The Course

Part 1 of the course is split into two lectures on the origins and development of the Renaissance.

 

Lecture 1 outlines the origins of the Renaissance in a Europe recovering from the ravages of the Great Plauge. It explores the significance of the confluence of an empowered mercantile class and the rediscovery of ideas from antiquity. Including the science and mathematical ideas of the Ancient Greeks preserved in the Islamic world and the feats of engineering and grandiose architecture of Ancient Rome rediscovered in thirteenth century Italy.

 

Lecture 2 looks at the ascendency of Renaissance ideas, from the existential threat they faced during Savanarola's 'Bonfire of the Vanities' to the crowning glory of St. Peter's Basillica and the transformation of the Vatican. This lecture will address the rise and significance of influential Renaissance patrons including the Medici and the Borgia.

Part 2 of the course is also split into two lectures and this time focusses on the art and artists responsible for evolving the Renaissance style.

 

Lecture 1 traces the development of Renaissance art out of the late Gothic style. Beginning with transitional figures such as Massacio and Masolino, the lecture will look at the important pioneers of the Renaissance style from Fra Angelcio, to Donatello, Fillipo Lippi and Botticelli. As well as discussing painting and sculpture this lecture will also touch upon the important architectural commissions of the Renaissance such as the Orsanmichele and Baptistry of Florence.

 

Lecture 2 looks at the careers of the heros of the 'High Renaissance': Michaelangelo, Donatello and Raphael, their contribution to the emergence of the 'Northern school' school will be considered as well as their evolution of increasing artistic naturalism, and its offshoot Mannerism 



 

Intended to be a seminar as much as a lecture, this final session will be a discussion on the relative merits of the Renaissance and its role in shaping the modern world.

 

Celebrated as a time of heightened intellectual freedom and entrepreneurial opportunity the Renaissance is also responsible for laying the foundations for the financial system that continues to dominate the developed world.

 

Using the writing of contemporary commentators such as Dante and Erasmus as a springboard to discussion we will consider the importance of the development of Humanism and the ways it branched into the Empiricism, Idealism and Dualism that has preoccupied philsophers of the Modern era. We wil attempt to consider what Europe may now look like without the Renaissance and in so doing come to appreciate the debt that industrialisation, modern medicine and ultimately telecommunications owe to the Renaissance era.