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Giotto's Campanile
Giotto's Campanile (, also , ) is a free-standing campanile that is part of the complex of buildings that make up Florence Cathedral on the Piazza del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Standing adjacent to the Basilica of Santa Maria del Fiore and the Baptistry of St. John, the tower is one of the showpieces of Florentine Gothic architecture with its design by Giotto, its rich sculptural decorations and its polychrome marble encrustations. The slender structure is square in plan with 14.45 metre (47.41 ft) sides. It is 84.7 metres (277.9 ft) tall and has polygonal buttresses at each corner. The tower is divided horizontally into five stages. History On the death in 1302 of Arnolfo di Cambio, the first Master of the Works of the Cathedral, and after an interruption of more than thirty years, the celebrated painter Giotto di Bondone was nominated as his successor in 1334. At that time he was 67 years old. Giotto concentrated his energy on the design and construction of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arnolfo Di Cambio
Arnolfo di Cambio (c. 1240 – 1300/1310) was an Italian architect and sculptor. He designed Florence Cathedral and the sixth city wall around Florence (1284–1333), while his most important surviving work as a sculptor is the tomb of Cardinal de Braye in S. Domenico, Orvieto. Biography Arnolfo was born in Colle Val d'Elsa, Tuscany. He was Nicola Pisano’s chief assistant on the marble Siena Cathedral Pulpit for the Duomo in Siena Cathedral (1265–1268), but he soon began to work independently on an important tomb sculpture. In 1266–1267 he worked in Rome for King Charles I of Anjou, portraying him in the famous statue housed in the Campidoglio. Around 1282 he finished the monument to Cardinal Guillaume de Braye in the church of San Domenico in Orvieto, including an enthroned Madonna (a ''Maestà'') for which he took as a model an ancient Roman statue of the goddess Abundantia; the Madonna's tiara and jewels reproduce antique models. In Rome Arnolfo had seen the C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francesco Talenti
Francesco Talenti (''c''. 1300 – aft. 1369) was a Tuscan architect and sculptor who worked mainly in Florence after 1351. He is mentioned working at Orvieto Cathedral in 1325. In the 1350s he completed the two middle storeys of Giotto's Campanile, and two doorways, the Porta dei Cornacchini and the Porta del Campanile, respectively in the north and south sides of the Florentine ''Duomo''. In 1351 he succeeded Andrea Pisano Andrea Pisano (Pontedera 12901348 Orvieto) also known as Andrea da Pontedera, was an Italian sculptor and architect. Biography Pisano first learned the trade of a goldsmith. Pisano then became a pupil of Mino di Giovanni, about 1300, and wo ... as director of works of the cathedral. The cathedral's famous dome is first mentioned in 1357, but opinions differ whether Talenti was responsible for its inclusion or not. Talenti enlarged its structure by redesigning the apses and prolonging the nave, making the church the largest ever built in Europe so far. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black Death
The Black Death (also known as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality or the Plague) was a bubonic plague pandemic occurring in Western Eurasia and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. It is the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history, causing the deaths of people, peaking in Europe from 1347 to 1351. Bubonic plague is caused by the bacterium ''Yersinia pestis'' spread by fleas, but it can also take a secondary form where it is spread by person-to-person contact via aerosols causing septicaemic or pneumonic plagues. The Black Death was the beginning of the second plague pandemic. The plague created religious, social and economic upheavals, with profound effects on the course of European history. The origin of the Black Death is disputed. The pandemic originated either in Central Asia or East Asia before spreading to Crimea with the Golden Horde army of Jani Beg as he was besieging the Genoese trading port of Kaffa in Crimea (1347). From Crimea, it was most likely carried ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leon Battista Alberti
Leon Battista Alberti (; 14 February 1404 – 25 April 1472) was an Italian Renaissance humanist author, artist, architect, poet, priest, linguist, philosopher, and cryptographer; he epitomised the nature of those identified now as polymaths. He is considered the founder of Western cryptography, a claim he shares with Johannes Trithemius. Although he often is characterized exclusively as an architect, as James Beck has observed, "to single out one of Leon Battista's 'fields' over others as somehow functionally independent and self-sufficient is of no help at all to any effort to characterize Alberti's extensive explorations in the fine arts". Although Alberti is known mostly for being an artist, he was also a mathematician of many sorts and made great advances to this field during the fifteenth century. The two most important buildings he designed are the churches of San Sebastiano (1460) and Sant'Andrea (1472), both in Mantua. Alberti's life was described in Giorgio Vasari's ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Filippo Brunelleschi
Filippo Brunelleschi ( , , also known as Pippo; 1377 – 15 April 1446), considered to be a founding father of Renaissance architecture, was an Italian architect, designer, and sculptor, and is now recognized to be the first modern engineer, planner, and sole construction supervisor. In 1421, Brunelleschi became the first person to receive a patent in the Western world. He is most famous for designing the dome of the Florence Cathedral, a feat of engineering that had not been accomplished since antiquity, as well as the development of the mathematical technique of linear perspective in art which governed pictorial depictions of space until the late 19th century and influenced the rise of modern science. His accomplishments also include other architectural works, sculpture, mathematics, engineering, and ship design. His principal surviving works can be found in Florence. Biography Early life Brunelleschi was born in Florence, Italy, in 1377. His family consisted of his father, B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrea Pisano
