The study of anatomy came to a standstill during the Medieval age. The physical body carried sinful connotations and dissecting god's creation was strictly forbidden. The stifling of realistic depiction in favor of iconographic art is a phenomenon evident in art created during this time, such as Croix Peinte, painted around 1270 by an Ombrian artist for the Santa Maria Eglise in Assise. Bodily proportion is used haphazardly while scale is employed to indicate the importance of the various figures. Most bodies are draped in layers of clothing, while little to no attention is paid to depicting Christ's anatomy realistically.
Things changed in the 1300s, when master Italian fresco painters such as Giotto and Cimabue created frescos in churches that displayed greater naturalism in figure and gesture. This tendency toward greater realism and depiction of depth launched a rich movement of artistic creation, a 'rebirth' of classical learning, humanistic endeavors, and realistic depiction. During this era the human figure ceased to be a symbolic placeholder and once again took the stage as the celebratory focal point in works. Renaissance artists essentially 're-embodied' art.
This drastic shift in artistic representation of the human form parallels another rebirth. Anatomy, a field of study lain dormant since the age of the Romans, reemerged, and would remain a scientific and artistic discipline for the rest of time. Mondino da Luzzi, an Italian anatomist known as Mundinus, began to dissect cadavers, energizing the dormant field of anatomical study. Classical ideas of human body and soul as distinct entities found firm footing in 15th century Florence. These Platonic ideologies emphasized the physical body as an essential entity in and of itself. But artists seeking to illustrate and celebrate the human body in all its complicated realistic glory needed more information. Free from the vice-like grip of the church and hungry for anatomical information, artists sought out cadavers themselves and delved into studying the human body. This renewed interest in the physical body is illustrated by detailed carnal engravings such as Battle of Ten Nude Warriors (1472), shown below.
During this time in history, anatomy was a field shared by artists and medical practitioners. Leonardo Da Vinci, a man who bridged both worlds, produced a number of anatomical sketches in the 1400s in preparation for The Last Supper. Da Vinci dissected many cadavers and filled sketchbooks with accurate cross-hatched anatomical depictions.
In Venice in 1492 the Gregoriis brothers discovered a series of woodcuts with anatomical diagrams created by a dead physician named Johannes de Ketam. With an upper-class coffee-table market in mind, the brothers published the diagrams, along with an anatomical text written by Mundinus the Italian anatomist, in 1493. Fasciculo de Medicina was immensely popular and opened the floodgates of illustrated anatomical texts that motivated accurate figure drawing throughout the 1500s and 1600s.
This increased interest in anatomy and realistic depiction during the 1400s is reflected in much of the art I saw hanging in the Louvre collections this week. The piece below is a good work to illustrate the slow transition from Medieval to Renaissance art because it features simplified, iconographic elements alongside more nuanced forms. Many of the human figures are planar, frontal and stiff, hallmarks of Medieval Art. Yet the red figure on the right wielding a sword has a more naturalistic pose and indicates the artists interest in experimenting with movement of the human form.
While the piece below could be interpreted as just one more iconographic image of the Virgin Mary and child, it stands apart from Medieval Art because of increased depth and the naturalness of the figures' gestures. These elements are evidence of a greater attunement to human form on the part of the Renaissance-era artist.
Saint Jerome soutenant deux jeunes pendus, painted by Piterro Vannucci around 1473-1475, is equally illustrative of a greater attentiveness to the physical human body. Depicted in death, the two idealized nude figures sport exaggerated muscles and carefully rendered tendons in the neck and feet. While the proportions are not perfectly accurate, the artist clearly sought to illustrate elements of surface anatomy.
Also hanging at the Louvre and evocative of increasing anatomical insight is L'Alluno, painted by Niccolo di Liberatore for the Chapel of Saint Nicolas de Bari in Ombria in 1492. Though the muscles of the calves and abdomens are clearly simplified and exaggerated, the artist notates the various muscles of the abdomen and limbs with shading rather than the cartoonish lines of the previous century, such as the first painting in this post. Greater depth, depiction of volume, and naturalism in figure and posture emerged as common goals among Renaissance artists.
Apollon et Marsyas, painted by Petro de Cristoforo Vannucci around 1495, illustrates the 'rebirth' of classicism during the Renaissance and the 'rebirth' of the human form in all its anatomical glory. This piece epitomizes many themes found in early Renaissance art — the return of the nude human form as subject, realistic depiction mixed with a strong dose of idealism, and naturalism of form as artists strove for anatomical accuracy. During this time artists and medical practitioners were equally dedicated to the frontier of anatomical study, and this commitment is evident in both the anatomically-minded artworks and dissection-based literature published during the Early Renaissance.
This post marks the end of my fourth week of study for my independent project 'Art Embodied'. Keep an eye out for anatomical drawing 2, inspired by the Medieval and Early Renaissance eras, coming soon!
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