Art Literature and Theory of Art
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 June 2013
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 June 2013
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195399301-0035
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 June 2013
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 June 2013
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195399301-0035
Introduction
In contrast to theories of poetry or rhetoric, no complete ancient theory of the figurative arts survives. Renaissance authors wishing to underpin the “rebirth” of painting therefore had to resort to a variety of strategies to invent a new genre. Literary metaphors and fragments from artists’ biographies (mainly from Pliny) were joined with scientific discoveries such as the theory of perspective and the proportions of human anatomy. Leon Battista Alberti’s On Painting of 1435 was the first text to merge ancient conceptions and newfangled geometric insights into a coherent whole that professed to revive classical art theory. His efforts sparked the development of a sizeable genre in Italy in the 15th and 16th centuries. In 17th-century France, the Netherlands and (to a lesser extent) Spain and Britain developed their own traditions. These texts shared a prescriptive approach in combination with biographical information about artists. As a central tenet from Alberti onward, humanistic knowledge was tied to basic acquaintance with the artist’s studio. Only at the end of the 16th century did art theory become a topic for courtiers stylizing their texts in a literary fashion. In the 17th century, the role of learned art lovers and their symbiotic relationship to the painters became increasingly important. By comparing the figurative arts to respectable activities such as poetry, rhetoric, and antiquarianism, and by drawing humanistic interest to the painter’s workshop, these texts served an essential role in facilitating the communication between craftsmen and the lettered. Developing the ideal of the “learned painter,” the textual tradition thus developed synchronously to the artist’s changing social status. Whereas in the 16th century most authors were artists or had some link to studio practice, in the 17th century amateur-connoisseurs began to replace them; simultaneously, visual art and its theory were institutionalized in the first academies of art. Implicitly or explicitly, Renaissance treatises on painting have, therefore, as their main argument the inclusion of painting among the liberal arts, the intellectual activities worthy of the universal man. Other written sources relevant for the historical reconstruction of manners of speaking about the visual arts include poems, plays, and diaries. As a topic of analysis, sculpture plays a comparatively minor role.
General Overviews
Von Schlosser 1924 is the first overview work by one of the founding fathers of academic art history and surveys the entire corpus of Western writing on art from Antiquity to modern times. Involving technical treatises, works of criticism, and early historiography it extends to all of the main European traditions and contains extensive bibliographical material. Blunt 1980 is a concise, elegant, and easily accessible overview privileging the Florentine tradition and for that reason now somewhat outdated. Barasch 1985 focuses on the historical development of various theoretical themes rather than individual authors, leaning toward a philosophical approach rather than details on painting technique. In addition, Ames-Lewis 2000 offers a fact-filled account of the literacy and learned surroundings of early modern artists, chiefly in Italy, and Wilde 2002 is a collection of essays that have little in common but cover a broad scope of relevant issues.
Ames-Lewis, Francis. The Intellectual Life of the Early Renaissance Artist. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000.
Contains accounts of the “paragone” discussion on the merits of painting and sculpture; the comparison between painting and poetry; and “ekphraseis” or image descriptions. Charting the intellectual component of the artist’s training, social world, and reputation, it brings into view the boundaries and conditions for research into the interplay of theory and practice in early modern art.
Barasch, Mosche. Theories of Art. Vol. 1, From Plato to Winckelmann. New York: New York University Press, 1985.
The second half of the book discusses respectively the Early Renaissance (focusing on Alberti, Dürer, and da Vinci), the High Renaissance (focusing on the comparison between painting and sculpture and on Michelangelo), the Late Renaissance (differentiating local trends in Florence, Rome, Venice, and Lombardy), and the 17th century (singling out classicism and the academy, the debate between Rubenistes and Poussinistes, and finally Roger de Piles).
Blunt, Anthony. Artistic Theory in Italy, 1450–1600. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980.
