HUM 146 Introduction to Humanities II

First Quarter Review

Introduction

Artificial
Sign and Symbol
Text/Context/Subtext
Medium/media

The Italian Renaissance

• Basic terms and concepts

Renaissance
The Medici family (Cosimo, Lorenzo)
Florence
Memento Mori
Devotional Realism
Artistic Patronage
Humanism (studia humanitatis)
L'uomo Universale
Neoplatonism
Fresco
Contrapposto
Chiaroscuro
Sfumato
Linear Perspective
Aerial Perspective
Mannerism

• Italian Renaissance Artists and their Works

Andrea Pisano: The Baptistery Doors (south)
Lorenzo Ghiberti: The Baptistery Doors (north and
     east- "Gates of Paradise")
Brunalleschi: The Florence Cathedral Dome
Donatello: David, Mary Magdalene
Masaccio: The Tribute Money, The Holy Trinity
Fra Angelico: The Annunciation/ other frescoes of
     San Marco
Botticelli: Primavera, Birth of Venus
Leonardo da Vinci: The Last Supper, Mona Lisa
Raphael: School of Athens, Madonna of the
     Meadows
Michelangelo Buonarroti: David, Sistine Chapel
     Ceiling, The Last Judgment
Titian: Fete Champetre
Tintoretto: The Last Supper
Parmagianino: Madonna of the Long Neck
El Greco: Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane

• Italian Renaissance Literature

Boccaccio: The Decameron (pre Renaissance)
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Oration on the Dignity
     of Man
Petrarch: letters and sonnets
Castiglione: The Book of the Courtier
Machiavelli: The Prince

The Northern Renaissance

• Basic terms and vocabulary

The cities of Ghent and Bruges
The Protestant Reformation
Martin Luther
John Calvin
Albrecht Zwingli
Henry VIII of England
The Protestant Ethic
Anabaptist
Individualism
Indulgence
Relic
Iconoclasm
Intaglio printing
Relief printing
Genre Art
Triptych
Polyptych
Elizabethan Sonnet
Quatrain
Couplet

• Northern Renaissance Artists and their Works

Robert Campin: Merode Altarpiece
Jan van Eyck: Ghent Altarpiece, Giovanni Arnolfini
     and His Wife Giovanna Cenami
Hieronymus Bosch: Death and the Miser, Hay Wain,
     Garden of Earthly Delights
Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Peasant Wedding, The
     Wedding Dance, The Blind Leading the Blind
Mathias Grunewald: The Small Crucifixion
Albrecht Durer: Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,
     Adam and Eve, Knight, Death, and the Devil

• Northern Renaissance Literature

Erasmus: The Praise of Folly
Martin Luther: The Ninety-Five Theses (not
     "literature" in the traditional sense of the term but
     important writing nonetheless)
William Shakespeare: Sonnet 130; Hamlet

Discussion Questions

1. In general: be familiar with basic content and elements of major Southern and Northern Renaissance paintings, sculptures, and literary works.  Be able to recognize and identify those listed above.

2. Describe the events (e.g., social, political, economic, religious) that led to the Italian Renaissance.  What was happening in Florence that made this city a particularly fruitful center for this cultural phenomenon?

3. What is Neoplatonism?  What are its basic principles and how are they reflected in Renaissance painting, sculpture, and literature?  Give examples.

4.  Compare Giovanni Pico's Oration on the Dignity of Man to the Hebrew account of the creation of humankind as presented in the biblical book of Genesis.  How do they differ?  What is de Pico emphasizing that is markedly different from the previous medieval view of humankind?  How does Pico reflect the Renaissance spirit?

5. Describe some of the ways in which Southern Renaissance (Italian) and Northern Renaissance (Dutch, German) painting styles differ from one another.  Focus on such things as style, content, and subject matter.  Give examples.

6. What were Martin Luther's issues with the Roman Catholic church?  What was the primary theological basis for his dissent?  Aside from its effects on the institution of the church itself, what were some of the social or political results of the Protestant Reformation?

7.Using Hamlet as an example (along with others if you wish), why are the plays of Shakespeare regarded as "timeless?"  How does their content and subject matter reflect the Renaissance spirit?  Based on what you saw in the video performance, why is Hamlet as significant a story today as it was four hundred years ago?  Are you familiar with other examples of Shakespearean plays that have been adapted to contemporary contexts?  On the other hand, can it be argued that Hamlet is strictly a "period piece?"

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