The artistic transformation from the Middle Ages known as the “Renaissance” began in Florence, Italy and spread throughout the rest of Europe from the fourteenth until the close of the sixteenth century. The Renaissance evolved from the Medieval period, developed into Mannerism and eventually influenced more modern periods such as Baroque and Rococo. The background to this movement was the Hundred Years War that took place during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. This was an important time for the development of European capitalism when big enterprising families throughout Europe developed international trade, such as the Medici family of Florence. Along with this increasing wealth from trade came a new opulence in materials for art. During this time painters changed from using egg-based paint, known as tempera, to oil-based paint. Oil had been used for many centuries, but it was not until the fifteenth century that it became widely popular, first in the northern countries and then spreading to the south.
Other innovations of the time included Filippo Brunelleschi’s (1377-1446) development of the one point perspective for painting. This system allowed for greater illusionism in two dimensional paintings, creating the impression of a three dimensional space. This was a breakthrough from the flattened, awkward pictures of the Middle-Ages. Initially as an architect he would use different coloured Italian marbles to create the classical orders and architectural elements such as pilasters, pediments, and domes remnant of the Colosseum and the Pantheon. The movement was based on a resurgence of classical technique and the development of linear perspective in painting which gradually lead to a complete educational reform through artists such as Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519). It encompassed intensive studies of all the classical poets, and a new found appreciation for ancient sculpture and architecture. Later, Brunelleschi went to Rome to excavate, study, and measure the remains of antique buildings, and was accompanied by the goldsmith and sculptor Donatello (c. 1386-1466). The sculptures found during this period and even during later excavations fuelled the enthusiasm of the Renaissance sculptors – an enthusiasm powerful enough even to lead Michelangelo to bury one of his masterpieces in the ground, so that afterwards it could be excavated and classified as a “genuinely antique” structure.
The driving force of the Renaissance was the emphasis on the perfection of the human form, the term known as Humanism, which is in complete contrast to the Medieval era in which emphasis was always placed on the divinity. This humanist perspective became a futile point in southern Renaissance portraiture, a style that became a basis for portraiture for the next two and a half centuries. The Northern style of portraiture can be best described as “naturalist” and focused more on organic forms and textures rather than the light and depth seen in the Humanist paintings-a style that can be seen in many of Albrecht Dürer’s works such as his famous Self Portrait with Gloves or Hans Memling’s portrait of Maria Portinari (Maria Magdalena Baroncelli).
Eventually the Renaissance artists desired to become closer to nature and began not only looking at their subjects from an aesthetic point of view but also from a methodical perspective. Therefore, the Renaissance also extended to the scientific arena where many technological and industrial advancements took place. Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) began his experiments by inventing the pendulum and the thermometer in the sixteenth century. Galileo was also interested in astronomy, but it was Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) who developed the heliocentric, or sun-centred, theory that the earth revolves around the sun.
The northern European countries were embracing Protestantism and this changed the patronage system in art. Due to the wealth from increasing global trade, a new merchant class developed in northern Europe which commissioned more secular works of art for both churches and private homes. Although still life and landscape paintings were among the most popular genres at the time, the formation of guilds and civic militias created a new market for the group portrait. In Italy, the Catholic Church was the primary patron of the arts, while in the north individuals among the bourgeoisie class were the principal patrons, thereby creating a market force that determined the subject matter of the painting or portrait. Artists could no longer depend on large church commissions for religious works the way they had prior to the Reformation.
Contrary to the secular developments taking place in the north, much of Spanish and Italian art was still created through religious patronage. King Francis I of France (1494-1547) was generally considered the monarch who embodied the Renaissance. His courtly style and love of humanist knowledge was expansive. Leonardo da Vinci eventually wound up in his court in France, where he found generous patronage for his science and experiments and lived out the rest of his life near Amboise with the support of the king.
The Renaissance lasted for around two hundred years and has a long and complex history that is still widely studied and debated. Some art historians debate the relevance of the term “Renaissance” classifying it sceptically as nostalgia for the classical age while others believe that without it the later artistic movements would not have developed so intensely. Since the Renaissance is such a vast and expansive movement it is classified into three different periods based on its original Italian origins. The early Renaissance belongs to the period between 1420 and 1500 known as the Quattrocento, the peak of the Renaissance ended around 1520, and the late Renaissance, which gradually evolved into Mannerism, came to a close at around 1600 (the Cinquecento). Baroque art developed as an imperceptible transition from the late Renaissance as a further developed art in Europe that was occasionally seen as deviant and decadent, but now and again as a higher form of development, dominating until the end of the seventeenth century. Contrasts of light and shadow became nearly as important as the paintings themselves Teneberism and the painting of extreme light and dark colours to draw out the subject later became the main focus of the Baroque composition. Many artists became uninterested in portraiture and reverted to painting narrative scenes, sometimes even returning to religious subjects.