Early Italian Renaissance

Filippo Brunelleschi

While still in the early phase of his architectural career (probably c. 1410-15), Brunelleschi rediscovered the principles of linear-perspective construction known to the Greeks and Romans but buried along with many other aspects of ancient civilization during the European Middle Ages. Brunelleschi demonstrated his findings with two painted panels, now lost, depicting Florentine streets and buildings. From Manetti's descriptions it is clear that Brunelleschi had understood the concept of a single vanishing point, toward which all parallel lines drawn on the same plane appear to converge, and the principle of the relationship between distance and the diminution of objects as they appear to recede in space. By using the optical and geometric principles upon which Brunelleschi's perspective devices were based, the artists of his generation were able to produce works of astonishing realism. On two-dimensional surfaces they were able to create extraordinary illusions of three-dimensional space and tangible objects, so that the work of art appeared to be either an extension of the real world or a mirror of nature. Although the laws governing perspective construction were brought to light by Brunelleschi, they were codified for the first time by the humanist architect Leon Battista Alberti. In 1435 Alberti set them down in Della pittura ("On Painting"), his famous treatise on painting, which included a warm dedication to Brunelleschi--undoubtedly an expression of Alberti's debt to his friend's revolutionary discovery.

The above paragraph does not give the whole story, although it is a story that is commonly believed. The paragraph assumes that the person viewing the art sees the world internally like a camera does. Human vision is much more complicated than that. While we do have lenses that look like a camera lens in our eye, the signals they send to the brain don't necessarily correspond to sending the picture. The brain reassembles the visual information in it's own way and constructs the 'picture' we see.

So it is a bit simplistic to assume that perspective is the 'correct' way to represent depth in a picture. However, since the Renaissance, modern viewers have been trained to look at the world this way. Why this is so is still an open question. But perspective is a style like any other style. This style has been popular longer than any other technique for both a conceptual and economic reason. Conceptually it was given modern validation because lenses and camera produce these same kinds of pictures. But there are many other possibilities for showing depth. Mattisse, among other contemporary artists, explored other ways of showing depth. But before the Renaissance, back to and including ancient Egypt, artists have employed conventions that were equally valuable. It is hard for modern viewers to appreciate other ways of seeing depth in art because we have been so insistently exposed to photography, TV, and motion pictures, which force the view that what a lens does is the "correct way" of representing three dimensions on a flat media... Economically perspective is only the cheapest, most mechanical way of many techniques that show depth. Once you really understand this, looking at mediæval and ancient art becomes a bit easier, because by letting your preconceptions go, you can begin to see depth in these pictures yourself, and you stop thinking how primitive the early artists were. These early artists were not primitive, it is your prejudice that has limited your enjoyment.

Even if you accept the perspective as the 'natural' model for depth, the formal model of linear perspective that Brunelleschi used is deficient in other ways. For example it gives no help on how to draw rounded objects except by using rectangular boxes to approximate the distortion; but for a practicing artist this can be a nightmare with something as simple as a lute or as complex as a human body in an unusual position. Linear perspective also gives only little help in representing complex patterns on floors or cloth.

Art going on in the lowlands of Northern Europe was often far advanced in the "realism" or "photoness" of paintings. Communication between Brugé and Italy was not easy, but it was relatively common. It is known that artists traveled between Northern and Southern Europe, often staying for multiple years in Italy. Less often are Italy's painters recorded going North for a holiday, but that can be easily explained by climate and attitude. So some of the techniques, intent, and style of the 'Italian' Renaissance may well have come from the North.

Christ on the Cross, shown above, was the last sculpture by who then dedicated himself to architecture.

The design of the dome of the Florence Duomo, shown below, was not Brunelleschi's. The cathedral had been sitting domeless for years because no one knew how to but the dome on it. Brunelleschi did the engineering design and developed the construction techniques to create it.

Brunelleschi's first major architectual commission was for the Foundling Hospital. The Ospedale degli Innocenti. Although the portico of the hospital is composed of many novel features, in form it still remains close to the style of the Italian Romanesque and late Gothic architecture.

What is new in the building comes from Brunelleschi's intuitive sense balance and consistency, based on the classical art of antiquity. This set the Innocenti facade apart from the medieval buildings and offered a new look in Florentine architecture.

In 1420 the Medici family commissioned Brunelleschi to design the sacristy of San Lorenzo (known as the Old Sacristy distinguishing it from Michelangelo's new sacristy in the same church) and the Basilica of San Lorenzo itself.

Work on the church was begun in 1421. The sacristy was completed (without its decoration) by 1428. Construction on the basilica was halted at that time but began again in 1441 and lasted into the 1460s.