Renaissance art is the painting, sculpture and decorative arts of the period of European history, emerging as a distinct style in Italy in about 1400, in parallel with developments which occurred in philosophy, literature, music, and science. Renaissance art, perceived as the noblest of ancient traditions, took as its foundation the art of Classical antiquity, but transformed that tradition by absorbing recent developments in the art of Northern Europe and by applying contemporary scientific knowledge. Renaissance art, with Renaissance Humanist philosophy, spread throughout Europe, affecting both artists and their patrons with the development of new techniques and new artistic sensibilities. Renaissance art marks the transition of Europe from the medieval period to the Early Modern age.


The influences upon the development of Renaissance men and women in the early 15th century are those that also affected Philosophy, Literature, Architecture, Theology, Science, Government, and other aspects of society. The following list presents a summary, dealt with more fully in the main articles that are cited above.

  • Classical texts, lost to European scholars for centuries, became available. These included Philosophy, Prose, Poetry, Drama, Science, a thesis on the Arts, and Early Christian Theology.
  • The improvement of oil paint and developments in oil-painting technique by Dutch artists such as Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden and Hugo van der Goes led to its adoption in Italy from about 1475 and had ultimately lasting effects on painting practices, worldwide.
  • A similar heritage of artistic achievement occurred in Venice through the talented Bellini family, their influential in-law Mantegna, Giorgione, Titian and Tintoretto.[1][2][3]


Proto-Renaissance in Italy, 1280–1400

 Square fresco. In a shallow space like a stage set, lifelike figures gather around the dead body of Jesus. All are mourning. Mary Magdalene weeps over his feet. A male disciple throws out his arms in despair. Joseph of Arimethea holds the shroud. In Heaven, small angels are shrieking and tearing their hair.
Giotto: The Lamentation, c. 1305, Scrovegni Chapel, foreshadows the Renaissance.



Early Netherlandish art, 1400–1525




Early Renaissance in Italy, 1400–1479

Donatello, David (1440s?) Museo Nazionale del Bargello.






Early Renaissance in France, 1375–1528


High Renaissance in Italy, 1475–1525






German Renaissance art

Lucas Cranach the Elder, Apollo and Diana.

German Renaissance art falls into the broader category of the Renaissance in Northern Europe, also known as the Northern Renaissance. Renaissance influences began to appear in German art in the 15th century, but this trend was not widespread. Gardner's Art Through the Ages identifies Michael Pacher, a painter and sculptor, as the first German artist whose work begins to show Italian Renaissance influences. According to that source, Pacher's painting, St. Wolfgang Forces the Devil to Hold His Prayerbook (c.1481), is Late Gothic in style, but also shows the influence of the Italian artist, Mantegna.[4] Artisans, such as engravers, became more concerned with aesthetics rather than just perfecting their craft. Germany had master engravers, such as Martin Schongauer, who did metal engravings in the late 1400s. Gardner relates this mastery of the graphic arts to advances in printing which occurred in Germany, and says that metal engraving began to replace the woodcut during the Renaissance.[5] However, some artists, such as Albrecht Dürer, continued to do woodcuts. Both Gardner and Russell describe the fine quality of Dürer's woodcuts, with Russell stating, in The World of Dürer, that Dürer "elevated them into high works of art."[6]

In the 1500s, Renaissance art in Germany became more common as, according to Gardner, "The art of northern Europe during the sixteenth century is characterized by a sudden awareness of the advances made by the Italian Renaissance and by a desire to assimilate this new style as rapidly as possible."[7] One of the best known practitioners of German Renaissance art was Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528). Dürer's fascination with classical ideas led him to Italy to study art. Both Gardner and Russell recognized the importance of Durer's contribution to German art in bringing Italian Renaissance styles and ideas to Germany.[6][8] Russell calls this "Opening the Gothic windows of German art,"[6] while Gardner calls it Dürer's "life mission."[8] Importantly, as Gardner points out, Dürer "was the first northern artist who fully understood the basic aims of the southern Renaissance,"[8] although his style did not always reflect that. The same source says that Hans Holbein the Younger (1497–1543) successfully assimilated Italian ideas while also keeping "northern traditions of close realism."[9] This is contrasted against Dürer's tendency to work in "his own native German style"[8] instead of combining German and Italian styles. Other important artists of the German Renaissance were Grünewald, Albrecht Altdorfer, and Lucas Cranach the Elder.[10]

Hieronymus Bosch was a painter of the Netherlands, who employed the type of fanciful forms that were often utilized to decorate borders and letters in illuminated manuscripts, combining plant and animal forms with architectonic ones. When taken from the context of the illumination and peopled with humans, these forms give Bosch's paintings a surreal quality which have no parallel in the work of any other Renaissance painter. His masterpiece is the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights.


Britain was very late to late to develop a Renaissance style and most artists of the Tudor court were imported foreigners, usually from the Low countries, including Hans Holbein the Younger, who died in England. One exception was the portrait miniature, which artists including Nicholas Hilliard developed into a distinct genre, well before it became popular in the rest of Europe. Renaissance art in Scotland was similarly dependent on imported artists, and largely restricted to the court.

Themes and symbolism

Sandro Botticelli, Magnificat Madonna, 1480–81, tempera on panel, Uffizi, Florence



  • foreshortening – The term foreshortening refers to the artistic effect of shortening lines in a drawing so as to create an illusion of depth.

Italian artists

Artists of the Low Countries



German artists

French artists

Spanish artists

Croatian artists


Major collections

General Collections:

See also


  4. ^ Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. p. 555. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 
  5. ^ Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. pp. 555–556. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 
  6. ^ a b c Russell, Francis (1967). The World of Dürer. Time Life Books, Time Inc. p. 9. 
  7. ^ Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. pp. 556–557. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 
  8. ^ a b c d Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. p. 561. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 
  9. ^ Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. p. 564. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 
  10. ^ Gardner, Helen; De la Croix, Horst; Tansey, Richard G (1975). "The Renaissance in Northern Europe". Art Through the Ages (6th ed.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. p. 557. ISBN 0-15-503753-6. 

External links