This imaginative reframing of the Renaissance presents its history
asthat of connections across Europe, where artists from the north
andsouth were products of the brilliantly fertile mix of classical
inspiration, observation, and self-consciousness that set European
culture alight from the fifteenth to the early seventeenth centuries.
From Leonardo da Vinci to Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel to Titian,
this stirring narrative sets the lives of artists against a period of
great change across the continent.
Across thirteen chapters, art critic and writer Jonathan Jones relates
the story of Renaissance artists as pioneers, adventurers, and by their
own rights "geniuses." He reveals how they were inspired by their
travels and encounters across Europe and beyond, such as the Aztec
treasures upon which Albrecht Dürer gazed with wonder in Brussels in
1520, or Antonello da Messina's arduous journey to Bruges to discover
the true nature of oil paint.
In this history of shared ideals, the arrival of a hitherto unknown
Netherlandish painter, Bruegel, in 1550s Rome carries the same
importance as the work Michelangelo was engrossed in at that very same
moment to raise the new Saint Peter's Basilica toward heaven. From
Italian palazzi and piazzas to German woods, the royal castle of Prague
to the Habsburg Empire, this engaging and evocative read will captivate
general readers and scholars alike.
