Art of the Renaissance and Impressionism, Research Paper Example

The relation between the art of the Renaissance and Impressionism remains a prescient question to art historians. A conceptual affinity may be discerned as common to both periods; however, Renaissance and Impressionist art appear to differentiate themselves in terms of a commitment to two radically distinct artistic styles. In the following, we shall provide an analysis of this relation.

When recapitulating the concept of Renaissance art, the foremost motif is the term “Renaissance” itself: it evokes a re-birth. This re-birth may be understood in two senses that appear at first glance to be contradictory: as a simultaneous breaking with and return to the past. Art historians temporally frame the Renaissance as occurring between the 1300s and the 1600s, and these dates help clarify the aforementioned return and break.  On stylistic, conceptual and thematic levels, the Renaissance suggests a break with the immediate past of the Middle Ages and its Christian dominated art; furthermore, it calls for a return to the cultural beginnings of Europe civilization, in the form of Ancient Greece and Rome. Certainly, the societal conditions, particularly in Italy, of an emerging new social consciousness contributed to this movement. This consciousness may be understood as an emphasis on humanism, which consisted philosophically of a re-appraisal of the Middle Ages as combined with a renewed importance given to non-Christian European culture. In consequence, the Renaissance marked a thorough revolution in objects of art, evoking the anatomical idealism of mythological art. Furthermore, new techniques were developed, with the introduction of perspective and a renewed attention paid to light and shadow. In essence, the Renaissance demarcates a complete re-evaluation of every possible feature of the work of art, however, with a continuity to both the Classical world and Christianity.

Impressionism begins two hundred years after the waning days of the Renaissance. Whereas the latter may be thought of as a greater cultural movement whose traces may be found in all aspects of intellectual and artistic life, Impressionism, although present in music and sculpture, is most closely connected with a specific style of painting. The art of Impressionism may be thought of as a certain synthesis of realism and perspectivism. The subject matters of Impressionism are realist in nature, such as the depictions of ordinary people and landscapes; nevertheless, the way they are painted recalls a unique perspective of its subject matter, as opposed to a faithful idealist copy of the latter. This concept can be clarified through what in philosophy is termed “qualia”: qualia are the subjective qualities, such as color and light, which are relative to the perceiver. That in impressionism the entire painting appears to form a cohesive breathing whole – as objects remain blurred and seem to flow into each other – recalls this notion of an emphasis on how objects are perceived as opposed to how they exist in themselves. Impressionism could therefore be viewed as consistent with the development of Renaissance humanism, however with this humanism taken to its most radical conclusions: humanism does not only suggest an idealized form of the human, but rather, the human perspective becomes central to the painting, insofar as perspectives are thought of as necessarily subjective and relative. This conceptual radicalization of humanism creates the potential to portray an object in the Impressionist style.

In this regard, the relation between the two periods can be thought of as a continuation of the humanist project. In essence, Impressionism suggests a certain de-idealization of the human form itself. This idea becomes clear when considering the rigorous studies of anatomy of the Renaissance and Impressionism’s approach to anatomy: The Renaissance attempted to maintain a fealty to the form of the human, while impressionism is an existentialism that attempts to paint according to how the human lives. Whether this difference suggests a deviation or continuation of a unified tradition depends on how one interprets the humanist core of both periods.

The above hypothesis may be supported by comparing two pieces: the impressionist Claude Monet’s “Woman with a Parasol” (1875) and one of the classics of the Renaissance, Michelangelo’s “David” (1504). Certainly, both pieces have a human being as the central thematic. However, the way the human form is portrayed shows the radical difference between the two periods. Michelangelo’s “David” represents a certain idealized type of the human form – the anatomy is sculpted to represent the perfection of human anatomy itself. Furthermore, the aim appears to depict the human from an exterior perspective, that is, to portray the most ideal human form possible. Monet’s approach is radically different – there is no acute anatomical presentation in “Woman with a Parasol”. Rather, Monet attempts to capture the lived experience of the human: in phenomenological terms, the embededness of the human in a Lebenswelt. When a person sees another person, sometimes the latter is immersed in shadow; sometimes the play of light makes forms, if only for an instant, indistinguishable. Moreover, there is a certain psychological motif involved in the painting of the woman, as it can be said that she is almost painted from memory, as opposed to being the reproduction of an idealized anatomical form. As such, Monet’s work, and Impressionism in general, can be understood as continuing the humanist insight of Renaissance art, however with an emphasis placed on how the human being lives as opposed to idealized representations of human life.

The influence of Renaissance art and Impressionism are present today. The impact of Impressionism is more evident in contemporary art, insofar as the latter does not accent the reproduction of forms in their idealized purity, but rather in how forms may be experienced either psychologically or existentially. It is particularly the Impressionist emphasis on a plurality of possible representations that is continued in the art of today, as opposed to the singular, idealized type of the Renaissance period.