Art+and+Archetecture

=﻿Overview= The two principal components of Renaissance style are the following: a revival of the classical forms originally developed by the ancient Greeks and Romans, and an intensified concern with secular life-­interest in humanism and assertion of the importance of the individual. During the High Renaissance, artists tend to reduce their subjects to the essentials and few irrelevant details or sketchy features were allowed ensuring that the viewer's attention would be focused on the essence of the theme. The center of the High Renaissance began to shift to Rome and the court of Pope Julius II, who hired the leading Italian artists and architects to work on his ambitious projects. The Renaissance style places emphasis on symmetry, proportions, geometry and the regularity of parts as they are demonstrated in the architecture of classical ancient times and in particular ancient Roman architecture, of which many examples remained. Orderly arrangements of columns, pilasters and lintels, as well as the use of semicircular arches, hemispherical domes, and niches replaced the more complex proportional systems and irregular profiles of medieval buildings. Art in the Renaissance focused on natural detail, expressive characters, and idealism. =Art= Learn more about El Greco at: []

El Greco was a Cretan-born painter, sculptor, and architect who settled in Spain and is regarded as the first great genius of the Spanish School. He was known as El Greco (the Greek), but his real name was Domenikos Theotokopoulos; and it was with that he signed his paintings throughout his life, always in Greek characters, and sometimes followed by Kres (Cretan). Little is known of his youth, and only a few of his works survive in the Byzantine tradition of icon painting, notably the Dormition of the Virgin discovered in 1983. The strangeness of his art has inspired various theories, for example that he was mad or suffered from astigmatism, but his blissful paintings make complete sense as an expression of the religious passion of his adopted country. No other great Western artist moved mentally—as El Greco did—from the flat symbolic world of Byzantine icons to the world-embracing, humanistic vision of Renaissance painting, and then on to a predominantly conceptual kind of art .

Learn more about the life and times of Shakespeare at: []

William Shakespeare was born in 1564. Not much is known about him, and the only information about literature’s most famous Bard is found in registar records, court records, wills, marriage certificates and his tombstone. Some say that William did not attend a school when he was young as there are no records. In1582, He married Anne Hathaway, who was pregnant at the time. They had their first child seven months later. He wrote 37 plays and 154 sonnets, and then died in 1616. His direct line of descendents ended 54 years later when his eldest daughter’s daughter, Elizabeth, died. His plays left an indelible mark on the period because of their complex characterization, seen in characters such as Iago and Edmund, who were far more than flat villains, and their rich language, seen in Hamlet's musings and Othello's poetic self-defenses. It is no wonder, then, Harold Bloom titled his 1998 study of Shakespeare's canon, "The Invention of the Human," given how central the individual's plight and progress in the secular world was to both his plays and Renaissance Humanism as a philosophy .

=Archetecture= Learn more at: [] The renaissance in Europe has been one of the most defining moments in history and the Italian renaissance brought forth many talented artists including Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Andrea Palladio. Andrea Palladio may be described as perhaps one of the most famous among the architects of the renaissance. Architects have used his designs for the past four hundred and fifty years. Andrea Palladio was born on November 30 in the year 1508 in Padua, Italy. Getting an assignment from Trissino was perhaps the best thing that could have happened to Andrea Palladio. His mentor introduced him to the principles of classical architecture and renaissance education.Trissino sponsored him to visit Padua and Venice between 1538-9. He even went to Rome in 1541 to study classical roman works and early renaissance architecture. Andrea Palladio has written very important books on architecture. He first wrote a guide to the classical ruins of Rome. Then in collaboration with his sons he published a new translation of Caesar’s Commentaries. He also contributed illustration to Danielle Barbaro’s annotated edition of Vitruvius’ treatise on classical architecture. Finally in 1570 he published what is perhaps one of the most famous and well read and referred book in architecture. It is called I Quattro Libri dell’ Architettura ( The Four Books of Architecture). This book has been translated in to every European language & to date it can be bought either in its hardback or paperback version. It is the work of a master & details not only architectural principles but also gives advice on practical applications. It has meticulous woodcut illustrations drawn from his original work. He recreated ancient classicism in his own unique style.In 1570 he was alsoappointed as the architectural adviser to the Venetian republic.