Concepts of Beauty in Renaissance Art

In this Volume, published in1998, Fifteen scholars reveal the ways of preserving, conceiving and creating beauty were as diverse as the cultural influenced at work at the time, deriving from antique, medieval and more recent literature and philosophy, and from contemporary notions of morality and courtly behaviour. Approaches include discussion of contemporary critical terms and how these determined writers' appreciation of paintings, sculpture, architecture and costume; studies of the quest to create beauty in the work of artists such as Botticeli, Leonardo, Raphael, Parmigianino and Vasari; and the investigation of changes functioning of the eye and brain, or to technical innovations like those found in Venetian glass.

Francis Ames-Lewis, Mary Rogers

1. Introduction, Elizabeth Cropper. 2. The Biological Basis of Renaissance Aesthetics, John Onians. 3. The Perception of Beauty in Landscape in the Quattrocento, Alison Cole. 4. 'Condecenti et Netti...': Beauty, Dress and Gender in Italian Renaissance Art, Jane Bridgeman. 5. Giovanni Sabadino Degli Arienti and a Practical Definition of Magnificence in the Context of Renaissance Architecture, Rupert Shepard. 6. Beauty as an Aesthetic and Artistic Ideal in Late Fifthteenth-Century Florence, David Hemsoll. 7. Defining the Beautiful in Early Renaissance Germany, Andrew Morrall. 8. The Artist as Beauty, Mary Rogers. 9.' La Pinu Bella e Meglio Lavorata Opera' : Beauty and Good Design in Italian Renaissance Architecture, Georgia Clarke. 10. Poetry in Motion: Beauty in Movement and the Renaissance Conception of Leggiadria, Sharon Fermor. 11. Resplendent Vassels: Parmigianino at Work in the Steccata, Mary Vaccaro. 12. Michealangelo's Christian Neoplantonic Aesthetic of Beauty in His Early Oeuvre: The Nuditas Virtualis Image, Jonne Snow-Smith. 13. Venetian Glass and Renaissance Self-Fashioning, Paul Hills. 14. Vasari's Interpretation of Female Beauty, Liana De Girolami Cheney. 15. The Notion of Beauty in Francesco Bocchi's Bellezze Della Citta di Fiorenza, I , Thomas Frangenberg. 16. The Notion of Beauty in Francesco Bocchi's Bellezze della citta di Fiorenza, II, Robert Williams.