations that began in Florence
began to spread throughout Northern Italy
in the 1440s-1500s.

34. Northern Renaissance as a term refers to the new
style of painting in France, Germany, and the
Netherlands.

35. Northern Renaissance as a term refers to
the new style of painting in France,
Germany, and the Netherlands.

36. Northern Renaissance

37. Gothic styles remained an important part of the
visual arts of the Northern Renaissance (Gothic
churches for instance continued to be built well
into the 16th century).
Northern Renaissance painting generally was less
interested with perspective and naturalism (that is
with form) and more on color and details.
As well, there is initially much less interest outside
of Italy on classical past

38. These northern painters were able to achieve
remarkable color effects and detail through their early
adoption of the new invention of oil paints.

39. Robert Campin, Merode Altarpiece c. 1425
While this and other Northern Renaissance pieces often do not have the
accurate perspective of contemporary Italian works, there is an attention to
detail (often requiring a magnifying glass to see) as well as less homage to
classical forms.

40. Jan van Eyck, Ghent Altarpiece, c. 1432

44. Madonna of
Chancellor Rolin
Jan van Eyck,
1435

45. Jan van Eyck,
Arnolfini Portrait, c. 1434
The best guess is that the subjects are
Giovanni di Nicolao Arnolfini and
Costanza Trenta who were married in
1426.
The Arnolfini were rich Italian merchants
living in Bruges.
She died in 1433, the year before it was
painted.

46. Single candle is
thought to represent
either: Flemish
She is by the bed and
the door, symbolizing
wife’s realm of child
wedding day custom,
the holy ghost, or that
this is a memorial
painting for his dead
wife (notice the candle
He is by window,
symbolizing husband’s
rearing and household
management. But
because she looks at
him (and not down)
painter is showing she is
her husband’s social
stub on her side).
focus on the sphere of
commerce and politics
husband s equal.
She is not pregnant:
rather she is showing off
h lth(lt flth
her wealth (lots of cloth =
rich) as well as the
couple’s desire for
children.
Oranges were
extremely expensive
imports and symbolize
love.
Hands here might
indicate a marriage
ceremony, or evidence of
a business transaction
(she is being given the
right to conduct business
on husband’s behalf)
Removal of shoes in a
Dog represents fidelity b d i di t d
… or perhaps it is just
a dog.
bedroom indicated
sexual passion.

48. Johann van Eyck was
here
5cm or 2.2” 10cm or 4”

50. http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/the-annunciation/
xwFVdn0XxLmf9Q?projectId=art-project
http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/triptych-the-
crucifixion/3gF9kN6BYvNuxw?projectId=art-project
http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/lucca-madonna/
YQF1hx5g-8VglQ?projectId=art-project
http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/portrait-of-
a-lady/pwGhp-hQAnSBdg?projectId=art-project
http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/portrait-of-
isabella-of-portugal/dQFnG1h6Jg1hYg?projectId=art-project

51. In the 15th century, we can also see a
transformation in artist’s willingness to
make the human body a focus of attention.

52. Adam, from the left wing
of the Ghent Altarpiece -
Jan van Eyck, 1425

54. Descent from the Cross,
c. 1435-1438

55. Masaccio [1425]
The Expulsion of Adam and Eve

56. Garden of Eden World Before the Flood Hell
Hieronymus Bosch, Garden of Earthly Delight, c. Bosch Delight c 1510

62. Albrect Durer (1471-1528)
Self portrait, 1484 [13 yrs old],
the youngest self portrait in art
history

63. Albrect Durer [1471-1528]
Self Portrait 1493
[22 yrs old],
painted to send to his
fiancé (whom he had
never met)

68. Albrecht Dürer,
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, c. 1497-1498.
Woodcut, 15 2/5" x 11".

70. Albrecht Dürer,
Melancholia, c. 15148. Copper plate

71. Gutenberg printing press [1450]