Just to warn you, this is what I like to call "idea vomiting." I am simply regurgitating everything I know about this subject without further research so I know where to start.
I just took Civ 1 where we talked about the Renaissance, but it was mainly focused on the arts. We talked a lot about Renaissance humanism, which spread rapidly. I'm going to post my work so far on Renaissance humanism, but the main components are (1) an emphasis on man, and his dignity and privileged place in the universe, (2) individualism, (3) a connection to fundamental classicism, and (4) an attempt to revive philosophical doctrines from antiquity.
Some other aspects of the Renaissance is that it was a time of war and much conflict, which surprised me because of the beautiful harmony reflected in art at the time. Machiavelli describes this political turmoil. Even the Pope was involved in warfare. However, the Pope was also involved in sponsering the arts. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the Pope at the time of Raphael worked with him a lot in order to create much of the art inside the Vatican.
It was also an age of exploration and when printing really began. Aldus Manutius was famous among Italian printers in Venice because of his beautiful italic typesetting. He did tons of classical work and printed fairly small volumes to be carried. This created much more access to information.
I believe another theme in the Renaissance was universalism. This was demonstrated by Leonardo da Vinci who was a man of both science and art. He dived into every area of science possible as well as created beautiful works of art that have remained famous throughout the ages. This was also shown by Alberti who did nearly everything on the planet.
There were also several other famous people at the time. Raphael was a young artist with many beautiful works, including The School of Athens. Donatello pioneered Renaissance sculpture through his rendition of David, the first male nude in bronze since antiquity. Brunelleschi pioneered Renaissance architecture which several astonishing works including the Florentine Chapel, Hospital for Foundings, and the Potsa Chapel. Botticelli completed many astonishing works, including Birth of Venus which represents many ideals from the Renaissance. Cellini sculpted many scenes from antiquity, including Perseus. Massaccio jump-started Renaissance painting and was greatly influenced by Giotto, Burlesque, and Donatello. He uses perspective to artfully make a significant figure the focus point. He also made characters more real and showed more emotion. He also went back to classical styles by painting many figures in the contraposto stance. Montaigne demonstrated individualism through personal essays. Lorenzo "the Magnificent" created some art himself while sponsoring many local artists. Cosimo de Medicci was also called Pater patrize, or father of the city. He was also a great patron to the arts. Michelangelo created many works in nearly all media, including sculpture and architecture. He also showed clear Neo-Platonist ideas through his paintings of the sistine chapel. Uccello was obsessed with perspective in his paintings which was new in the Renaissance. Piero della Francesca also painted with symbolic significance and wrote a book of perspective. Machiavelli wrote The Prince which challenged many humanist ideas, but he also tied greatly to classical works, which is a component of Renaissance Humanism. There are several other important contributors to the Renaissance, but this paragraph is already ridiculously long.
So I just realized how much I know about the Renaissance because I just outlined some main points, and I haven't even brought up Renaissance music yet or the development of many different instruments. I didn't even fully describe Renaissance humanism, but I will leave it at that and post my work on humanism from last semester. Hopefully, I will come to see how all of this information relates to digital civilization!
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