The presentation (first printed in 1940) follows the chronological development demonstrating how the questions posed and the solutions offered changed in the course of time. Sketching atmosphere and context as least as much as inventorying theoretical concepts, the book is exceptional in granting the religious reformer Savonarola’s writings and Michelangelo’s poetry a role as fully fledged theories of art.
Von Schlosser, Julius. Die Kunstliteratur: Ein Handbuch zur Quellenkunde der neueren Kunstgeschichte. Vienna: Anton Schroll, 1924.
The author is particularly interested in technical treatises and the writings of artists. Moreover, the book foregrounds travel literature, thus sparking the insight that many early modern texts on painting doubled as travel guides. In spite of his comprehensive outlook, Von Schlosser privileges the Italian tradition, and his opinions on individual authors are in many cases superseded by more recent scholarship.
Wilde, P. S. C., ed. A Companion to Art Theory. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2002.
Contains essays on Alberti, Leonardo, Neoplatonism, concepts of tactility in responses to sculpture, academism (especially in relation to rhetorical theory), and the concept of the “picturesque” that thematizes the positive appreciation of irregular design and ugliness.
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Article
- Academies
- Aemilia Lanyer
- Agrippa d’Aubigné
- Alberti, Leon Battista
- Alexander VI, Pope
- Amsterdam
- Andrea del Verrocchio
- Andrea Mantegna
- Andreas Bodenstein von Karlstadt
- Anne Boleyn
- Antwerp
- Aretino, Pietro
- Ariosto, Ludovico
- Art and Science
- Art, German
- Art in Renaissance England
- Art in Renaissance Florence
- Art in Renaissance Siena
- Art in Renaissance Venice
- Art Literature and Theory of Art
- Art Market
- Art of Poetry
- Art, Spanish
- Art, 16th- and 17th-Century Flemish
- Art, 17th-Century Dutch
- Artemisia Gentileschi
- Artisans
- Ascham, Roger
- Askew, Anne
- Astell, Mary
- Astrology, Alchemy, Magic
- Augsburg
- Augustinianism in Renaissance Thought
- Austria
- Autobiography and Life Writing
- Avignon Papacy
- Bacon, Francis
- Banking and Money
- Barbaro, Ermolao, the Younger
- Barbaro, Francesco
- Baron, Hans
- Baroque
- Baroque Art and Architecture in Italy
- Barzizza, Gasparino
- Bathsua Makin
- Beaufort, Margaret
- Bellarmine, Cardinal
- Bembo, Pietro
- Benito Arias Montano
- Bernardino of Siena, San
- Beroaldo, Filippo, the Elder
- Bessarion, Cardinal
- Bible, The
- Biography
- Biondo, Flavio
- Bishops, 1550–1700
- Bishops, 1400-1550
- Black Death and Plague: The Disease and Medical Thought
- Boccaccio, Giovanni
- Bohemia and Bohemian Crown Lands
- Borgia, Cesare
- Borgia, Lucrezia
- Borromeo, Cardinal Carlo
- Bosch, Hieronymous
- Bracciolini, Poggio
- Bradstreet, Anne
- Brahe, Tycho
- Bruegel, Pieter the Elder
- Bruni, Leonardo
- Bruno, Giordano
- Bucer, Martin
- Budé, Guillaume
- Buonarroti, Michelangelo
- Burgundy and the Netherlands
- Calvin, John
- Calvinism
- Camões, Luís de
- Caravaggio
- Cardano, Girolamo
- Cardinal Richelieu
- Cardinals
- Carvajal y Mendoza, Luisa De
- Cary, Elizabeth
- Casas, Bartolome de las
- Castiglione, Baldassarre
- Catherine of Siena
- Catholic/Counter-Reformation
- Catholicism, Early Modern
- Cavendish, Margaret
- Cecilia del Nacimiento
- Cellini, Benvenuto
- Cervantes, Miguel de
- Charles V, Emperor
- China and Europe, 1550-1800
- Christian-Muslim Exchange
- Christine de Pizan
- Church Fathers in Renaissance and Reformation Thought, The
