Italian Renaissance Art and Culture

Description: A study, analysis, and evaluation of the principal literary, artistic, philosophical, religious, and political developments in Italian Renaissance culture from c. 1350 to 1600. We will begin with the examination of the development of the Renaissance project of Christian Humanism: the unprecedented attempt to reconcile classical antiquity with Christianity. We will then proceed to study and analyze the artistic Renaissance in Florence, Rome, and Venice, invariably examining respective developments in literature, art, and architecture through the philosophical, religious, and political context of Renaissance culture in general. We will pay close attention to the important and unique dimensions of Florentine Christian Neoplatonism as we study the works of Brunelleschi, Donatello, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael, among others. The course will conclude with the study and analysis of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation and their impact on Renaissance history, philosophy, theology, and art, as well as their crucial importance for understanding later stages of Western history up to our own. Limited to students in the Honors Program.

Requirements: Students will be given specific reading assignments which they will be expected to have read before class; failure to do so will greatly compromise students’ ability to comprehend lecture material and, consequently, to do well on quizzes and exams. There will be a mid-term examination and final as well as four quizzes. The quizzes, midterm, and final will be comprised of 2-4 essay questions, which you will be given beforehand. The quizzes and tests will involve historical and theoretical questions. Quizzes and tests will be based on both lectures and readings.
Attendance: I strongly advice attending each class because what is being presented is not a repetition of a text but an interpretation of images and ideas, the culture, history, theology, philosophy, and theories that shaped them and that they in turn shaped and expressed. It will not be possible to reconstruct lectures from the assigned readings or, conversely, the readings from the lectures. Furthermore, there will not be an opportunity to makeup unexcused missed quizzes. Failure to attend class will make it extremely unlikely that you will do well in the course.

Grading: The midterm and final will not be cumulative. Grading will break down, roughly: Quizzes: 50% (12.5% each); Midterm: 25%; Final: 25%.