High Renaissance
• Sponsored by the popes and cardinals who
vowed to transform Rome
• Michelangelo’s ceiling of the Sistine Chapel
• Brmante’s Tempietto and basilica for Saint Peter
• Raphael’s frescoes for the Stanza della Segnatura
• Josquin des Prez’s Pangue Lingua –polyphonic
work, sang a cappella by the Sistine Chapel Choir
• Humanistic ideals of the age
• Aspiring to the standards of classical beauty
Leonardo da Vinci, Vitruvian Man, 1485.
Vitruvius – the circle and the square are the ideal shapes
Perfect shapes originate from the human body; they mirror the
symmetry of the body
Rome at the Beginning
of the 15th Century
• In the early 15th century, Rome seemed a pitiful place. Its population
had shrunk from around 1 million in 100 CE to under 20,000 as the
result of the Black Death
• The ancient Colosseum was now in the countryside, the Forum was a
pasture for goats and cattle, and the aqueducts had collapsed
• The popes had even abandoned the city when in 1309 Avignon was
established as the seat of the Church. When Rome reestablished
itself as the titular seat of the Church in 1379, succeeding popes rarely
chose to visit the city, let alone live in it
Anonymous, View of Rome
Oil on canvas, ca. 1550
Donato Bramante, Tempietto
1502
• Bramante’s Tempietto (Little
Temple), built directly over what
was revered as the site of Saint
Peter’s Martyrdom, is modeled
after a classical temple
• The 16 exterior columns are
Doric, their shafts original
ancient Roman granite columns
• Diameter of the shaft defines
the entire plan. Each shaft is
spaced four diameters from the
next, and the colonnade they
form is two diameters from the
circular walls
Bramante, Tempietto, 1502
Embodiment of Italian humanist architecture
Site of Saint Peter’s martyrdom
Modeled on a classical temple
Michelangelo, David
Marble, 17' 13", 1501-04
• Michelangelo represents David
before, not after, his triumph,
confident, ready to take on
whatever challenge faces him
• Each night, as workers installed
the statue in the Piazza della
Signoria, supporters of the exiled
Medici hurled stones at it
• Others objected to the statue’s
nudity, and before it was even in
place, a skirt of copper leaves
was prepared to spare the
general public any possible
offense
Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel
• While working on Julius II’s tomb, Michelangelo was
commanded by Julius to paint the 45- by 128-foot
ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. At first he refused, but in
1508 he reconsidered and began the task
• Michelangelo designed an ambitious plan—nine scenes
from Genesis, surrounded by prophets, Sibyls, the
ancestors of Christ, and other scenes, narrating events
before the coming of the law of Moses
• To paint the ceiling, Michelangelo had to construct a
scaffold that moved down the chapel from the
entrance to the altar. Thus, the first frescoes painted
were the Noah group, and the last, the Creation
Sistine Chapel Ceiling
Fresco, 45'  128', 1508-12
Creation of Adam
• With the Creation of Eve serving as the center panel, Michelangelo
planned the ceiling as a pairing of opposites, with the scenes before
Eve representing Creation before the knowledge of good and evil
entered the world, and everything after her showing the early history
of fallen mankind
• In the Creation of Adam, Adam is lethargic, passive; God flies through
the skies carrying behind him a bulging red drapery that suggests both
the womb and the brain, creativity and reason
• Adam, father of humankind, and God the Father are posed along
parallel diagonals, and their right legs are in nearly identical positions.
The fluttering green ribbon in God’s space echoes the colors of the
earth upon which Adam lies
Michelangelo, Creation of Adam
Sistine Chapel, Vatican, Rome, 1510
Michelangelo, Studies for the
Libyan Sibyl
Michelangelo, Libyan Sibyl
Red Chalk, 11-3/8"  8-7/26", ca. 1520
Fresco, 1512
A virtuoso display of technique mastery, the Libyan Sibyl underwent dramatic
changes between Michelangelo’s preliminary sketches and the final painting.
Raphael
• As Michelangelo was beginning work on the Sistine ceiling, the young
painter Raphael arrived in Rome and quickly secured a commission
from Julius II to paint the pope’s private rooms in the Vatican Palace
• The first of these rooms was the Stanza della Segnature, Room of the
Signature, which Julius used as a library
• On each of the four walls Raphael was to paint one of the four major
areas of human learning: Law and Justice, to be represented by the
Cardinal Virtues; the Arts, to be represented by Mount Parnassus;
Theology, to be represented by the Disputà, or Dispute over the
Sacrament; and Philosophy, to be represented by the School of Athens.