- Ciceronianism
- Cities and Urban Patriciates
- Civic Humanism
- Civic Ritual
- Classical Tradition, The
- Clifford, Anne
- Colet, John
- Colonna, Vittoria
- Columbus, Christopher
- Comenius, Jan Amos
- Commedia dell'arte
- Concepts of the Renaissance, c. 1780–c. 1920
- Confraternities
- Constantinople, Fall of
- Contarini, Gasparo, Cardinal
- Convent Culture
- Conversion
- Conversos and Crypto-Judaism
- Copernicus, Nicolaus
- Cornaro, Caterina
- Cosimo I de’ Medici
- Cosimo il Vecchio de' Medici
- Costume
- Council of Trent
- Crime and Punishment
- Croatia
- Cromwell, Oliver
- Cruz, Juana de la, Mother
- Cruz, Juana Inés de la, Sor
- Dance
- d'Aragona, Tullia
- Datini, Margherita
- Davies, Eleanor
- de Commynes, Philippe
- de Sales, Saint Francis
- de Valdés, Juan
- Death and Dying
- Decembrio, Pier Candido
- Dentière, Marie
- Des Roches, Madeleine and Catherine
- d’Este, Isabella
- di Toledo, Eleonora
- Dialogue
- Diplomacy
- Dolce, Ludovico
- Donatello
- Donne, John
- Drama, English Renaissance
- Dürer, Albrecht
- du Bellay, Joachim
- Du Guillet, Pernette
- Dutch Overseas Empire
- Early Modern Period, Racialization in the
- Ebreo, Leone
- Edinburgh
- Edmund Campion
- Edward IV, King of England
- El Greco
- Elizabeth I, the Great, Queen of England
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- England, 1485-1642
- English Overseas Empire
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- Environment and the Natural World
- Epic and Romance
- Erasmus
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- Family and Childhood
- Fedele, Cassandra
- Federico Barocci
- Female Lay Piety
- Ferrara and the Este
- Ficino, Marsilio
- Filelfo, Francesco
- Florence
- Fonte, Moderata
- Foscari, Francesco
- France in the 17th Century
- France in the 16th Century
- Francis Xavier, St
- Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros
- French Law and Justice
- French Renaissance Drama
- Fugger Family
- Galilei, Galileo
- Gallicanism
- Gambara, Veronica
- Gardens
- Garin, Eugenio
- General Church Councils, Pre-Trent
- Geneva (1400-1600)
- Genoa 1450–1700
- George Buchanan
- George of Trebizond
- Georges de La Tour
- Ghetto
- Giambologna
- Ginés de Sepúlveda, Juan
- Giustiniani, Bernardo
- Góngora, Luis de
- Gonzaga, Giulia
- Gournay, Marie de
- Greek Visitors
- Guarino da Verona
- Guicciardini, Francesco
- Guilds and Manufacturing
- Hamburg, 1350–1815
- Hanseatic League
- Henry VII
- Henry VIII, King of England
- Herbalism/Botany
- Herbert, George
- Hispanic Mysticism
- Historiography
- Hobbes, Thomas
- Holy Roman Empire 1300–1650
- Homes, Foundling
- Huguenots
- Humanism
- Humanism, The Origins of
- Hundred Years War, The
- Hungary, The Kingdom of
- Hus, Jan
- Hutchinson, Lucy
- Iconology and Iconography
- Ignatius of Loyola, Saint
- Infanticide
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- Ireland
- Isaac Casaubon
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- Italian Wars, 1494–1559
- Ivan IV the Terrible, Tsar of Russia
- Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples
- Jansenism
- Japan and Europe: the Christian Century, 1549-1650
- Jeanne d’Albret, queen of Navarre
- Jesuits
- Jewish Women in Renaissance and Reformation Europe
- Jews
- Jews and Christians in Venice
- Jews and the Reformation
- Jews in Amsterdam
- Jews in Florence
- Jews in Rome
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- Jonson, Ben
- Joseph Justus Scaliger
- Juan de Torquemada
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- Julius II
