Early Renaissance Art

The Feast of Herod and Beheading of St. John the Baptist ca. 1462, by Benozzo Gozzoli  tempera on panel Samual H. Kress Collection

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Early Renaissance painting, sculpture, and literature in Italy were also influenced by an influx of scholars who migrated to Rome following the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The arrival of these scholars generated new interest in ancient Greek and Roman learning with a re-examination of ancient Greek and Roman texts. This humanist learning and study of the antique was reflected in Early Renaissance art in painting, sculpture and literature. Early Renaissance artists of the 15th century began once again to study nature to gain an understanding of concepts like perspective and anatomy, knowledge lost since antiquity. The stylized works of Byzantine artists was replaced in the Early Renaissance by a return to naturalism. These extraordinary achievements were reflected in the art and architecture of the Early Renaissance.

Prominent Early Renaissance artists were people such as Masaccio, Donatello, Piero della Francesca, Perugino, Verrocchio, and Botticelli

Brenda Harness, Art Historian

For more information on Italian Renaissance Art and book recommendations, click here.