SSTEIN Mannerism and Maniera

Craig Hugh Smyth, Mannerism and Maniera, pp. 24-49 and 98-99

Today’s concept of maniera was passed on the 1600s. Maniera had caused the fall of cinquecento painting. Bellori had said hat painting had reached its height during the time of Raphael.  He says that artists abandoned the study of nature and were corrupted by maniera.  Maneria being the painting was far from the natural truthful painting done by Raphael. Bellori saw this as the destroying of painting that began to be studied in schools. Maniera seemed to be bored artists searching for a new way to paint. The artist began to enjoy painting weak disegno that was far from the truth of earlier paintings. It was based more on imagination rather than truth. 

This style was peculiar and thought as a decline during the 1500s. The art was very capricious and imaginative and seemed to have no higher meaning. The paintings were confusing and unnaturally composed. The poses of the muscular subjects seem to be impossible and completely pointless. I love the energy and confusion that these maniera paintings contain. 

During the mid sixteenth century the term maniera was a derogatory term towards painting. This was in the case of Dolce. Vesari on the other hand came up with the term belle maniera as he was a mannerist painter and loved the work of maniera.  Vesari saw it as an ideal figure that could be used to recreate all figures. Vesari saw the figures as more graceful and sweet (perfection).  He saw a lack of style in earlier paintings. He wanted to see bizarre figures, perfection in feet, hands and other body parts.  He also wanted to see more imaginative lovely colors. He saw maniera as a way to change, eliminate dryness and create interest.  The introduction of mannerism is so beautiful and I wouldn't say that later arts were boring, but art needed to change. There is definitely a point where change is needed to spark interest, controversy, and different ideas.  Imagine how boring art would be without these important historical changes.

SSTEIN Freedberg and Mannerism Discussion 7

Freedberg; Painting in Italy 1500-1600, pp. 285-291

Maniera allowed for a more complex response. The beginning of maniera was a style that conveyed a complex sensation by aesthetes or by illustrations. High maniera was composed of artificial form and content. Drapery hair and human anatomy became perfected. Forms in these paintings were decorated and painted with an arbitrary perfection. The human form took on a fake look that looked like a porcelain figure or a doll. The people emit a cool light that hits them rather than a warm light that would bring life to them. This only allows them to seem somewhat like real people. The atmosphere seems un-breathable and empty. This look is extremely stylized and artificial. It can be compared to a poetic lie. This lie shows a power and existence in the people even though they seem to be untruthfully painted.

There is a disjunction in the expectation we have of nature in high mannerist art. It presents a meaning behind it by depiction admirable and terrible characteristics of the culture during the time. There is a multiple meaning in maniera by depicting an ambiguity while also showing some positivity. High Maneria is the borrowing of a form that can represent a meaning that it doesn’t usually represent. Usually the artists own inclination. The verbal meaning of a painting could be completely different form the picture itself. Painters of this time were decorators, they composed the whole surface of a painting beautifully.

I think High maneria would have caused a lot of problems in the beginning of quatracento art as it would have not correlated with religious paintings. It doesn't meet any of the requirements. Maneria has no sympathy with passion. This and the fact that the style requires emotions to be avoided and replaced with chastened feelings. Aesthetics seem to replace the human feeling and spirituality. Art of the early quatracento was more about the feeling and religious meaning behind it.

Artist of the maneria definitely departed from the unity of form and aesthetics. The change mannerism presents is the start of different ideas and has changed the history of art greatly. Adding this hidden meaning to a stylized picture can have little to no meaning to a person that doesn't take a more sophisticated approach and look behind the stylized beauty of the painting.

SSTEIN-Michelangelo’s Last Judgment

Michelangelo’s Last Judgment 

Hall, Marcia, After Raphael: Michelangelo’s Last Judgment, pp132-136

The painting Of Michelangelo’s last judgment reinforced the message that Rome was on the rise again. The painting is one huge scene on one massive wall of the Sistine chapel. The giant fresco took Michelangelo five years to finish.

The content behind the painting was a depiction of the second coming of Christ, the resurrection. Michelangelo’s challenges in the painting included: how he was going to depict the heavens, how he was going to make the angels look different form the humans, how to make the demons look evil without making them look to imaginative.

 In the fresco Michelangelo placed Christ in the center of the action like most renaissance art. Placed in the large composition are the dead in the lower left hand corner and hell in the lower right. The figures on Christ’s right are rising to join the saved and the figures on the other side are entering hell. Michelangelo made Christ look like earlier depictions of Christ to show a newly resurrected Christ. Christ looks to the figures in damnation as if commanding them to go to where they belong. All of the figures are extremely spiritual showing ideal strength. Michelangelo depicts the figures with new idealized and perfect bodies. If they had previously been mutilated deformed or destroyed they are now beautiful and perfect. It is possible but not certain that Michelangelo painted himself in the figure of Bartholomew to show that the old withered boy he has now would not be his last. That he will someday be re-gifted with an idealized body different than that of his earthly body.

The figures seem to be leaning in and surrounding Christ showing more engagement that other paintings of the last judgment. In surrounding god it shows the figures choice in following god or sin. They all have a choice.

