1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:12,120 Greetings friends, my name's Cosimo, allow me to be your guide to the sights, sounds 2 00:00:12,120 --> 00:00:17,280 and smells of the Italian Renaissance. 3 00:00:17,280 --> 00:00:19,920 So what is the Italian Renaissance? 4 00:00:19,920 --> 00:00:26,280 Well, the word Renaissance is a French word that means rebirth. 5 00:00:26,280 --> 00:00:31,240 A rebirth is a new beginning, and a new beginning it was. 6 00:00:31,240 --> 00:00:35,840 Between the 14th and 17th centuries some really creative things started happening in Europe, 7 00:00:35,840 --> 00:00:44,240 especially in drawing, sculpture, painting and architecture. 8 00:00:44,240 --> 00:00:47,720 During the 1300s Europe rose out of the dark ages. 9 00:00:47,720 --> 00:00:53,120 Bubonic plague was a disease which wiped out a lot of the population. 10 00:00:53,120 --> 00:01:04,000 The country was made up of independent city-states. 11 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:08,040 The city of Florence was ruled by a family of bankers, the Medici's. 12 00:01:08,040 --> 00:01:12,620 They used their vast wealth to sponsor the arts and sciences. 13 00:01:12,620 --> 00:01:16,720 The true impact of the Renaissance could really be seen in the visual arts. 14 00:01:16,720 --> 00:01:18,560 New styles and techniques emerged. 15 00:01:18,560 --> 00:01:27,040 The influence of geometry and mathematics could be seen as artists strived for perfection. 16 00:01:27,040 --> 00:01:32,680 By the mid 14th century paintings had very flat, decorative, religious themed images. 17 00:01:32,680 --> 00:01:37,960 All this changed however, with the arrival of painters like Giotto and Fra Angelico. 18 00:01:37,960 --> 00:01:43,900 They studied artists from ancient Greece and Rome, and drew from real life. 19 00:01:43,900 --> 00:01:48,240 They painted with egg tempera, which was colour pigment mixed with egg yolk. 20 00:01:48,920 --> 00:01:53,960 They also used gold, which could be flattened as thin as leaves, and could be brushed onto the paintings. 21 00:01:53,960 --> 00:01:59,760 Our good friend Johannes Gutenberg helped spread these new ideas to the rest of the world with his invention, 22 00:01:59,760 --> 00:02:05,680 the printing press. 23 00:02:05,680 --> 00:02:10,000 By the early Renaissance artists painted people more realistically, and placed them in three 24 00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:11,760 dimensional settings. 25 00:02:11,760 --> 00:02:20,200 The introduction of perspective revolutionized the way buildings and backgrounds were painted. 26 00:02:20,200 --> 00:02:25,040 The architecture at the time was also inspired by ancient Greece and Rome. 27 00:02:25,040 --> 00:02:28,600 Common features included columns, pilasters, domes. 28 00:02:28,600 --> 00:02:34,680 The most famous dome of all was Florence Cathedral, designed by none other than famous engineer 29 00:02:34,680 --> 00:02:40,740 and architect Filippo Brunelleschi. 30 00:02:40,740 --> 00:02:43,820 These years saw an explosion in creativity. 31 00:02:43,820 --> 00:02:49,300 Compositions, meaning where people and objects are placed in a picture, became balanced, 32 00:02:49,300 --> 00:02:51,940 proportioned, perfected. 33 00:02:51,940 --> 00:02:55,420 The ideas for artworks no longer came just from religion. 34 00:02:55,420 --> 00:03:00,340 Oil paints took longer to dry and could be applied thickly or thinly, allowing artists 35 00:03:00,340 --> 00:03:04,220 to give their works a much more realistic feel. 36 00:03:04,220 --> 00:03:06,980 These artists became the superstars of their day. 37 00:03:06,980 --> 00:03:12,780 A true Renaissance man could be a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, all rolled 38 00:03:12,780 --> 00:03:14,300 into one. 39 00:03:14,300 --> 00:03:18,580 Some were even inventors, like our good friend Leonardo da Vinci. 40 00:03:18,580 --> 00:03:23,460 Michelangelo Bonarroti was also a painter and sculptor, whose crowning achievement was 41 00:03:23,460 --> 00:03:27,180 the sealing of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. 42 00:03:27,180 --> 00:03:32,260 So what was life like for the men, women, and children of the Renaissance? 43 00:03:32,260 --> 00:03:35,780 Men worked as bankers, farmers, or goldsmiths. 44 00:03:35,780 --> 00:03:40,380 Women were either silk weavers, midwives, seamstresses, or nuns. 45 00:03:40,380 --> 00:03:41,920 Children didn't have it easy either. 46 00:03:41,920 --> 00:03:45,220 From the time they learned to put one foot in front of the other, they were expected 47 00:03:45,220 --> 00:03:51,260 to work just as hard as the grown-ups. 48 00:03:51,260 --> 00:03:53,300 This was a time of style. 49 00:03:53,300 --> 00:03:56,820 What you wore and how you wore it was very important. 50 00:03:56,820 --> 00:04:01,060 Women wore sweeping gowns, and every man had to wear a hat. 51 00:04:01,060 --> 00:04:05,660 They would show off their new threads at a variety of public and sporting events. 52 00:04:05,660 --> 00:04:12,620 Their pastimes included chess, bullfighting, and jousting. 53 00:04:12,620 --> 00:04:16,340 Most music at the time was composed solely for the church. 54 00:04:16,340 --> 00:04:22,340 However, as with all the arts, new styles were introduced, and music was also made simply 55 00:04:22,340 --> 00:04:27,380 for people's entertainment. 56 00:04:27,380 --> 00:04:29,880 As with any great action comes a reaction. 57 00:04:29,880 --> 00:04:35,480 The perfection achieved in the High Renaissance gave way to a style called Mannerism. 58 00:04:36,300 --> 00:04:39,680 This brought about a much more stylized approach to painting. 59 00:04:39,680 --> 00:04:44,880 Cooler colors were used, figures were put in more unusual settings, and were painted 60 00:04:44,880 --> 00:04:48,680 with longer bodies. 61 00:04:48,680 --> 00:04:54,480 The Renaissance, which began in Italy, shook everything up and lasted hundreds of years. 62 00:04:54,480 --> 00:04:59,960 It led to big achievements in art and science, and changed how people think. 63 00:04:59,960 --> 00:05:02,560 Until next time, mi amici, arrivederci.