- Kepler, Johannes
- King of France, Francis I
- King of France, Henri IV
- Knox, John
- Kristeller, Paul Oskar
- Labé, Louise
- Landino, Cristoforo
- Landscape
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- Laura Cereta
- Law
- Lay Piety
- Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm
- Leo X
- Leonardo da Vinci
- Leoni, Leone and Pompeo
- Leto, Giulio Pomponio
- Letter Writing and Epistolary Culture
- Libraries
- Literary Criticism
- Literature, French
- Literature, Italian
- Literature, Late Medieval German
- Literature, Penitential
- Literature, Spanish
- Locke, John
- London
- Lorenzo de' Medici
- Lorenzo Ghiberti
- Louis XI, King of France
- Louis XIII, King of France
- Louis XIV, King of France
- Lucas Cranach the Elder
- Lucretius in Renaissance Thought
- Luther, Martin
- Lyric Poetry
- Machiavelli, Niccolo
- Macinghi Strozzi, Alessandra
- Malatesta, Sigismondo
- Manetti, Giannozzo
- Mannerism
- Mantovano (Battista Spagnoli), Battista
- Manuel Chrysoloras
- Manuzio, Aldo
- Margaret Clitherow
- Margaret Fell Fox
- Margery Kempe
- Marinella, Lucrezia
- Marino Sanudo
- Marlowe, Christopher
- Marriage and Dowry
- Mary Stuart (Mary, Queen of Scots)
- Mary Tudor, Queen of England
- Masculinity
- Medici Bank
- Medici, Catherine de'
- Medici Family, The
- Medicine
- Mediterranean
- Memling, Hans
- Merchant Adventurers
- Merici, Angela
- Midwifery
- Milan, 1535–1706
- Milan to 1535
- Milton, John
- Mining and Metallurgy
- Mirandola, Giovanni Pico della
- Mission
- Monarchy in Renaissance and Reformation Europe, Female
- Montaigne, Michel de
- More, Thomas
- Morone, Cardinal Giovanni
- Music
- Naples, 1300–1700
- Navarre, Marguerite de
- Netherlandish Art, Early
- Netherlands (Dutch Revolt/ Dutch Republic), The
- Netherlands, Spanish, 1598-1700, the
- Nettesheim, Agrippa von
- Newton, Isaac
- Niccoli, Niccolò
- Nicholas of Cusa
- Nicolas Malebranche
- Nobility
- Opera
- Ottoman Empire
- Ovid in Renaissance Thought
- Panofsky, Erwin
- Paolo Veronese
- Papacy
- Papal Rome
- Paracelsus
- Paris
- Parr, Katherine
- Patronage of the Arts
- Perotti, Niccolò
- Persecution and Martyrdom
- Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia
- Petrarch
- Petrus Ramus and Ramism
- Philip Melanchthon
- Philips, Katherine
- Piccolomini, Aeneas Sylvius
- Piero della Francesca
- Pierre Bayle
- Pilgrimage in Early Modern Catholicism
- Plague and its Consequences
- Platonism, Neoplatonism, and the Hermetic Tradition
- Poetry, English
- Pole, Cardinal Reginald
- Polish Literature: Baroque
- Polish Literature: Renaissance
- Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, The
- Political Thought
- Poliziano, Angelo
- Polydore Vergil
- Pontano, Giovanni Giovano
- Pope Innocent VIII
- Pope Nicholas V
- Pope Paul II
- Portraiture
- Portugal
- Poulain de la Barre, Francois
- Poverty and Poor Relief
- Prince Henry the Navigator
- Printing and the Book
- Printmaking
- Prophecy
- Pulter, Hester
- Purgatory
- Purity of Blood
- Quirini, Lauro
- Rabelais, François
- Raphael
- Reformation and Hussite Revolution, Czech
- Reformation and Wars of Religion in France, The
- Reformation, English
- Reformation, German
- Reformation, Italian, The
- Reformation, The
- Reformations and Revolt in the Netherlands, 1500–1621
- Rembrandt
- Renaissance Poland-Lithuania, Art of
- Renaissance, The
- Reuchlin, Johann
- Revolutionary England, 1642-1702
- Rhetoric
- Ricci, Matteo
- Richard III
- Rienzo, Cola Di
- Roman and Iberian Inquisitions, Censorship and the Index i...
