My Perspective on the Story of the Early Renaissance

 Introduction

After reading and watching both Art of the Western World and Chapter 12 of Cunningham and Reich's Culture and Values. I understand that they both have a quite amazing analysis from the Western works of art during the Early Renaissance. 

In this case, the video focused heavily on the early developments of Italy, especially florence, introduced alongside with some of the important arts within the era, which you can tell from the beginning of the video, "Over the next hundred years, an extrodinary interaction took place in Florence. The innovation of the artists and architect, the excitement of rediscovering classic achievements, and the patronage of wealthy commercial class. These key elements brought about a series of artistic and intellectual break through that came to aknown as the Renaissance, literally the rebirth of learning and culture."(Art 3:23-3:52) This is a brief introduction with clear information.

In the reading, This is how the opening explained, "It was the century of Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Chaucer. The entrenched scholastic approach to learning was being tempered by renewed interest in Classical literature. The long-cherished Byzantine art style was being chanllenged by the new realism of such Italian artists as Cimabue and Giotto in Florence, Simone, Martini, and the Lorenzetti brothers, among other.(Cunningham 266) This also is a eye catching opening like the video as well, which now we understand that the main ideas for both video and the reading are pretty much on the same topic, Florence and Early Renaissance.

Information I Learned About

Monumental tomb of Leonardo Bruni

The information we see in the video is to explore early activities in Florence during Early Renaissance, from explaining the developments in Florence with history, going back and forth at different cities of Italy, and also slide into some of the artworks that related to the main history, such as the monumental tomb of the Florentine Chancellor Leonardo Bruni, which the video introduced us with. "Without ever leaving Santa Croce, we can move into the world of Renaissance with this tomb of Leonardo Bruni, long time chancellor of Florence, who died in 1444."(Art 7:05-7:16) This was the area that reading did not covered much as the video did. 

My preception about this is that the majority of video did fulfill the topic, but much instead I feel it's explaining the history of Florence, introducing much about it to let the audience understand that it's the absolute center of Renaissance.

Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci

From the chapter we read, we do see some of the knowledge about Florence and Italy explained, but  the majority we can see are the artworks from many famous artists and their inspirations as well their achievements, especially the introducing some of the most famous paintings and sculptures that still hold great influence today, definitely including Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, as well as Michaelangelo's Pietà. We also learned about some of the backstories about Leonardo Da Vinci  "Leonardo Da Vinci came from a small Tuscan town near Florence called Vinci. He lived in Florence until the 1480s, when he left for Milan; from there he moved restlessly from place to place until his death in France."(Cunningham 283) As well as Michaelangelo's, "After his early days in the sculpture garden of Lorenzo, he produced many of his greatest works in Rome. However,  even a few examples of his early work show both the great promise of Michaelangelo's talent and some of the influences he absorbed in Florence under the Medici."(Cunningham 285)

Pietà by Michaelangelo

My perception is that readers while reading could feel the comprehensive knowledges storming in, and alsothe feel of walking around a museum of important arts. It gives readers a perspective that they did not had from previous looking at these artworks, a new understanding. This is where the video did not touched on, the video instead focused the majority in the fascinating forms of buildings and history of Florence, as well as expressing the idea why this place holds such importance.

How They Treat The Topic

As I have stated from the previous paragraphs, the way that the reading treated the topic, it provided us a broad understading to the many important arts by famous artists, including their stories, overall felt like the reading is suggesting us that the city of Florence was the cradle of many artistic geniuses. We can see that in the very last part of the summary, "Part of the explanation was native talent, but part of it also lies in the character of a city that supported the arts, nurtured artists, and enhanced civic life wtih beauty and learning."(Cunningham 292) This is why the reading is telling Florence from a comprehensive learning prespective, starting from the artists and their artworks.

The video also stated the importance of Florence as well, Michael Wood explained, "What we see here in Florence, is what they made of that tradition. Just as this, is what we are making of them, but its continued reinterpretation is an necessity for the west, if it is to understand its own cultural tradition." (Art 24:36-24:52) In here, it seems that Michael Wood suggest in order to understand the greatness of the art, we must understand the greatness in Florence as our first goal.

Either way, both video and the reading brought us back to the question of theme—what is the place of artists and the art they create? In this case, is it simply just Florence? I think this question certainly requires a long answer.

Works Cited

Reich, John J, and Cunningham, Lawrence. “Culture and Values. Volume 2.” Belmont, Calif., Wadsworth; Andover, 2013. Accessed 7 Sept. 2020.

Santa Croce in Florence. “A Florentine Chancellor Leonardo Bruni and His Monumental Tomb in Santa Croce.” The Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence, 20 Apr. 2015, santacroceinflorence.wordpress.com/2015/04/20/a-florentine-chancellor-leonardo-bruni-and-his-monumental-tomb-in-santa-croce/. Accessed 7 Feb. 2021.

Valley of Gargoyles. “Pietà, Michelangelo - a Brief History.” YouTube, 23 Sept. 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=81kqmkF3KUw. Accessed 7 Feb. 2021.

Wood, Michael. “Art of the Western World - Episode 5.” Open College of the Arts. Vimeo, 18 Nov. 2010, vimeo.com/16980514. Accessed 7 Sept. 2020.

Wikipedia Contributors. “Mona Lisa.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 Jan. 2019, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mona_Lisa. Accessed 7 Feb. 2021.