Renaissance

The Renaissance, as a visual language, is a system of pictorial principles that revived the ancient ideal of harmony, measure and human dignity, placing the human being at the centre of the universe. Its central idea is the rational cognition of the visible world, grounded in observation and science, and its embodiment in perfect form. Formally, the Renaissance gave art linear and aerial perspective, precise anatomy, chiaroscuro modelling and a balanced, often symmetrical composition governed by mathematical proportion. The palette grew ever richer, especially with the development of oil painting, which allowed subtle glazes and soft transitions (sfumato). Its motifs embrace religious subjects, classical mythology, portraiture and the birth of landscape. Technically, its artists combined scientific perspective with virtuoso draughtsmanship. The movement arose in Italy in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, passing from the Early to the High Renaissance. Its titans were Leonardo da Vinci, with the "Mona Lisa" and "The Last Supper"; Michelangelo, with the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel; Raphael, with his harmonious Madonnas; and Titian, as the master of Venetian colour. In the North, a parallel line developed with Jan van Eyck and Albrecht Dürer and their scrupulous detail. The Renaissance shaped the European canon of beauty for centuries to come. Today it is valued for its synthesis of science and art, its humanist pathos and its unsurpassed technical perfection.