Reformation and Counter - Reformation

Religious Reformation:
At the beginning of 16th century the Catholic Church had several problems of corruption such as:
· The luxury life of the high hierarchy
· The ignorance of a part of the clergy who didn’t carry out their pastoral work correctly.
· Simony: important ecclesiastic charges were sold to people without aptitudes for being a priest who only search for economic benefits.
· Nepotism: The high hierarchy gave important charges to their relatives.
In that moment, The Pope was building a new St Peter’s Basilica in Vatican and he needed money. So, he published the Indulgences or documents that people could buy to get the pardon for their sins.
It was another big scandal and many people criticized these facts and proposed a change. One of them was Martin Luther who wrote 95 thesis against the indulgences.
Besides these, he expressed other important ideas:
F People are saved by faith
F There is a direct relation between God and Human being. People don’t need intermediaries
F Everybody can read and interpret the Bible in a free way. So, Bible has to be written in vernacular
F There are only two important sacraments: Baptism and Eucharist
F Lutherans don’t worship the virgin and saints
F Lutherans accept neither the pope nor the ecclesiastical hierarchy.
The pope excommunicated Luther from the Catholic Church, but Luther’s ideas spread quickly by Germany and the center and north of Europe. Followers of Luther were named Protestants.

The Counter – Reformation
Catholic Church had to make its own reformation.
In 1545, The Council of Trent met and adopted different resolutions:
· To stop Protestants and to spread the Catholicism,
o They created the catechism with the main ideas of the Catholic dogma.
o They open new schools for priests (seminars)
o They reformed old religious orders and created other new like The Society of Jesus, founded by Ignatius of Loyola.
· To improve the conditions of the Church and its priests, they fixed rules for clergy.
The religious changes of 16th century brought important consequences in Europe:
a. It was a period of intolerance both in Catholic and Protestant countries
b. There were long and violent wars in much of Europe
c. There were lists of prohibited books and Inquisition persecuted those who didn’t practice the Catholic religion.

The Renaissance painting

Characteristics
· Renaissance painters discovered the perspective. They used landscapes or buildings as background scenes to get depth in the picture and so, the perspective sensation.
· They also looked for the beauty through the harmony of proportions and, of course, they represented the idealized beauty in human faces and bodies.
· The subjects were religious, but they painted mythological scenes, portraits and nudes too.

Main artists:
o BOTTICELLI: (Quattrocento) He knew how to represent the sense of movement. The draw in the picture was very important for him: The birth of Venus (Florence).
o LEONARDO DA VINCI: (Cinquecento) He was a master of sfumato.
His most important works: Gioconda, The last supper, Virgin of the rocks.
o MICHELANGELO: (Cinquecento). He represents the strength, the movement and the expression: Frescoes of Sistine Chapel.
o RAPHAEL: (Cinquecento) Great perfection in his use of the color, drawing and compositions: The school of Athens.

Vocabulary
Perspective (from Latin perspicere, to see through) in the graphic arts is a representation, on a flat surface (such as paper), of an image as it is seen by the eye.
Sfumato: Technique of smoothing or blurring the outlines of the figures to create a sense of depth and perspective. Painters use shades and colors.

Click on the link to open the worksheet

The humanism

It is a cultural and intellectual movement of the Renaissance. For humanists, Human being is the center of the world. Click on the image to know its most important characteristics

The ball game

 

When Spaniards arrived at America, they found different civilizations living there. The three most important pre - Columbian peoples were Aztecs in Mexico, Maya in Peninsula of Yucatan and Inca in Andes. Through this reading we will learn some aspect about the Aztec culture. Click on the image

Comentario de una obra arquitectónica andalusí.

