STUDY GUIDE EXAM 1
There will be a variety of questions, including:
- Identification of images - before each exam you will be given a selection of about 30 images
that you must be prepared to identify. Identifying an image involves knowing its name, the name
of the artist who created it, the medium, the date and the place of creation; in the exam you will
be asked to identify 10 of those images. (40 points)
- Attribution question - You will be shown a work not shown in class by an artist who was
studied. You will attribute the work to an artist and a style period and rationalize your decision
with examples drawn from class. (10 points)
- Two longer essay questions that will require you to provide your own examples to support your
statements. As a minimum, answering these longer questions will require that you be well
informed about the topics we have been studying (the textbook is an excellent source of
information); it will also require that you go over the powerpoint presentations several times to
get a good grasp of the visual developments and their contextual connections. One of these longer
questions will involve a comparison between two works of art so you are advised to read
Barnet's A Short Guide to Writing about Art before each test. (25 points each)
------------------------------------Exam 1
Comparison essay: You will be asked to write an essay comparing ONE of the two pairs below.
However, you must be prepared to write on both pairs, as you will know which pair you will be
comparing only at the time of the exam.
Pair 1:
Masaccio, Adam and Eve (Expulsion from the Garden of Eden), c. 1425, fresco, c. 7’ x 2’6”,
Brancacci Chapel, Church of Santa Maria del Carmine, Florence.
Jan van Eyck, Adam and Eve (Ghent Altarpiece), c. 1430-32, tempera and oil on panel, c. 11’ x
7’6”, St. Bavo, Ghent
Pair 2:
Donatello, David, c. 1430-1440, bronze, 5’2”, Florence
Michelangelo, David, 1501-1504, marble, c. 14’, Florence
Begin by identifying each of the works fully and correctly. Then write an essay comparing and
contrasting them, noting differences of medium, composition, scale, size, light, color, style and so
on. State what you consider to be the main point of the comparison, what specifically stands out
as being different or similar and why, and then comment on other aspects that support your point.
Be sure to relate these differences to context - when and where the artists lived, the social and
artistic tendencies of the time, must have influenced their production, as their own concerns and
personality must have too. Other aspects that influence output: is it a fresco covering an entire
wall, is it an altarpiece, a piece to be hung in a private house? What was the intention of the
artist/donor? All the aspects involved in the production of a work have an influence on the work.
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Essay: You will write an essay on ONE of the two following topics. However, you must be
prepared to write on both, as you will know which topic you will have to write on at the time of
the exam.
1. Why is Filippo Brunelleschi generally thought to be the “father” of the Italian
Renaissance? Among other things, consider his breakthroughs in architecture and
perspective, and relate them to the development of the Renaissance. Give examples to
support your arguments.
2. What were the main differences between the Italian and the Northern Renaissance in the
fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries?
__________________
Images for identification (alphabetical order)
Correggio, Assumption of the Virgin
Donatello, Equestrian Statue of Gattamelata
Fillipo Brunelleschi, Florence Cathedral dome
Fillipo Brunelleschi, The Foundling Hospital
Fra Angelico, Annunciation
Giorgione or Titian, The Pastoral Concert
Giotto, Scrovegni/Arena Chapel interior
Giotto, The Last Judgment, Scrovegni/Arena Chapel
Giotto, The Kiss of Judas, Scrovegni/Arena Chapel
Jan van Eyck, Giovanni Arnolfini and his Wife
Jan and Hubert (?) van Eyck, Ghent Altarpiece
Leonardo da Vinci, Vitruvian Man
Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper
Leonardo da Vinci, The Virgin of the Rocks
Lorenzo Ghiberti, Gates of Paradise
Masaccio, Holy Trinity
Masaccio, The Expulsion of from the Garden of Eden
Michelangelo, Pietà
Michelangelo, Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel
Michelangelo, The Creation of Adam, ceiling of the Sistine Chapel
Michelangelo, Vestibule of the Laurentian Library
Michelozzo di Bartolomeo (attributed), Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, Florence
Parmigianino, Madonna of the Long Neck
Piero della Francesca, Batista Sforza and Federico da Montefeltro
Pontormo, Deposition
Raphael, The School of Athens
Raphael, Madonna of the Goldfinch
Robert Campin, Mérode Altarpiece (open)
Rogier van der Weyden, Descent from the Cross/Deposition
Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus