Students will be expected to develop, in the course of the semester, the following:

-       A familiarity with period and individual styles of Late Gothic and Early Renaissance art through a study of major works. Ready recognition of selected works, and knowledge of relevant factual information.

-       Command of problems of interpretation in relation to the study of

selected works; basic familiarity with subject matter and iconography,

function, patronage and purpose

-       An understanding of different art historical methodologies and views of the period through selected readings by major scholars in the field

-       A familiarity with some contemporary sources and writings on Early Renaissance art.

-       A basic understanding of the historical, political and social context in which this art and architecture was produced and in which artists and architects were formed.

-        Development of critical thinking about art and art history through course readings,  assignments and class discussion

-       Improved research skills through use of not simply the JCU library (and ideally, others in Rome), Jstor, and use of bibliographical sources, published and electronic.

-       Furthering of writing skills: declaration and development of a clearly stated theme, organization, discussion of distinctive views and approaches, written expression and structure.

-       Furthering of oral communication skills, through class discussion.

Description of the Course

            In Early Renaissance Italy, a new type of art emerged that was to change the concept of looking and representation, and the relationships between artist and patron, viewer and artwork. Beginning with the revolutionary vision of such artists as Giotto and Duccio in the early 14thC, and concluding with the flourishing of art and architecture in Florence under Cosimo de’Medici until his death in 1464, this course will investigate the culture and accomplishments of two centuries of creativity which lay the critical groundwork for Western art to the later 19thC.

            A basically chronological exploration of works of painting, sculpture and architecture in, especially, Florence, Siena and Rome will present a consideration of major art historical issues concerning this period. Through study of the works of Donatello, Ghiberti, Masaccio, Brunelleschi, Alberti, Piero della Francesca and other key artists, students should gain familiarity not only with the selected artworks themselves, but also with the historical and social context in which they were produced, and debates concerning style, patronage, function, iconography and meaning. 

Some topics will include: the Renaissance “rediscovery” and reinterpretation of antiquity; the relationship of humanist study to art;  the social and economic structures of art patronage; observation of nature and artistic convention; narrative and “istoria”; the effects of religious thought and practice on the devotional image; portraiture and social identity; civic pride and self-imaging in Florentine art; the “renovatio” of Rome under the Quattrocento popes; perspective as science and as symbolic space.

            An important aspect of the course will be on-site study, in Rome (for your Journals) and, especially, in Florence.  These experiences will give students the opportunity to examine works of the Early Renaissance in person, and often in their original context.

TEXTBOOK: F: Hartt and D: Wilkins, History of Renaissance Art, 7th ed.

            Attendance and participation: Students are expected to attend all classes, with assigned reading completed. More than one unexcused absence from class will result in a lower letter grade for the final assessment. Keep in mind that this class meets only once a week for two class periods, so a missed class is actually two! Participation is a required part of the course, (see “Assignments and Requirements”). The study visit during the weekend in Florence is a required – in fact essential – part of the course, and not optional. Scheduling of this weekend will be announced shortly.

Sequence of Classes

A specific schedule is forthcoming; due the double class period, several sections below will, of course, be combined in one class.

Assigned readings from Hartt are based on the edition last used (the 7^th); if there is a new edition, these will be adjusted!

TBA: Due dates of assignments, examinations, Florence trip

I)  Introduction

II)  Art in Italy ca. 1300.

Byzantine, Gothic, Antique currents and changing attitudes to nature in painting, sculpture and architecture. Signs of change are already perceptible in the late 13C art and culture of Rome and Tuscany. The rise of the mendicant orders and a new emphasis on the substance of the eucharist brought changes to ways of representing religious subjects.

Reading: HW, Introduction (Chapter 1)

III)  Giotto and a new observation of nature and human experience.

            An examination of Giotto’s work will focus on the Arena Chapel in Padua. In addition, a look at the “Giotto problem” and the Franciscan cycle in the upper church at Assisi.

Reading: HW, Chapter 3, pp 73-101

               John White, Art and Architecture in Italy 1250-1400, pp 309-332

   Bonaventura, selected passages from the life of St. Francis, the Legenda maior

IV)  Late Gothic Siena.

