Context
Villard de Honnecourt (c. 1200-c. 1250) was a thirteenth-century French artist best remembered for his sketchbook, in which he drew objects, architectural motifs, animals, and people from real life (click here to view the sketchbook; the website is in French, but you can virtually flip through the pages of Honnecourt's sketchebook by clicking on the word "Feuilleter" and then the purple arrows above the drawings). The mere existence of Honnecourt's sketchbook shows how artists were taking a renewed interest in the world around them during the late Gothic period. Also during this time, artists started being known widely and valued as individuals, and they began signing their works.
This era also coincided with invention of moveable type by the German printer-publisher Johann Gutenberg (born 14th century, died 1468), which eventually allowed for the rapid dissemination of knowledge on a scale never seen before. Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574), the Italian artist and writer, would later compare this period to the Renaissance and find it wanting in his highly influential "Lives of the Artists." The "Lives of the Artists" was a series of biographies focused on artists whose accomplishments led up to and were part of the Renaissance, beginning with Giotto, who would become known as the father of the Italian Renaissance, and ending with Michelangelo and Titian.
An increased interest in naturalism - that is, in capturing the world as we see it - can be traced in art through the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Scholars were also increasingly engaged with Humanism. Thus this period, what is sometimes called the Proto-Renaissance, was a "rebirth" of classical ideals that led to the modern era. Gutenberg's moveable type allowed publishers to reprint not only the bible, but stories and treatises, especially from ancient Rome and Greece, that had once been forgotten or read only in high social circles.
The study of Humanism was strengthened by the new circulation of ancient philosophies and stories, among other texts, and it inspired people to create a code of civil conduct, as well as new theories about education and scholarship. Humanism focused on the concept of the individual within society and the use of one's own senses in the search for knowledge. Artists also sought fame based on their merits outside the existing guild system. To this point, guilds were associations made up of certain types of merchants and craftsmen. For instance, there was a guild of wool merchants and a guild of armorers in Florence. Before the Renaissance, artists were often lumped in with house painters and carpenters, but during and after the Renaissance, artists created their own guilds and sought recognition as individuals. The enthusiasm for antiquity that began in Italy spread across Europe. Moreover, while Latin remained the official language of the Catholic Church, vernacular (non-religious) literature became more popular and it was printed more frequently. That led to the standardization of the Italian language, which had varied by region until that time. Medieval style and conventions still dominated the way art was made and looked, but there was more of an attempt to break away from such conventions during the 13th and 14th centuries.
City-states came to power during these years as empires broke up in the Romanesque and Gothic eras. In Italy, each city-state was governed by executive bodies, councils, and special commissions. Each kingdom had their own sources for revenue and support, and they all enjoyed the start of an age of economic prosperity. Politics were often tied directly to religious bodies and the Catholic Church, which in turn encouraged many religious commissions.
A break in the Catholic Church, called the Great Schism, occurred in 1305. The Great Schism was sparked when a French pope was appointed and he settled Avignon instead of the traditional Rome. This caused a divide between those who thought the papacy should stay seated in the Vatican, in Rome, and those who objected to the discord they perceived in that Italian center. This tension led both parties to comission propagandistic works in an attempt to sway parishioners.
Also in the 14th century, the Black Death (Bubonic Plague) eliminated 25 to 50 percent of Europe's population in only around five years. People were witness to diseases and outbreak never witnessed in the history of human civilization. These events led many to seek refuge in Church doctrine.
Sculpture: There was an interest in classical sculpture throughout the Middle Ages.
Painting:
NOW IN THE YEAR 1276, in the country of Florence, about fourteen miles from the city, in the village of Vespignano, there was born to a simple peasant named Bondone a son, to whom he gave the name of Giotto, and whom he brought up according to his station. And when he had reached the age of ten years, showing in all his ways though still childish an extraordinary vivacity and quickness of mind, which made him beloved not only by his father but by all who knew him, Bondone gave him the care of some sheep. And he leading them for pasture, now to one spot and now to another,was constantly driven by his natural inclination to draw on the stones or the ground some object in nature, or something that came into his mind. One day Cimabue, going on business from Florence to Vespignano, found Giotto, while his sheep were feeding, drawing a sheep from nature upon a smooth and solid rock with a pointed stone, having never learnt from any one but nature. Cimabue, marvelling at him, stopped and asked him if he would go and be with him. And the boy answered that if his father were content he would gladly go. Then Cimabue asked Bondone for him, and he gave him up to him, and was content that he should take him to Florence.
There in a little time, by the aid of nature and the teaching of Cimabue, the boy not only equalled his master, but freed himself from the rude manner of the Greeks, and brought back to life the true art of painting, introducing the drawing from nature of living persons, which had not been practised for two hundred years; or at least if some had tried it, they had not succeeded very happily. Giotto painted among others, as may be seen to this day in the chapel of the Podestà's Palace at Florence, Dante Alighieri, his contemporary and great friend, and no less famous a poet than Giotto was a painter.(Vassari)
We see the high pedestal that Vassari places this artist in relation to the transition from the Gothic era to the Renaissance. Vassari notes the naturalism that is demonstrated from observation. He also presumes Cimabue to be his teacher and it is also presumed that he could have been influenced by many different styles or people, but the outcome is a major shift in expression. According to Vassari, Giotto is almost solely responsible for displacing Byzantine style, establishing painting as a major art form, and restoring a naturalistic approach which had been abandoned. This also expressed the dominance of sight for gaining knowledge of the world which pushed the early scientific revolution.
Pietro Lorenzetti, The Birth of the Virgin (1342): Lorenzetti was also a pupil of Duccio. His work demonstrates a search for convincing spatial illusions. This was painted for a Cathedral as part of a series honoring the Virgin Mary. The painting seems a sort of diorama of the narrative. Characters are even cut by the architecture giving mor sense of a space. This was a large step in integrating architectural illusionism with the figure.
Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Peaceful City (From: Effects of Good Government in the City and in the Country) (1338-1339): Ambrogio was the brother of Pietro and also a student of Duccio. These paintings were done as a part of a series of frescos that are in the public house of Siena, Italy. The series represents the effects of good and bad government done as a sort of reminder by those in charge to keep with the program. The mural project gave the artist the chance to study everyday life and use it as metaphor. It also gave the artist the chance to practice new ideas of perspective in depicting the cityscape and landscape in the paintings of the effects on the country.
Architecture
This module was produced by Professor Josh Yavelberg utilizing a mixture of open educational resources and notes from:
Kleiner, Fred. Gardner's Art through the Ages: The Western Perspective,|. Vol. 2. Cengage Learning, 2013.