Two scenes had classical themes, the other two Christian
Raphael, School of Athens
Fresco, 19'  27', 1510-11
Raphael, Pope Leo X with Cardinals Giulio de’
Medici and Luigi de’ Rossi
Panel, 60½"  47", 1517
• After Julius died in 1513, the
new pope, Leo X, son of Lorenzo
the Magnificent, quickly hired
Raphael for other commissions
• His portrait of Leo suggests a
new direction in Raphael’s art.
The lighting is more somber,
and there is greater emphasis
on the material reality of the
scene
• The painting creates a sense of
drama, as if the viewer is
witness to an important
historical moment
Michelangelo,
Laurentian Library Staircase
Designed beginning 1524; completed 1559
• Michelangelo’s most
original contribution to the
library, which was
designed to house the
Medici’s book collection, is
the large triple stairway
• The cascading waterfall
effect suggests that
Michelangelo was
becoming increasingly
interested in exploring
realms of the imagination
beyond the humanist
vision of a rational world
governed by structural
logic
Santi di Tito, Niccolò Machiavelli
ca. 1510
• A humanist scholar, Machiavelli
(1469-1527) had studied the
behavior of ancient Roman rulers
and citizens at great length
• In 1512, Machiavelli was
dismissed from his post as second
chancellor, wrongfully accused of
being involved in a plot to
overthrow the new heads of state,
imprisoned, tortured, and finally
exiled permanently to a country
home in the hills above Florence
• There, beginning in 1513, he
wrote The Prince, his essay on
political power
The High Renaissance in Venice
• Of all the Italian cities, Venice alone could claim invincibility because it
possessed the natural fortification of being surrounded on all sides by
water
• Venice considered itself blessed by Saint Mark, whose relics resided in the
cathedral of Saint Mark’s
• A center of fashion, Venice provided the continent with satins, velvets,
and brocades
• During the Renaissance, an elaborate, sensuous style of architecture
would develop in Venice
View of the Doge’s Palace, with
Saint Mark’s Cathedral to the Left
Carpaccio, Lion of Saint Mark, 1516, Venice
Venice considered itself blessed by Saint Mark, whose relics resided in
the cathedral of Saint Mark
Masters of the Venetian High Renaissance:
Giorgione and Titian
• The two great masters of painting in the Venetian High Renaissance
were Giorgione da Castelfranco, known simply as Giorgione (ca. 14781510), and Tiziano Vecelli, known as Titian (ca. 1489-1576)
• Giorgione especially had been inspired by Leonardo’s visit to Venice in
1500. As did Leonardo in his landscapes, Giorgione and Titian built up
color on their canvases by means of glazing
• Their paintings, like the great palaces of Venice whose reflections
shimmered on the Grand Canal, demonstrate an exquisite sensitivity
to the play of light and shadow, to the luxurious display of detail and
design, and to an opulent variety of pattern and texture
Giorgione, Tempest
Oil on canvas, 31¼"  28¾", ca. 1509
• Nothing about this painting
could be called controlled.
The landscape is overgrown
and weedy—just as the man
and woman are disheveled
and disrobed
• Lightning has revealed to the
viewer a scene not meant to
be witnessed
• Sensuality, even outright
sexuality, would become a
primary subject of Venetian
art
Giorgone, Tempest, 1509
Mysterious quality, atmospheric painting
Almost nude young woman, German mercenary soldier
Pediment topped with two broken columns
Pastoral Concert
• A harmony of opposites: male and female, clothed and nude, the
nobleman and the peasant, court music and folk song, city and country,
and so on
• Musical instruments (the lute and the flute)—metaphors for parts of male
and female anatomy, a usage common in both the art and the literature of
the period
• Narrative presents a purposefully mysterious dream world, giving the
viewer’s imagination the freedom to play
Giorgone, pastoral Concert, 1510
Sensuality
Men are fully clothed
Venetian nobleman, peasant garb
Instruments -metaphors
Titian, Sacred and Profane love, 1514
Lamp –divine light
Neoplatonic ideal of the celestial Venus and sacred love
Titian, Sacred and Profane Love
Oil on canvas, 46½"  109-7/8", ca. 1514
Two female figures—nude is sacred love and luxuriously clothed is earthly or profane love—
probably represent two aspects of the same woman.
Titian, Reclining Nude, 1538
Venus of Urbino –more like a woman than an ethereal goddess
Titian, Reclining Nude
(Venus of Urbino)
Oil on canvas, 47"  65", ca. 1538
More real woman than ethereal goddess, this “Venus” stares out at the viewer
with matter-of-factness, suggesting she is totally comfortable with her nudity.