Andrea Pisano (Pontedera 12901348 Orvieto) also known as Andrea da Pontedera, was an Italian sculptor and architect. Biography Pisano first learned the trade of a goldsmith. Pisano then became a pupil of Mino di Giovanni, about 1300, and worked with him on the sculpture for S. Maria della Spina at Pisa and elsewhere. He made his chief works in Florence, and the formation of his mature style was due rather to Giotto di Bondone than to his earlier master. Of the three world-famed bronze doors of the Baptistery in Florence, the earliest one on the south side was Pisano's work; he started it in 1330 and finished it in 1336. It consists of a number of small quatrefoil panels, the lower eight containing single figures of the Virtues, and the rest scenes from the life of John the Baptist. Andrea Pisano, while living in Florence, also produced many important works of marble sculpture, all of which strongly show Giotto's influence. In 1340 he succeeded Giotto as Master of the Works of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Luca Della Robbia
Luca della Robbia (, also , ; 1399/1400–1482) was an Italian Renaissance sculptor from Florence. Della Robbia is noted for his colorful, Tin-glazed pottery, tin-glazed terracotta statuary, a technique which he invented and passed on to his nephew Andrea della Robbia and great-nephews Giovanni della Robbia and Girolamo della Robbia. Though a leading sculptor in stone, he worked primarily in terracotta after developing his technique in the early 1440s. His large workshop produced both cheaper works cast from molds in multiple versions, and more expensive one-off individually modeled pieces. The vibrant, polychrome glazes made his creations both more durable and expressive. His work is noted for its charm rather than the drama of the work of some of his contemporaries. Two of his famous works are ''The Nativity'' () and ''Madonna and Child'' (). In stone his most famous work is also his first major commission, the choir gallery, ''Cantoria'' in the Florence Cathedral (1431–143 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bas-relief
Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term ''relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that the sculpted material has been raised above the background plane. When a relief is carved into a flat surface of stone (relief sculpture) or wood (relief carving), the field is actually lowered, leaving the unsculpted areas seeming higher. The approach requires a lot of chiselling away of the background, which takes a long time. On the other hand, a relief saves forming the rear of a subject, and is less fragile and more securely fixed than a sculpture in the round, especially one of a standing figure where the ankles are a potential weak point, particularly in stone. In other materials such as metal, clay, plaster stucco, ceramics or papier-mâché the form can be simply added to or raised up from the background. Monumental bronze reliefs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Siena
Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena. The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuries. Siena is also home to the oldest bank in the world, the Monte dei Paschi bank, which has been operating continuously since 1472. Several significant Renaissance painters worked and were born in Siena, among them Duccio, Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Simone Martini and Sassetta, and influenced the course of Italian and European art. The University of Siena, originally called ''Studium Senese'', was founded in 1240, making it one of the oldest universities in continuous operation in the world. Siena was one of the most important cities in medieval Europe, and its historic centre is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. From January until the end of September of 2021 it had about 217,000 arrivals, with the largest numbers of foreign visitors coming ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prato
Prato ( , ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, Italy, the capital of the Province of Prato. The city lies in the north east of Tuscany, at the foot of Monte Retaia, elevation , the last peak in the Calvana chain. With more than 200,000 inhabitants, Prato is Tuscany's second largest city (after Florence) and the third largest in Central Italy (after Rome and Florence). Historically, Prato's economy has been based on the textile industry and its district is the largest in Europe. The textile district of Prato is made up of about 7000 fashion companies, obtaining around 2 billion euros from exports. The renowned Datini archives are a significant collection of late medieval documents concerning economic and trade history, produced between 1363 and 1410. The city boasts important historical and artistic attractions, with a cultural span that started with the Etruscans and then expanded in the Middle Ages and reached its peak with the Renaissance, when artists such as Donatell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carrara
Carrara ( , ; , ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, in central Italy, of the province of Massa and Carrara, and notable for the white or blue-grey marble quarried there. It is on the Carrione River, some Boxing the compass, west-northwest of Florence. Its motto is ''Fortitudo mea in rota'' (Latin: "My strength is in the wheel"). Toponymy The word ''Carrara'' likely comes from the pre-Roman (Celtic languages, Celtic or Ligurian language (ancient), Ligurian) element ''kar'' (stone), through Latin ''carrariae'' meaning 'quarries'. History There were known settlements in the area as early as the ninth century BC, when the Apuan Ligures lived in the region. The current town originated from the borough built to house workers in the marble quarries created by the ancient Rome, Romans after their conquest of Liguria in the early second century BC. Carrara has been linked with the process of quarrying and carving marble since the Roman Age. Marble was exported from the nearby ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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