- Ronsard, Pierre de
- Roper, Margeret More
- Royal Regencies in Renaissance and Reformation Europe, 140...
- Rubens, Peter Paul
- Russell, Elizabeth Cooke Hoby
- Russia and Muscovy
- Ruzante Angelo Beolco
- Saint John of the Cross
- Saints and Mystics: After Trent
- Saints and Mystics: Before Trent
- Salutati, Coluccio
- Sandro Botticelli
- Sarpi, Fra Paolo
- Savonarola, Girolamo
- Scandinavia
- Scholasticism and Aristotelianism: Fourteenth to Seventeen...
- Schooling and Literacy
- Scientific Revolution
- Scotland
- Scève, Maurice
- Sephardic Diaspora
- Sforza, Caterina
- Sforza, Francesco
- Shakespeare, William
- Ships/Shipbuilding
- Sidney Herbert, Mary, Countess of Pembroke
- Sidney, Philip
- Siena
- Simon of Trent
- Sir Robert Cecil
- Sixtus IV, Pope
- Skepticism in Renaissance Thought
- Slavery and the Slave Trade, 1350–1650
- Southern Italy, 1500–1700
- Southern Italy, 1300–1500
- Spain
- Spanish Inquisition
- Spanish Islam, 1350-1614
- Spenser, Edmund
- Sperone Speroni
- Spinoza, Baruch
- Stampa, Gaspara
- Stuart, Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia
- Switzerland
- Tarabotti, Arcangela
- Tasso Torquato
- Tell, William
- Teresa of Avila
- Textiles: 1400 to 1700
- The Casa of San Giorgio, Genoa
- The Radical Reformation
- The Sack of Rome (1527)
- Thirty Years War, The
- Thomas Wyatt
- Titian
- Toleration
- Tornabuoni, Lucrezia
- Trade Networks
- Tragedy, English
- Translation
- Transylvania, The Principality of
- Traversari, Ambrogio
- Universities
- Urbanism
- Ursulines
- Valeriano, Pierio
- Valla, Lorenzo
- van Eyck, Jan
- van Schurman, Anna Maria
- Vasari, Giorgio
- Vega, Lope de
- Vegio, Maffeo
- Velázquez
- Venice
- Venice, Maritime
- Vergerio, Pier Paolo, The Elder
- Vermeer, Johannes
- Vernacular Languages and Dialects
- Vida, Marco Girolamo
- Virgil in Renaissance Thought
- Visitors, Italian
- Vives, Juan Luis
- Walter Ralegh
- War and Economy, 1300-1600
- Ward, Mary
- Warfare and Military Organizations
- Weyden, Rogier van der
- Widowhood
- Witch Hunt
- Wolsey, Thomas, Cardinal
- Women and Learning
- Women and Medicine
- Women and Science
- Women and the Book Trade
- Women and the Reformation
- Women and the Visual Arts
- Women and Warfare
- Women and Work: Fourteenth to Seventeenth Centuries
- Women Writers in Ireland
- Women Writers of the Iberian Empire
- Women Writing in Early Modern Spain
- Women Writing in English
- Women Writing in French
- Women Writing in Italy
- Wroth, Mary