Michelangelo made a huge shift from traditions in this painting by depicting the angels without wings and making them look more human like. The bodies must all be nude according to Michelangelo, to shed distinction and to discard placement in society. The figures originally had no clothing or drapery. 

Hall, Marcia, After Raphael: Reception of the Last Judgment  pp189-193

 Michelangelo’s last judgment had many objections because of the nudity depicted in the fresco. Pope Paul considered having the fresco destroyed. Changes were made by Daniel da Volterra. He added loincloths to the offending parts of the figures during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The clothing was never removed because they were thought to hold an important place in history.

 The images were thought to have violated the second commandment,”you shall not make for yourself any graven image.”

Gilio had written harsh things about Michelangelo’s painting. How nothing was right, from the image of Christ to the sequence of events in the painting. He thought Michelangelo’s figures were showing too much contrapposto and strain. He believed the figures should be show with the right amount as in normal life, not an exaggerated twist. Gilio’s writings seemed to be a warning to all painters about what was to be expected in future paintings. Gilio was looking for a painter that didn’t exaggerate form, a humble painter that didn't have a big ego.

SSTEIN Research Proj- Raphael’s Cartoons for the Sistine Chapel Tapestries

V & A (n.d) The Raphael Cartoons. Retrieved from
 http://www.vam.ac.uk/users/node/1718

In Christ’s Charge to Peter, Christ is speaking to the disciples and telling peter that he will give him the keys of the kingdom of heaven. After Christ’s resurrection he appears before the disciples and charges peter to feed his sheep. The religious context indicates that Christ selected peter as the foundation of the church. In the cartoon Christ points towards the flock of sheep and with his other hand points at peter, appointing him to his position in the church. Leonardo’s intention was to make the focal point of the composition to be in the direction of Christ pointing figure to the kneeling ST. Peter.

Raphael
'Christ's Charge to Peter'
1515-16

In Raphael’s ‘Paul preaching at Athens’, Paul is shown talking to the Areopagus at Athens. The Areopagus is known as the seat of judicial councilors. There are two men behind Paul as he preaches, these men could have been molded after Pope Leo and Janus Lascaris. Pope Leo was very interested in what Paul had to say. This represent him following in Paul’s footsteps. The bottom two figures in the right of the painting are thought to not have been painted by Raphael himself. They are thought to have been painted by his follower Giulio Romano because they seem to be an afterthought that does not fit the composition in either scale or form.

Raphael
'Paul Preaching at Athens'
1515-16

SSTEIN Research Proj- Raphael’s Cartoons for the Sistine Chapel Tapestries

Freedberg Continued
Freedberg, Painting of the High Renaissance, Oberhuber, Hall. 280-293

In the creation of the Cartoons for the Sistine chapel, Raphael made each tapestry contains a scene that he focused on making with the intention to achieve a maximum coherent lucidity. The form and content has a lucidity that most none of his other works contained. Each of the tapestries is also more explicit in form and classical style than his previous works. The shape in which the important elements of the tapestries are arranged is extremely compact. The designs seem simpler than that of most frescos, and less ornamentally decorated. The geometrical designs and placements of figures is more obvious to the eye. The perspective in the cartoons is clear, but there is no longer a need for perspective. The shape and masses of the figures fill the space in the cartoons. In some of the designs the figures create a rectangular whole shaped solid that acts as a deep relief. The appearance seems to be a classical relief style. The classical antiquity in the figures and the visual information in the cartoons blends well with the style approached to show the clarity of generalization in designs. (280)

In the cartoons, the dominant theme is the sense of humanity in the actors of the scenes. The effect of the characters scale, shape in space, and actions within the composition are composed formally and conceptually. The clarity in the design that is instantly legible by the viewer creates dramatic action within the composition. The gestures in the cartoons have strong expressions with strong significance, and the gestures are extremely vigorous and lucid.  The hierarchy of the characters is not placed on the size they are or the position they are located in the scene, the hierarchy and social status placement is characterized by the role each individual plays in the scene itself. The figures are very naturally composed and look humanistic, but also have a spiritual force. (281) there is a sense of action and reaction amongst the charters represented that relate the figures and create meaning. There is a direction of movement in each design that depicts the sequence of events in each of the dramatic cartoons. (282)

The cartoons were created to show emphasis. There is strong clarity in the expression of the gestures and faces of the figures. The meaning and expressions show a forceful emphasis on the meaning and iconography rather than a graceful implication of the events being portrayed. (283)

The cartoon s have a strong contrapposto, but the interactions of the actors in the scenes are very harmonious and well composed. The major actors seem to be set in bold relief for emphasis where the minor actors are more set back and are merely stated and simplistic. (284)

The cartoons are very harmonious. There clarity and literal sense is more ideal. The simplicity expresses the idea in form and content, without the need for extremely decorated subjects. The colors used in the cartoons are more illusionistic than descriptive. The effect of color seems dry creating a leeched bronze tone that is set in an airless light. The colors used form muted reds and greens in the background create this different tonality and feeling. (287)