Renaissance Art Reflection The Birth and Evolution of Beauty

Perspectives on form and beauty have changed over the span of hundreds of years, from unrealistic expectations in anatomy to that of more lifelike depictions. Of course, no story on beauty can ever be told without the use of Venus and the changes she undergoes throughout the years during the Renaissance. Botticelli gave Venus life, Bronzino beatified her to a goddess-like pedestal, and Cambiaso shadowed her in humanity. It is through these artists' eyes that one can see the progression of beauty throughout the Renaissance years.

Earlier Renaissance artists sought to epitomize and define beauty as "an order or arrangement such that nothing can be altered except for the worse" (Haughton, N.). While the movement brought along by the Renaissance certainly aimed to focus toward a realistic depiction of beauty, this was not always so defined during Botticelli's time. If one looked at Botticelli's The Birth of Venus (c. 1485), one...

R. Hughes states that "[the] great Italian Renaissance portraits of women were dream images"; in Botticelli's case, this seems to be true. Venus is far removed from reality. Golden-haired Venus has an elegant neck that seems far too long, and her posture over her shell lacks a careful application of perspective (see how Venus's foot is positioned on the shell -- a natural impossibility). Botticelli's painting was in no way an essence of naturalism, but rather, a depiction of what was considered at his time the Renaissance ideal: that of the impeccably unreachable goddess of beauty.
The later years pushed Renaissance artists into exploration of anatomy, furthering the envelope of perspective. Where Botticelli idealized Venus and the notion of beauty, artists such as Bronzino and Cambiaso brought about a much more naturalistic aspect to their art. In Bronzino's Venus, Cupid and Time (1540-45), one sees a more naturalistic use of shadows, color, and…