Classicism

Ancient Greece and Rome

Plato and Aristotle

order and rationality
clarity
emotional restraint
elegance
objectivity
simplicity
balance, symmetry, proportion
excellence

primarily upperclass/nobility

14 C. Roman and Florentine Renaissances

Renaissance classicism introduced a host of elements into European culture, including the
application of mathematics and empiricism into art, humanism, literary and depictive realism,
and formalism. Importantly it also introducedPolytheism, or "paganism", and the juxtaposition
of ancient and modern.

Roman Renaissance

sculpture: Pieta by Buonarroti
a) classical influences: Christ sculpted like ancient Greek god. Mary is composed,
restrained, serene.
b) New direction: did not follow standard proportions for human form (allows for a
more compact elegant design, heightened expression)

painting: School of Athens by Raphael
a) artist-scholar, vision of one Golden Age, the Renaissance, and connects it with the
Golden Age of Greece
b) classical in subject and design
c) considered by many to be summation of Renaissance art. Celebrates Renaissance
ideals of perfection, beauty, noble principles. Masterful linear perspective
d) two schools of philosophy represented by two classical thinkers: Platos more
abstract and metaphysical, and Aristotles more earthly and physical

Florentine Renaissance

Individual personality highly regarded (unlike Hellenic Classicists who depicted generalized
types)

David by Donatello
a) first life-size bronze nude sculpture in-the-round since antiquity
b) exhibits serenity, curving posture and modeled body of its classical ancestors but also
a sensual awareness that Hellenic sculpture did not exhibit.

18
th
C. Age of Enlightenment (Neoclassicism)

Reason, rationality (knowing)
Science, scientific method
Universe is orderly, knowable
Emergence of secular authority
Education level for non-noble citizenry considerably increased

new ideas about human nature and rights
middle class rights

painting: Death of Socrates by Jacques Louis David
a) classicism: muted colors, symmetry in balance, arch in the building of the jail, lamps,
socratess body is sculpted face is serene. story comes from classics
b) new direction: more emotional, shown in tenseness of muscles and uplifted hand
pointing condemning finger. wailing men in the background . Socrates still teaching even
as he is dying shows knowledge is important.

Architecture: Rotunda at University of Virginia Thomas Jefferson
a) classicism: modeled after the Pantheon in Rome. Balance, symmetry
b) devoted to learning, meant to be the heart of the academical village, as Jefferson
put it. "authority of nature and power of reason"

Music: Haydn, Mozart, early beethoven