Week 8: Italian Renaissance

 Italian Renaissance (1400-1600)

• Historical settings
• Renaissance means rebirth 
• After returning from the Crusades
• Classical forms refined and adapted for new uses
• Climate was less of an influence
• Furnish interiors were Gothic and Romanesque
• It was first developed in Italy
• There was a massive shift from religious to a secular emphasis
• Arts, literature, and architecture were points of emphasis in ancient Rome
• Client relationships were based on a long-term basis
• Architects, painters, furniture designers, and sculptors, copied designs from excavations and focused on horizontal and symmetrical design
• Ancient Roman style and details were added to buildings and were medieval in concept
• Early emphasis was on the interior architecture, not the furniture
• The Italian Renaissance palace, or palazzo, took on many Ancient Roman forms and showed the power and influence of prominent families. 
• The arts
• Humanism was a big influence on Italian society
• It was a quest for knowledge including antique rights, science, medicine, and engineering
• Leonardo Da Vinci's Expertise in many fields including art architecture, geology, aerodynamics, hydraulics, botany, and military science, served to define the term "Renaissance Man"
• The family "Medici" were wealthy and generous patrons of the arts and architecture and Their generosity greatly fueled the Renaissance movement in Italy
• This period cannot be fully understood without consideration of "Courtly Culture"
• 1401 AD was a time of military turbulence and the people of Florence were called to stand up and fight for their country
• The cathedral initiated an artistic competition centered on Abraham and Isaac and sacrifice. Filippo Brunelleschi and Lorenzo Ghiberti were the finalists
• Donatello was a great sculptor of the Early Renaissance and influenced many well-known sculptors, such as Leonardo Da Vinci
• Leonardo Da Vinci was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was a painter, engineer, scientist, draughtsman, theorist, architect, and sculptor and was one of the most influential artists of all time. 
• Michelangelo Buonarroti is one of the most famous artists in modern history and was an Italian sculptor, painter, poet, and architect. He sculpted the Pieta and the David in Rome. 
• Palaces
• Renaissance palace facades had three divisions, compound windows, and a heavy project cornice. 
• The general first-floor plan, or the Piano Nobile, consisted of the vestibule, cortile, summer apartments, kitchen, bathrooms, and storage
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• Palazzo Rucellai Introduced the classic orders to facades. it was adapted in the coliseum in Rome and consisted of a central court, storerooms on the ground floor, and more windows on the top floor for ventilation and light. 
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• Palazzo Farnese was completed by Michelangelo and was made of rectangular blocks with a courtyard, arches, columns, pilasters, and corbels. 
• the ground floor had tabernacle windows
• the second floor alternated arched and triangular pediments
• the third story had all arched with triangular pediments
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• The Villa Rotonda Andrea Palladio was the most influential in the Renaissance. The building rotated 45 degrees to the south so that all rooms would get sun. 
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• Renaissance furniture and interior
• There was a lot of contrasting light shown by the three-dimensional moldings. There was a lot of paneling for furniture and surfaces. 
• the expansion of space through painting perspective was brought into play
• Many elaborate turnings for structural support were also used as ornamentation. 
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• Furniture was portable and sparse
• There were many ornamentations and inlays on furniture such as marble, ivory, and lapis
• Chairs
• The straight box-like armchair, or the sedia, has straight rectangular legs attached to floor stretchers and turned baluster or vaselike forms were used to support the front of the arms. 
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• The sgabello, or stool with a back, is a small seat that is supported by three legs and was used as an all-purpose dining chair
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• The X chair, or the Dante chair has an X in the front and back that are separated by floor stretchers and arms 
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• Modern X Chair (closest I could find)
• Beds
• Textiles were a significant part of the beds. It consisted of a paneled head and footboards and a cassone in the understructure
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• Tables
• The most common table type was the trestle type which was a large rectangle supported by two heavy carved pedestals. 
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• Modern Trestle table
• The Florentine table was a hexagonal or octagonal wood or stone top that was edged with ornamental moldings. the base was tripodal
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• modern Florentine table 
• One step further: Leon Battista Alberti was an architect during the Italian Renaissance. He was also a humanist author, priest, artist, poet, philosopher, and cryptographer. One of his most famous designs was the Basilica of Santa Maria Novella. It was said to be the first basilica in Florence and is now one of the most used churches in the city. 
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