Fra Angelico (Metropolitan Museum of Art Series)

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Fra Angelico

Description

Fra Giovanni da Fiesole (c. 1390/95-1455), known as Fra Angelico, was possibly the most celebrated religious painter of the Italian Early Renaisance. Adhering to the austere life of a Dominican monastery despite his huge success, Fra Angelico's contemporary biographer Giorgio Vasari said of him 'it is impossible to bestow too much praise on this holy father, who was so humble and modest in all that he did and said and whose pictures were painted with such facility and piety.' Originally trained as an illuminator, Fra Angelico went on to paint altarpieces that even early on in his career showed great skill in the rendering of the figures, composition and use of colour. Perhaps his most famous works however are the astonishing frescos that decorate the cells, corridors and Chapter House of San Marco Monastery in Florence, to where Fra Angelico moved in 1436 along with many of the monks from the Fiesole monastery in which they had been living.A magnificent altarpiece was also among the commissions for the newly built monastery, which showed an unprecedented realism in the intimate arrangement of the holy figures. Diane Cole Ahl's engaging text is combined with almost 200 images to create a book that is both informative and visually stunning. The works are discussed in detail, in the context of the time and places in which they were created, and Fra Angelico's influence, both directly on his pupils such as Benozzo Gozzoli, and more wide-ranging on the artists that followed in the later Renaissance, is also examined. The original viewpoints of the author and the hitherto unpublished artwork of a newly restored predella ensure that Fra Angelico will appeal to the specialised reader as well as students and those with an interest in art history.

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Fra Angelico

Description

Nicknamed "Angelico" for his clear and tender style, this artist, who was also a Dominican friar, was considered in his lifetime the greatest Italian painter of his generation.

In his engaging new appraisal, John Spike discusses how Angelico's painting reveals important artistic innovations, from his use of linear perspective to his invention of the Renaissance altarpiece known as the sacra conversazione (sacred conversation). As the author persuasively demonstrates, his precision with Greek, Latin, and Hebrew inscriptions placed him in the center of the new theological debates of the time. This Dominican friar fulfilled some of the most remarkably learned early humanistic projects, from his early Annunciations, to his ambitious series of large frescoes for the Dominican monastery of San Marco in Florence, to papal commissions including the private chapel for the humanist Pope Nicholas V.

This essential volume contains an extensive essay on the artist's life and work, followed by large color plates with detailed discussions of individual works and a catalog of the artist's oeuvre. Lavish details of Angelico's works and an up-to-date bibliography make this volume indispensable for anyone interested in this critical period of the Renaissance.

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Fra Angelico: Colour Library (Phaidon Colour Library)

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This series acts as an introduction to key artists and movements in art history. Each title contains 48 full-page colour plates, accompanied by extensive notes, and numerous comparative illustrations in colour or black and white, a concise introduction, select bibliography and detailed source information for the images. Monographs on individual artists also feature a brief chronology.

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Fra Angelico at San Marco

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Fra Angelico's fresco paintings at the Dominican priory of San Marco are among the best-loved works of Italian art, yet they have been oddly neglected by art historians. In this book, William Hood analyzes the newly cleaned frescoes at San Marco, setting them against the background of 15th-century Florentine artistic, political, cultural, and religious history. Hood discusses the ideals, daily rituals, and pictorial traditions of the Dominican order - especially the reformed or Observant branch to which Fra Angelico belonged. He presents new material on traditions of religious art, altarpiece design and imagery, and the decoration of chapter rooms and cloisters. Hood compares Angelico's work at San Marco to earlier Dominican altarpieces and to Angelico's other alterpieces for Dominican buildings in Siena, Pisa, Prato, and Florence, pointing out both the traditional elements and the novelty of the San Marco altarpiece. Similarly, by comparing San Marco to other Florentine fresco cycles, he illuminates the originality of the cloister and chapter-house of San Marco. Hood's discussion of San Marco follows and itinerary through the church and adjoining convent buildings, beginning with the high altarpiece and ending with the corridor paintings - especially the exquisite "Annunciation" in the dormitory corridor. Throughout, he analyzes Angelico's use of colour, his technique in fresco and tempera, the way he solved specific visual problems and how his paintings affected 15th-century viewers.

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Fra Angelico (Masters of Italian Art)

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The volumes in this bibliophile series provide unique portraits of European art history. Readers gain fascinating insights into the artists' biographies and their styles: Durer and his famous portraits and altarpieces, the vivid farm scenes of Pieter Bruegel, the great painters of the Italian Renaissance, the symphonies in color of Titian, the mysterious chiaroscuro paintings of Caravaggio, the rococo worlds of Antoine Watteau, and the great historical paintings created by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. Authoritative texts illuminate the decisive stages in the artists' lives and the development of their styles, explaining their impact against the background of their social context as well as their significance for following generations of artists. Plentiful large sized illustrations showcase each artist's oeuvre. Each volume contains a comprehensive appendix providing information on the artists' biographies in tabular form as well as an extensive bibliography. Each of the authors of the individual volumes is renowned in his or her field.

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