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.

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