Masaccio: Innovator of Perspective and Illusion Essay examples

Many ages of art shine through Duccio’s portraying of Mary in Madonna Enthroned (fig. 6). Both being trained in the Greek manner, Duccio’s version of Siena’s patron saint is comparable to Cimabue’s Enthroned Madonna and Child with Angels and Prophets from the year 1280 2 (fig. 7). Duccio, however, took a softer

Masaccio’s famous religious painting, “The Holy Trinity”, is known for the engagement of linear perspective to create an image that goes beyond just paint on canvas, (or should I say wall?) by creating the illusion of depth. This painting addresses many religious concepts by setting up different levels and layers in the constructed space. The characters depicted are made up of four groups of human figures, which include the Trinity (God the father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit), the Virgin Mary and Saint John, a pair of donors, and a skeleton on a tomb at the bottom of the picture. There is an apparent point of separation, which is made clear due to each group being on separate levels. Their difference in power is fundamental feature in

4. Space- Perspective is demonstrated in many ways. This artwork takes up almost the whole canvas. The horses on the edge look like they were maybe even squeezed in. All of the characters in this artwork look to be congregated to the middle of the painting, besides the villages in the distance. Linear perspective is used in the placement of the villages in the background and in all the men and horses, which are grouped in the middle of the screen. Looking at the features in the painting I notice the use of overlapping and vertical placement, which both imply depth. The horses overlap each other as well as the gentlemen and other elements of the painting. The brown horse’s head overlaps the black one hiding its mouth. The villages and hills in the background appear to be very far away (diminishing size); they look smaller and distant from the rest of the main aspects of the painting.

Another technique that was developed was perspective. Perspective was formed with the creation of the vanishing point to make paintings more realistic. Masaccio was one of the great painters of his time because of his skill of recreating lifelike figures and movement, along with portraying a sense of three-dimensionality. One of Masaccio’s greatest paintings is the Holy Trinity which was painted in 1427. This painting has a great use of perspective and chiaroscuro to show realism. Chiaroscuro was another technique that was formed to show light and dark intensities to give the impression of depth and texture as well as a source of light. With the use of different shades of colour, sfumato was a new technique that emerged during this time that produces soft, imperceptible transitions between colours and tones to show blending and oneness. These techniques established a basis of modern art. These techniques are still used till this day and have shaped the way art is currently produced.

Raphael was one of the most important artists of the Italian Renaissance. Raphael painted and designed many brilliant pieces of work and the stanzas inside the Vatican. He was a master at such necessities of modern art such as depth and perspective and the use of light and shadow, and was the turning point styles of paintings like the use of Madonnas in paintings. Through his short life, Raphael would make some of the most awe-inspiring, beautiful, and influential works of art during the Italian Renaissance.

We can also see the use of black shades to create a hole at the bottom part of the rock. With his excellent use of colors, we can identify the good, healthy and green grass from the bad, unhealthy, brown grasses. Looking beyond the main focus of the painting, he uses colors to separate the sky from the land in the background creating a solid form of perspective on the painting. He also uses colors to create water forms as seen behind the young character. Now, for the sky, he uses shades of white to magnificently differentiate the thick clouds from the light ones. He also uses this to create a source to light to the whole area. All these put together creates a splendid, realistic and familiar atmosphere for the viewers to relate with.

Three dimensional art was accomplished during the early southern renaissance by the use of the technique linear perspective. Linear perspective is type of perspective in which the relative size, shape, and position of objects are determined by drawn or imagined lines converging at a vanishing point on the horizon. An artist with the name of Masaccio created a new movement in Florentine painting with his fresco, or a painting done in watercolor on wet plaster on a wall or ceiling, Trinity. The artwork gave an illusion of a stone funerary monument and altar table set in a framed niche on the wall. The use of the vanishing point located at the eye level of the viewers of the church allowed for the viewers to see the art as if they were looking

Brunelleschi’s linear perspective system views pictures as windows that allow a glimpse into the world. In the photo, the man sees the world through a window of three ATM machines. He sees the same view everyday. The view of the ATMs become his single reality; they are his only focus into the world. His single focus and single reality is the opposite application of Gulammohammed Sheikh’s “mobility of vision.” The mobility of vision takes a multiple focus on the world and “embraces reality from all possible life perspectives in time” (Sheikh 52). However, instead of taking a multiple focus, the man sits in one place and chooses a stagnant “pictorial route” (Sheikh 45). Sheikh uses examples of viewers moving around artworks to illustrate the

2. Justifying my answer above, the two elements of this technique and where I see them in Andrews’s painting Lights IV: Pier and Road are one point linear perspective on the road and diminution of the buildings.

Therefore one of his grammar school friends Domenico Ghirlandaio realized this and introduced him to the painter Domenico Ghirlandaio, his father soon realized he had no interest in becoming a banker, therefore agreed to apprentice him to the fashionable Florentine painter's workshop. Only after a year Michelangelo was offered an extraordinary opportunity to study classical sculpture in the Medici gardens.Michelangelo fled to Bologna after the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent’s death, where he continued his study.In 1495 he moved back to Florence in 1495 to begin work as a sculptor, modeling his style after masterpieces of classical antiquity. In 1498 he moved to rome where he got commissioned by Jean Bilhères de La Graulas, a representative of the French King Charles VIII to the pope, where he did the statue pieta. Upon completion he moved back to Florence where he was now seen as a prominent figure in the art industry, soon after he moved back he started work on the statue of david.After this he really blew up getting asked to do works such as decorating the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and the creation of adam. After a brief illness, Michelangelo in 1564, coincidentally he is one of the only artists during this time to see the popularity of his art during his lifetime. Even though these two have different ways of achieving the point they are today, there's

Linear perspective is a mathematical system for creating the illusion of space and distance on a flat surface. Linear perspective was first used in Florence, Italy in the 1400s by Brunelleschi, an artist and architect. However, the first person to write the rules down was Leon Battista Alberti. Many artists have developed a concept of Alberti’s system for artists to follow. Leonardo da Vinci probably learned Alberti's system while serving as an apprentice to the artist Verrocchio in Florence. (Exploring Linear Perspective)

The distance put between them is called the spacial perspective, which is one of the techniques Leonardo feels is important in naturalistic art. Although, the

Leaving Florence, Leonardo arrived in Milan in 1482 (Leonardo world ¶ 7-8). He became a court artist for Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, often designing many mechanisms and even a sculpture of the Duke (¶ 7-8). During Leonardo’s stay in Milan, he painted Madonna of the Rocks and the famous Last Supper (¶ 7-8). In 1499, the French overthrew Milan, and Leonardo left the city to return to Florence (Leonardo world ¶ 9-11).

Innovators can be found in all fields of work, whether it is Albert Einstein in physics, Isaac Newton in mathematics, or Masaccio in early Renaissance painting. Even though these individuals labored in different fields, the influences of their work on later generations were equally great. Masaccio was able to build upon the works of proto-Renaissance painters such as Giotto, to further develop the mathematical technique of linear perspective to open a window into the world for his viewers. His innovative style can be found in most of his work, such as “The Tribute Money” found inside the Brancacci chapel, but the best example of his style is found not far from the Brancacci chapel in Florence. Found inside the Dominican church of Santa

This unique blending of fresh ideas and rejuvenating classical ideas defined Masaccio’s artwork and more importantly the art of the early renaissance.