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Gardner’s Art Through the
Ages, 12e
Chapter 21
Humanism and the Allure of Antiquity:
15th Century Italian Art
Renaissance Florence
Massacio and the Revolution in Representation
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Massacio was the first great painter of the Quattrocento period of the Italian
Renaissance. His frescoes introduce a plasticity previously unseen in
figure painting.
Despite his brief career, he had a profound influence on other artists. He
was one of the first to use scientific perspective in his painting, employing
techniques such as vanishing point in art for the first time.
Masaccio profoundly influenced the art of painting in the Renaissance.
According to Vasari, all Florentine painters studied his frescoes extensively
in order to "learn the precepts and rules for painting well.”
Masaccio's fresco of the Tribute Money in the Brancacci Chapel of Santa
Maria del Carmine in Florence shows psychologically and physically
credible figures illuminated by a light coming from a specific source
outside the picture. The light models the figures to produce an illusion of
deep sculptural relief. The main group of figures stand solidly in a semicircle in the foreground of a spacious landscape. Masaccio also employs
linear perspective and aerial perspective to enhance the sense of space and
distance.
Figure 21-10 MASACCIO, Tribute Money,
Brancacci Chapel, Santa Maria del Carmine,
Florence, Italy, ca. 1427. Fresco, 8’ 1” x 19’ 7”.
Figure 21-11 MASACCIO,
Expulsion of Adam and Eve from
Eden, Brancacci Chapel, Santa Maria
del Carmine, Florence, Italy, ca. 1425.
Fresco, 7’ x 2’ 11”.
Masaccio's starkly simple fresco of
the Expulsion of Adam and Eve from
Eden employs sharply slanted light
from an outside source to create deep
relief. The figures appear to have
substantial bodily weight and move
convincingly over the ground.
Figure 21-12 MASACCIO,
Holy Trinity, Santa Maria
Novella, Florence, Italy, ca.
1428. Fresco, 21’ x 10’ 5”.
Brunelleschi & Achievements in Architecture
• There is little biographical information about Brunelleschi's life to
explain his transition from goldsmith to builder and, no less
importantly, from his training in the gothic or medieval manner to
the new classicism in architecture and urbanism that we now
loosely call the Renaissance and of which Brunelleschi is
considered the seminal figure
• Brunelleschi’s first architectural commission was the Ospedale
degli Innocenti (1419-ca.1445), or Foundling Hospital. It was the
first building in Florence to make clear reference - in its columns
and capitals - to classical antiquity.
• Brunelleschi developed his revolutionary system of geometric
linear perspective that 15th century artists so eagerly adopted.
Ospedale degli Innocenti (The Foundling Hospital) - Filippo Brunelleschi
FILIPPO
BRUNELLESCHI,
dome of Florence
Cathedral (view
from the south),
Florence, Italy,
1420–1436.
Figure 21-14
Cutaway view
of dome of
Florence
Cathedral
FILIPPO BRUNELLESCHI, interior of Santo Spirito
Figure 21-15
Alternate View
Interior view of
nave and choir.
view E
© 2005 Saskia Cultural Documentation, Ltd.
FILIPPO BRUNELLESCHI, early plan of Santo Spirito (left)
FILIPPO BRUNELLESCHI,
facade of the Pazzi Chapel,
Santa Croce, Florence, Italy,
begun ca. 1440.
Brunelleschi's plan for the
Pazzi Chapel is one of the first
independent Renaissance
buildings conceived as a
central-plan structure where
emphasis is placed on the
central dome-covered space.
Brunelleschi used a basic unit
to construct a balanced,
harmonious, and regularly
proportioned space.
Figure 21-17
Alternate View
Overall view of
facade from
entrance
© 2005 Saskia Cultural Documentation, Ltd.
BRUNELLESCHI, plan of the Pazzi Chapel
Figure 21-19
FILIPPO
BRUNELLESCHI,
interior of the Pazzi
Chapel (view facing
northeast), Santa
Croce, Florence,
Italy, begun ca.
1440.