Renaissance Masterpieces of Art

The Renaissance was probably the most influential and fertile period of European cultural history. We are all familiar with the giants of High Renaissance art
Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael
but how much do you really know about how it all started and why it was so revolutionary?
This easily accessible, fresh and beautiful introduction to this wonderful world takes you from the stirrings of a revival in classical learning and humanist thought in late medieval Italy through the application of technical developments in painting and scientific knowledge, to the blossoming of astounding artworks that we all know and love, reaching its peak in the sixteenth century. A digestible introduction to the background and history of the Renaissance is followed by a gallery of treasured works focusing on the most popular Italian art, from Giotto’s frescoes and Fra Angelico’s delightful Annunciation, to Botticelli’s willowy Venuses, that ceiling of Michelangelo’s and the master of Venetian painting, Titian. AUTHOR: Julia Biggs (MA Cantab) is an independent researcher, writer, lecturer and tutor in art history. She specialises in Italian Renaissance art and theory, and the material culture of devotion in the early modern Jewish home. Julia has been a tutor and assessor with the Open College of the Arts, part of the University for the Creative Arts, since 2008 and is a member of the Association for Art History. She is a contributing writer to Art UK and through Renaissance Art History Cambridge, she runs courses, talks, study days and gallery visits in both the UK and Italy. 100 illustrations