ROOT/Help on The Artists of the Renaissance/Glossary Glossary Byzantine - The body of Western Art created between the 6th and 13th centuries. This art shows the influence of artists from the Eastern Roman Empire centered at Byzantium (Constantinople). This art is characterized by the icon - religious pictures of stylized figures with fixed stares. dimensionalism - a style of spatial extent, expecially width, height, or length naturalism - factual or realistic representation in art or literature relief - a mode of sculpture in which forms and figures are distinguished from a surrounding plane surface cartoon - a preliminary or full scale sketch, as for a fresco realism - an inclination towards objective truth and pragmatism humanism - A Renaissance movement that emphasized secular concerns as a result of the rediscovery of Classical literature, art, and civilization Gothic - Gothic art, with its strong religious overtones, developed around the middle of the 11th century in Northern Europe, and from there spread throughout Europe lasting up through the 16th century. In Italy its main spheres of development were in North Central Italy. Gothic art and architecture are characterized by gentle shapes, pure and harmonious lines, and elongated figures. In painting, pale and delicate colors are used. Simone Martini and Gentile da Fabriano represent this style. Mannerism - In the late 16th century, painters known as "mannerists" began to break away from the rigid formalism of the kind of Renaissance art which is typified by Raphael. The characteristics of this style show a freer, more complex and less rigid style of composition. Bronzio is a representative of this period. abstract - a genre of painting whose intellectual and affective content depends solely on what is inherent within chiaroscuro - the technique of using light and shade in pictorial representation sfumato - the definition of form without abrupt outline by delicate gradation from light to shadow producing an atmospheric effect modeling - to shape or fashion in a pliable material ; to give a 3-dimensional appearance to painting or drawing by means of chiaroscuro altarpiece - a work of art to decorate the space above and behind the altar apocalypse - writing professing to reveal the future apse - a projecting part of a building usually semi-circular in plan and vaulted (e.g. the bishop's seat or throne in ancient churches usually in the apse at the eastern end of the choir) bottega - the studio or workshop of a major artist in which other artists may participate in the execution of projects or commissions of the major artist campanile - a bell tower, usually freestanding nave - the main part of the interior of a church (e.g. the long narrow central hall in a cruciform church that rises higher than the aisles flanking it) basilica - an early Christian church consisting of nave and aisles with clerestory, sometimes a narthex, and a large high transept from which an apse projects and in its simplest form having a wooden roof, brick walls, and decorations used in mosaics or interior painting cathedral - a church that contains the official throne of a bishop (cathedra) and that is officially the principal church of a diocese oculus - a round opening in a dome (eye-shaped) pietra forte - "strong stone" pietra serena - "peaceful stone" diptych - a picture or series of pictures painted on two tablets connected by hinges triptych - a picture serving as an altarpiece and consisting of a central panel and two flanking panels of half its size that fold over it polyptych - an arrangement of four or more panels usually hinged and folding together perspective - the technique of representing on a plane or curved surface the space relationships of objects as they appear to the eye vault / ribbed - an arched structure of masonry usually forming a ceiling or roof in which solid ribs carry the vaulted surface terracotta - a usually low-fired and typically reddish unglazed ceramic material guelph - a member of a political faction in Italy from the 12th to 15th centuries that opposed the authority of the German emperors in Italy and was made up of a church party asserting the papacy to be independent of the emperors and a party of principalities and city republics contending for their own rights and liberties foreshortening - representation in art or literature in a mode of shortening by proportionally contracting in the direction of depth so that an illusion or extension of space is obtained contraposto - a position of the depicted human body in which twisting of the vertical axis results in hips, shoulders, and head turned in different directions icon - a venerated representation of Chirst, an angel, or a saint, found in Greek and Orthodox Eastern churches tempera - process of painting using pigments mixed with size, casein or egg, instead of oil linear - pertaining to or consisting of, a line ; drawn in lines stylized - to make conform to convention static - pertaining to bodies at rest or in equilibrium; motionless elongated - lengthened; extended fresco - a method of mural decoration on walls with fresh, still damp, plaster frieze - a decorative horizontal band, as along the upper part of a wall in a room