Netherland\'s Style With the Florentine

¶ … Netherland's style with the Florentine style (1300-1450s).

North vs. South: Compare and contrast the Netherland's style with the Florentine style (1300-1450s)

The period between the years 1300-1450 is often called a kind of proto-Renaissance, a transitional artistic and architectural period that existed between the Middle Ages and the High Renaissance. The differences between the Northern and Southern Renaissance styles and cultural attitudes are particularly manifest during this period. The Northern Renaissance in the Netherlands and other nearby nations had a more realistic style vs. The more idealized style of the Southern Renaissance, and tended to focus more on personalized and domestic subjects than the classical and nationalistic art of the Southern Renaissance. Additionally, "though the styles of northern artists vary according to geography, one characteristic that is fundamental to all northern art of this period is a fondness for meticulous rendering of details. In addition, there is generally less of the classical ideal apparent in the figures (which can be partly explained by their lack of access to Greek and Roman statues). Instead, remnants of Gothic influences are apparent in their compositions" (Urton 2008). In contrast, the Florentine or southern style was characterized by a seamless blending of classical styles of architectural construction or anatomy with Biblical scenes. Florence even called itself a "new Athens" ("The Early Renaissance," NGA, 2008).

A frequent use of heavily symbolic images in the form of the triptych was common in the Flemish style. A typical illustration of this is that of the Merode Altarpiece (c. 1425) created by Robert Campin, a notable Flemish artist of the period. Elaborate triptych altarpieces were common in the north of Europe, and the triptychs inevitably deployed a method of pictorial storytelling constructed across three hinged panels. The central panel of the Merode Altarpiece shows Mary interrupted at her reading, while the angel Gabriel comes to her, announcing that she will be the mother of Christ. In the work, "symbols of her purity include the vase of white lilies, the open biblical text, and the white linen," and closer inspection of the central panel "also reveals an image of Christ on the Cross, floating from the direction of the circular windows, and the extinguished candle probably also relates to his death" (Urton 2008). The central panel of the work deploys the most common use of perspective in the northern or Flemish style, and the tilted perspective of the room allows the symbolic iconography to be seen more easily than would be the case if the artist had used a linear perspective, as would be typically used in the Florentine style (Urton 2008).

Throughout the triptych a gothic style of architecture is used in the illustration of spatial structures. This is seen in Mary's doorway and in the right panel of Joseph at his workshop, where Joseph is shown "building mouse-traps," which is symbolic of Jesus' trapping the evils of the world (Urton 2008). In contrast, Florence is noted as the birthplace of the linear perspective and for disdaining Gothic architecture and images: "In one-point, also called linear, perspective, all lines converge to a single point in the distance -- the vanishing point," and was seen to manifest a greater interest in making the viewer of the painting the gazer, rather than part of the subject of the painting ("The Early Renaissance in Florence," NGA, 2008). In religious painting with a tilted perspective or a flat perspective "space seems to open out from the picture plane. It encompasses the viewer to make him part of the sacred events depicted, bringing him into the same sphere with the holy figures of Jesus, Mary, and the saints" ("The Early Renaissance," NGA, 2008). Also in Florence, both the actual architecture as well as the architecture seen in paintings makes use of classical proportions and styles.

While the Florentine style was less fascinated with the potential of symbolism in painting, in the Flemish style, the use of symbolism was not even confined to religious works of and was equally manifest in the domestic scenes that dominated a great many paintings, rather than the more mythic and nationalistic subjects typical of Florentine artists. For example, the Marriage of Giovanni Arnolfini (c.1434), Jan van Eyck's most famous work shows the newly married couple's bed chamber. The bride is pregnant, "symbolic of the holy purpose of their matrimony of bringing children into the world. This also explains the choice of the color of her dress (green representing fertility), and the fact that she is pulling her dress up in the front (signifying that she is willing to bear children)" (Urton 2008). The dog that stands between the new husband and wife, representing fidelity, their shorn sandals show that the bedchamber is holy ground, and the single candle in the candelabra symbolizes the presence of Christ approving the union (Urton 2008).