The adventurous steps that had first been taken by Cimabue, Duccio and Giotto ended up in a scale and depth of artistic endeavor that could not possibly have been anticipated. At its peak, the High Renaissance produced a generation of unique artists; at the end, it introduced a new attitude toward nature, the mysteries of the cosmos and life itself.
timeline
1498
Self-portrait,
Dürer
(1471–1528)
1501–03
David,
Michelangelo
(1475–1564)
1503–06
Mona Lisa,
da Vinci
(1452–1519)
1509–11
The School of Athens,
Raphael
(1483–1520)
1520–23
Bacchus and Ariadne,
Titian
(1488–1576)
1528
Visitation,
Jacobo Pontormo
(1494–1557)
1530
The Dead Christ between the Virgin and Mary Magdalene,
Bronzino
(1503–72)
1533
The Ambassadors,
Holbein
(1497–1543)
1535
Madonna with the Long Neck,
Parmigianino
(1503–40)
1546–64
Construction of the Dome of St. Peter’s, Vatican City,
Michelangelo
(1475–1564)
1551–53
Construction of the Villa Cornaro, Piombino Dese, near Padua, Italy,
Palladio
(
c
.1508–80)
1562–63
The Wedding Feast at Cana,
Veronese
(1528–88)
1567–69
Building of the Villa Rotunda,
Palladio
(
c
.1508–80)
c.1568
The Peasant Wedding,
Bruegel the Elder
(
c
.1525–69)
1590–91
The Last Supper,
Tintoretto
(1518–94)
DA VINCI
1452–1519 • HIGH RENAISSANCE
The Mona Lisa
1503–6 OIL ON WOOD
77 × 53 CM (30¼ × 20¾ IN)
MUSÉE DU LOUVRE, PARIS, FRANCE
Famed for the mystery of the sitter’s smile, few works of art have been the subject of so much analysis and reproduction. Set in a landscape inspired by the Arno Valley in Italy, it took five years to paint. The atmospheric sfumato (smoky) technique that Leonardo pioneered, and the mystery that shrouds the subject, continue to captivate and inspire.
Regarded by many as one of the greatest painters in history, Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was an artist, scientist, architect, engineer, mathematician, philosopher, botanist, inventor, musician and writer. With an insatiable curiosity and thirst for knowledge, this extraordinary genius made many discoveries and inventions years ahead of their time.
Born in Vinci near Florence, Leonardo was the illegitimate son of Piero da Vinci, a public notary, and a peasant woman called Caterina. He lived with his mother until the age of four and then moved into the home of his father and stepmother. He developed an enduring fascination with nature, and with animals in particular, and became a vegetarian at a time when the morality of eating animals was rarely questioned. Piero soon noticed his son’s exceptional artistic talent and enrolled him at the studio of the painter and sculptor Verrocchio (who had taught Botticelli and Ghirlandaio) when he was 15.
Within a short time, the young Leonardo outshone his master and he joined Florence’s distinguished Guild of St. Luke, an association named after the patron saint of painters. By the late 1470s, he was working as an independent painter, architect and engineer in Florence. His notebooks from this time are full of meticulous architectural and engineering details, but it is not known how he acquired his knowledge of these disciplines.
Although he began to attract wealthy patrons, Leonardo also gained a reputation for being unreliable, often failing to complete paintings. This might have been why Pope Sixtus IV did not call on him when he commissioned the most celebrated Tuscan artists to decorate the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Instead, Leonardo spent 18 years in Milan working for the powerful Duke Ludovico Sforza as musician, painter, designer, architect, engineer, sculptor, scientist and even magician. In 1499, however, the French invaded Milan and captured Sforza. Leonardo returned to Florence and although 25-year-old Michelangelo was well established as the greatest artist in the city, Leonardo regained his popularity almost instantly. Between 1502 and 1503, Cesare Borgia, Duke of Romagna, briefly employed him as a military architect and engineer. In 1506, he was summoned to Milan to act as architectural consultant for the French governor there, and a year later, King Louis XII appointed him court painter and engineer. He served Pope Leo X in Rome in 1513, but because of instability in Italy, he spent his last years in France, working for the French king, François I.
There are perhaps 15 surviving paintings by Leonardo, and each has become iconic for its delicacy, realism, dynamism, expression and glowing light effects. The many innovations and inventions that he explored in mirror writing, and in drawings and diagrams in countless notebooks, greatly advanced understanding in the fields of anatomy, civil engineering, optics and hydrodynamics. The ultimate Renaissance man, Leonardo’s brilliance remains as enigmatic as his most famous work of art.
Key Works
The Annunciation c.1472–5, GALLERIA DEGLI UFFIZI, FLORENCE, ITALY
Madonna Benois c. 1475–8, STATE HERMITAGE, ST PETERSBURG, RUSSIA
Madonna of the Rocks 1482–6, MUSÉE DU LOUVRE, PARIS, FRANCE
The Last Supper c.1495–8, SANTA MARIA DELLE GRAZIE, REFECTORY, MILAN, ITALY
The Virgin of the Rocks 1506–8, NATIONAL GALLERY, LONDON, UK
DÜRER
1471–1528 • (NORTHERN) HIGH RENAISSANCE
Self-Portrait
1498 OIL ON CANVAS
52 × 41 CM (20½ × 16½ IN)
MUSEO DEL PRADO, MADRID, SPAIN
Elegantly dressed as a gentleman, Dürer intentionally positions himself away from the humble artisan and toward the ideals of the Renaissance. His facial features are recorded with objective precision and the landscape seen through a window in the background is reminiscent of contemporary Venetian and Florentine paintings. At the age of 26, Dürer seems assured of his own genius.
The most significant German artist of the Renaissance, and possibly of all time, Albrecht Dürer was one of the first artists to experiment with etching. He raised woodcut and engraving techniques to new levels of artistic expression and established the practice of artists visiting Rome and Florence as a fundamental part of their creative education.