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The Renaissance

New Themes

Even when working in traditional media, the Italians began working in new themes. Most prominent among these was the use of ancient Roman and Greek mythology. Painting in the Middle Ages was almost universally concerned with religious themes, but in 15th century Italy, artists began to create works that had no reference to Christian themes at all.

In fact, some paintings seem to celebrate paganism. They show gods and goddesses at play, reveling in life. Other works have a religious theme but place the scene in a classical Roman setting, or in a carefully-realized Italian city. And some paintings, religious is theme, are investigations into the use of color or perspective or composition, and seem only formally concerned with religion.

The other new type of painting was the portrait. Portraiture was unknown in the Middle Ages, and only came into prominence in Italy in the later 15th century. From then on we see a profusion of such works--detailed studies of individuals, some of whom were princes but others who were simply merchants wealthy enough to pay the fees.

These new themes also serve to mark Renaissance art very distinctly apart from medieval art. Changes in theme were very closely tied to the changed conditions of the artists themselves, and in their relations to their customers.