Sixteenth-Century Italian Art is a first-rate collection of the major classic and contemporary writings on the Italian Renaissance. Taking a thematic approach, the book exemplifies the traditional concerns of the field and presents arguments in a clear, accessible way. A stellar collection of 23 classic and recent essays on the art and architecture of this fascinating period in art history Brings together in a single volume, important literature on sixteenth-century Italian art from the last half century, highlighting major topics of recent art historical studies Introduces major topics and debates in the field, including pagan mysteries, nature and artifice, the art of the body, and “reformations” of art, theory and practice Includes new translations of texts never previously published in English Organized thematically, and features substantial editorial introductions, making this anthology ideal for course use.

Sixteenth-Century Italian Art is a first-rate collection of the major classic and contemporary writings on the Italian Renaissance. Taking a thematic approach, the book exemplifies the traditional concerns of the field and presents arguments in a clear, accessible way. A stellar collection of 23 classic and recent essays on the art and architecture of this fascinating period in art history Brings together in a single volume, important literature on sixteenth-century Italian art from the last half century, highlighting major topics of recent art historical studies Introduces major topics and debates in the field, including pagan mysteries, nature and artifice, the art of the body, and “reformations” of art, theory and practice Includes new translations of texts never previously published in English Organized thematically, and features substantial editorial introductions, making this anthology ideal for course use.

Influenced by a revival of interest in Greco-Roman ideals and sponsored by a newly prosperous merchant class, fifteenth-century artists produced works of astonishingly innovative content and technique. The International Gothic style of painting, still popular at the beginning of the century, was giving way to the influence of Early Netherlandish Flemish masters such as Jan van Eyck, who emphasized narrative and the complex use of light for symbolic meaning. Patrons favored paintings in oil and on wooden panels for works ranging from large, hinged altarpieces to small, increasingly lifelike portraits. In the Italian city-states of Florence, Venice, and Mantua, artists and architects alike perfected existing techniques and developed new ones. The painter Masaccio mastered linear perspective; the sculptor Donatello produced anatomically correct but idealized figures such as his bronze nude of David; and the brilliant architect and engineer Brunelleschi integrated Gothic and Renaissance elements to build the self-supporting dome of the Florence Cathedral. This beautifully illustrated guide analyzes the most important people, places, and concepts of this early Renaissance period, whose explosion of creativity was to spread throughout Europe in the sixteenth century.

This volume catalogues paintings from Venice made between 1540 and 1600, and includes some of the greatest pictures in the National Gallery, London.

An introduction to 15th century Italian painting and the social history behind it, arguing that the two are interlinked and that the conditions of the time helped fashion distinctive elements in the painter's style.

This collection of an important architectural theorist's essays considers and compares designs by Palladio and Le Corbusier, discusses mannerism and modern architecture, architectural vocabulary in the 19th century, the architecture of Chicago, neoclassicism and modern architecture, and the architecture of utopia.

This interdisciplinary volume gathers essays by leading international scholars in the fields of Italian Renaissance literature, music, history and history of art to address the fertile question of the relationship between religious change and shifting cultural forms in sixteenth-century Italy. Each contribution examines the effects of the profound religious changes that took place in the period on cultural forms, seeking to establish an 'aesthetics of reform' for the sixteenth century.

This work describes art patronage in 16th-century Italy. For example, it was the time when Julius II and Bramante embarked upon rebuilding St Peter's; Paul III commissioned Michelangelo to paint the Last Judgement; and Sixtus V and Domenico Fontana transformed the urban fabric of Rome. Other great projects included Borromeo and Pellegrino Tibaldi introducing the ideals of the Counter-Reformation in an ambitious programme of religious architecture in Milan; the centre of Venice being dramatically remodelled by the city's government and Jacopo Sansovino; wealthy Venetian patricians building beautiful villas in the Veneto from designs by Pallado, and commissioning their altarpieces and portraits from artists of the calibre of Titian and Tintoretto. At the same time, Giulio Romano built and decorated the Palazzo del Te for Federigo Gonzaga and, perhaps in the most famous partnership of all, Vasari gave visual expression to Cosimo I's ambition in an enormous programme of building and embellishment that established Florence as a centre of artistic excellence.

The sixteenth century was a critical period both for Spain’s formation and for the imperial dominance of her Crown. Spanish monarchs ruled far and wide, spreading agents and culture across Europe and the wider world. Yet in Italy they encountered another culture whose achievements were even prouder and whose aspirations often even grander than their own. Italians, the nominally subaltern group, did not readily accept Spanish dominance and exercised considerable agency over how imperial Spanish identity developed within their borders. In the end Italians’ views sometimes even shaped how their Spanish colonizers eventually came to see themselves. The essays collected here evaluate the broad range of contexts in which Spaniards were present in early modern Italy. They consider diplomacy, sanctity, art, politics and even popular verse. Each essay excavates how Italians who came into contact with the Spanish crown’s power perceived and interacted with the wider range of identities brought amongst them by its servants and subjects. Together they demonstrate what influenced and what determined Italians’ responses to Spain; they show Spanish Italy in its full transcultural glory and how its inhabitants projected its culture - throughout the sixteenth century and beyond.