City states tended to resist papal and Holy Roman Empire control

The City-States: Economics and Politics

Gateways to the Mediterranean--rich, powerful

Chaos inside the cities--politics and civil war

Banking influence--Rome the largest banking center in the world

New vitality--out with the old in with the new--experimentation

Frist true city state--equal with kings

Humanism: The Revival of Classical Values

Code of civil conduct--envied the selfless state-first of the classical Romans--humanist

Humanists only wanted fame for their actions

The Humanization of Religious Experience

"interest in antiquity is one with the interest in human affairs and the human condition"

Reformists in the church as well--movement towards more personal church

Pre Protestant Reformation

Saint Thomas’ achievement of merging logic and dogma was shown to be false because you can’t prove God--therefore no point in trying to understand nature logically because it was God’s--religion becomes more mysitcal and the logical people split off to begin science

Emphasis on Intuition and Experience--began to make art more realisitic and less dogmatic

Sculpture

Strong classical emphasis under Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II (died 1250)

NICOLA PISANO (active c. 1258-1278)--moving towards classicalism with some elements of medieval traditions

GIOVANNI PISANO (c. 1250-1320)--more free and humanistic than PISANO

"two novel trends of great significance for Renaissance art: a new contract with the classical antuique and a burgeoning, native Gothic naturalism" which would permiate the fourteenth century.

Painting

maniera greca--Italian painting style strongly dominated by the Byzantine sytle in the Middle Ages

Byzantine influences--little detail in folds on clothing, lack of perspective

BONAVENTURA BERLINGHIERI (active c. 1235-1244)

DUCCIO DI BUONINSEGNA (active c. 1278-1318)--Sienese art at its best

Maestá Altarpiece, 1308-1311--formality and symetry, and frontality and rigity of the figures/icons are Byzantine, but they are more relaxed with more human faces and positions and more natural arm bends--details in the cloth--familiar of norhtern Gothic--exchange between north and Italy in 14c.

Other pannels in the Maestá show new levels of emotion, disorder, and expression in the people, replacing the iconic rigidity of Byzantine art, BUT the relationship to the ground and the backgroudns were still akward.

GIOTTO DI BONDONE (c. 1266-1337)--bigger break with the past than DUCCIO--moved into the world of visible things ruled by nature in his painting

PIETRO CAVALLINI (active c. 1273-1308)--broke from the Byzantine influence and worked on the influence of form more

GIOVANNI CIMABUE (c. 1240-1302)--teacher to GITTO DI BONDONE--not as advanced

GIOTTO--reveales nature--radical change in artistic perspective away from medieval inward vision searching for God--now looking for the truth of nature

Sculptural solidity and weight and almost perspective

Integration of emotional and formal ideas--attempt at perspective in the background--figures have weight, but this doesn’t prevent them from expressing emotion realisitcally.

Use of positioning and background to foucus attention on Christ

Use of an off canvas light source and appropriate shading in the clothing--first time

"synthesis of dramatic narrative, holy lesson, and truth to human expereince presented in a visual idiom of his own invention"

1320--achives great solemnity and presense through his portrayal of restrained emotions

rests the clothing on roms rather than just putting it there

shows people from the side as they would really have been

TADDEO GADDI (c. 1300-13666)--foster son of GIOTTO--immitated him in form but didn’t get the simplicity and power--does well with light and shadow, though

ANDREA DI CIONE "ORCAGNA" (active 1343-1368)

BERNADO DADDI (c. 1290-1348)--follows GIOTTO’s move towards more humanistic, soft forms

SIMONE MARTINI (c. 1285-1344)--brought together Northern French Gothic an dSienese art to creat ethe "so caled International Style"--popular in Europe durring the late 14 and early 15c.--knights and ladies in splended regalia, etc.

Annunciation--weightless figures in a spaceless setting

PIETRO LORENZETTI (active 1320-1348)

very effective use of perspective in The Birth of the Virgin

AMBROGIO LORENZETTI (acvite 1319-1348)--combined "som eof Giotto’s analytical powers with the narrative talent of Duccio"--spectacular results