1. Materiales: Se emplean materiales pobres como el ladrillo y la madera, pero ricamente decorados con mosaicos y yesería.
2. Soportes y arcos: el edificio utiliza las columnas como soporte con capiteles de pencas y arcos de herradura que se alternan con arcos polilobulados y entrecruzados.
3. Cubiertas: el edificio se cubre con techos de madera, pero en la fotografía se observa una cúpula califal, que es una cúpula de nervios que no se cruzan en el centro, ricamente decorada con mosaicos
4. La decoración empleada es de mosaicos y yesos y los motivos decorativos son de tres tipos: Caligráfica (se escriben sobre la pared textos del Corán), Ataurique o decoración con formas vegetales y Lacería o decoración con formas geométricas entrecruzadas
5. La imagen pertenece al Mihrab de la Mezquita de Córdoba. El Mihrab es un espacio sagrado, un nicho abierto en el muro de la quibla. Es por tanto, uno de los puntos más sagrados de la mezquita. En el Mihrab se coloca el Corán durante la celebración de la oración.
6. Ante el Mihrab se sitúa la Macsura o espacio reservado especialmente para el califa y las autoridades
7. Esta zona de la Mezquita fue construida durante el califato de Al - Hakam II en el S. X, es la parte de la construcción más rica y decorada.

The Islamic Culture

Vamos a descubrir hoy como era la ciudad islámica. Click on the image

Excursión a Córdoba

Ya que hoy no puedo estar en clase para presentaros la excursión y la visita a la Mezquita, tendréis que trabajar vosotros en plan virtual, pero contestáis en el cuaderno. Así que todo consiste en

• Leer el apartado Patrimonio de la página 77
• Buscad el significado de los siguientes elementos de la Mezquita y anotadlo en el cuaderno: MINARETE, SAHM, HARAM, QUIBLA, MIHRAB, MACSURA, MIMBAR, SABAT.
• Localizad cada uno de esos elementos en los números de la imagen que aparece a continuación:







• ¿En qué consiste la decoración caligráfica, de ataurique y de lacería?
• Ved la presentación sobre La Mezquita
  View more presentations from cati1garcia.

Comentario de una pintura gótica

1. Título y autor: El descendimiento de Roger Van der Weyden

2. Descripción: observamos a un grupo de personajes bajando a Cristo de la Cruz. Nicodemo y José de Arimatea sostienen el cuerpo de Jesús, mientras María, desmayada es sujetada por S. Juan. María Magdalena aparece en el extremo derecho de la escena.

3. Tema: religioso

4. Características

• La escena posee gran realismo. Cada uno de los personajes es un perfecto retrato. Las figuras tienen movimiento y expresan sentimiento de dolor por la muerte de Jesús a través de los gestos del cuerpo y el rostro.
• Los colores son intensos y variados.
• Posee gran detallismo. Se pueden observar los más mínimos detalles en los ropajes y rostros de las figuras.
• En este caso el fondo es dorado. De esta forma la mirada del espectafor se centra en la acción de los personajes.
• La composición se encierra en el paréntesis formado por las figuras en los extremos: San Juan y María Magdalena.

5. Técnica: Óleo sobre tabla. Recuerda que el óleo es una técnica que consiste en mezclar los pigmentos con aceite. De esta forma se consigue una pintura de colores intensos y brillantes que tiene la ventaja de que puede corregir detalles pintando sobre lo realizado anteriormente. La desventaja es que seca más lentamente que el temple

Una curiosidad. Esta obra formaba parte de un tríptico que el gremio de ballesteros de Lovaina encargó a van der Weyden para colocarlo en la capilla del gremio y en honor a él, el pintor colocó unas diminutas ballestas en los extremos de la escena.

Gothic sculpture

The picture represents "The foolish virgins" (Cathedral of Magdeburg - Germany). It is an alto - relief which shows the main features of the gothic sculpture: realistic figures with movement. They express feelings through their faces and they have a religious and educational function.

Click on the image to see the activity sheet

The Black Death

Pincha en el ENLACE

The Parliament in the Middle Ages

The first parliaments of Europe appeared in the Middle Ages. (12th century)

A parliament was an assembly where the king met with the nobility, clergy and representatives of the major cities of the kingdom to decide, among other things, taxes increase and loans to the crown.

Thanks to the parliaments and to the help of the cities, the king could control the power of the nobility. Through the parliament, he got money from the citizens and created his own army or held wars against his enemies. In return, the king offered to citizens charters of liberty and privilege.

Nowadays, parliaments are different. They are legislative institutions (in a democratic system) where the representatives of the population (elected by vote) make the laws and control the government.