             Duccio’s Maestà; Devotional image and narrative methods; the Virgin as civic protectress; Simone Martini and the Lorenzetti and the importance of Siena in the Trecento

Reading: HW, Chapter 4

              Hayden Maginnis, Painting in the Age of Giotto, Chapter III: Duccio’s Rucellai Madonna

             Recommended: Diane Norman, Painting in Late Medieval and Renaissance Siena, Chapter 2: The Golden Age of Sienese Painting (1300-1355)

V)– Late Gothic painting in Tuscany, especially Florence: elaboration and reaction to Giotto’s heritage; theories on the influence (or not) of the Black Death on art

Reading: HW,  Chapter 5, pp 137-148

              Millard Meiss, Painting in Florence and Siena after the Black Death, Chapter I, “The New Form and Content”

            Recommended: Maginnis, Chapter VIII: The Mid-Century and the Mannered Style 

VI)  Brunelleschi: Antique and medieval models, rationality and measure, and the synthesis toward a new ideal of architecture

Reading: HW, Chapter 6

The Cupola of Florence Cathedral; The development of one-point perspective.

Readings – Vasari, “Life of Brunelleschi” in Lives of the Artists

              Recommended: Ross King, Brunelleschi’s Dome (readable account of the construction of the cupola, though extremely dependent on an earlier, more scholarly publication!)

VII) – Sculpture in Early 15thC Florence: politics, society and public art projects; the competition panels for the Baptistery Doors; Ghiberti’s reliefs for the North Doors of the Baptistery

Works for the Cathedral and Orsanmichele; Ghiberti, Nanni di Banco, and early Donatello

Continuation of discussion of public sculpture in Florence and notions of civic identity; discussion of Vasari’s conception of art history

Reading: HW, Chapter 7

              Accounts of the Competition by Renaissance writers, in Krautheimer, Lorenzo Ghiberti

             Vasari, Preface II

VIII) – Introduction to new trends in Renaissance painting: Gentile da Fabriano and the courtly style;  Masaccio’s style of imposing simplicity; concepts of “naturalism” in early 15thC Florence; two currents of naturalism in Florence and elsewhere.

Fra Angelico: painting and piety in the work of a Domenican artist; Altarpieces; his work at S. Marco

Readings: HW, Chapters 8 and 9

                 Steinberg, Sexuality of Christ, selections

                Recommended: Keith Christianson, Gentile da Fabriano, chapter on the Adoration of the

                Magi

 Recommended: William Hood, Fra Angelico at S. Marco

IX) – Fra Filippo Lippi, iconographical invention and stylistic elaboration

Reading:  Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-Century Italy,

                Chapter II, “The Period Eye,” pp 29-108

                Vasari, Lives of Fra Angelico and Fra Filippo Lippi

X)  – Leon Battista Alberti. Humanism and the theory of art and architecture: Perspective and “istoria;” Ghiberti’s “Gates of Paradise”

Alberti’s architecture: Architectural theory and practice

Reading: HW, Chapter 10

               Alberti, On Painting, (selection)

              John Summerson, The Classical Language of Architecture, pp 7-20

XI) – THE EARLY RENAISSANCE IN ROME:

The Papacy established in Rome: Florentine artists and first Renaissance developments in the renovation of the papal city in the early 15thC

Art and Architecture in early Quattrocento Rome

Reading: Loren Partridge, The Renaissance in Rome 1400-1600, 1996, selections: Chapter One – to p 24; Chapter Two – 46-79; Chapter Three – 61-68; Chapter Four – 79-83; Chapter Five – 110-115

               Recommended: Meredith Gill, “The 14^th and 15^th Centuries,”in M. Hall, ed., Rome

              Stinger, The Renaissance in Rome, Chapter II, esp. pp 49-79

XII) – The later work of Donatello in Florence and Padua. Tomb sculpture and funerary chapels in mid-15thC Florence.

Reading: HW, Chapter 12, pp 299-311

             Recommended:  Start reading Kent, below

XIV) – Paolo Uccello, Domenico Veneziano,  Andrea del Castagno: “La dolce prospettiva”- spatial formula, ambiguities, and manipulations; devotion and diversion. Medici Patronage examined. Civic responsibility or propaganda in building projects, sculpture and painting commissions.

Reading: HW, Chapter 11, pp 265-281

               Recommended: Dale Kent, Cosimo de’Medici and the Florentine Renaissance, Chapter XI, pp 217-238;  Chapter XII, pp 239-291

XV) – Piero della Francesca: Ideal geometry and problems of interpretation. The frescoes of the Legend of the True Cross in Arezzo

Readings: HW, Chapter 11, pp 281 - 297

                 Verdon, “The Spiritual World of Piero’s Art,”in Cambridge Companion to Piero della            

                 Francesca

                 Recommended: Jeraldyne Wood, chapter on Legend of the True Cross in Cambridge Companion to Piero della Francesca