HUMANISM AND THE VISUAL ARTS

Humanism and the visual arts Humanistic themes and techniques were woven deeply into the development of Italian Renaissance art; conversely, the general theme of art was prominent in humanistic discourse. The mutually enriching character of the two disciplines is evident in a variety of areas. Realism Humanists paid conscious tribute to realistic techniques in art that had developed independently of humanism. Giotto di Bondone (c. 12661337), the Florentine painter responsible for the movement away from the Byzantine style and toward ancient Roman technique, was praised by Vasari as the pupil of Nature. Giotto's own contemporary Boccaccio said of him in the Decameron that there was nothing in Naturethe mother and ruling force of all created things with her constant revolution of the heavensthat he could not paint with his stylus, pen, or brush or make so similar to its original in Nature that it did not appear to be the original rather than a reproduction. Many times, in fact, in observing things painted by this man, the visual sense of men would err, taking what was painted to be the very thing itself. Boccaccio, himself a naturalist and a realist, here subtly adopts the painter's achievement as a justification for his own literary style. So Shakespeare, at the end of the Renaissance, praises Giulio Romano (and himself), who, had he himself eternity and could put breath into his work, would beguile Nature of her custom, so perfectly he is her ape (The Winter's Tale). It should be noted that neither Vasari, Boccaccio, nor Shakespeare endorses realistic style as a summum bonum: realism is rather the means for regaining touch with the sovereign creative principle of Nature.