Week 14, Locating Renaissance Art, Chapter 6, Art in fifteenth-century Venice: 'an aesthetic of diversity'

Introduction

Carol Richardson introduces this chapter by explaining Venice's almost unique position within Western Europe of contacts with the East. She explains Venice's strong trading position throughout the Mediterranean and beyond, but looks particularly at the influence of the many different cultures on Venice, its society and its own culture. Of the East she points out that care should be taken not to confuse the very different cultures of the Islamic and the Byzantine.

1. A distinctive place

Paul Wood explains that the distinctiveness of Venice lies in the wide diversity of peoples populating the city and of the cultures that they brought. Venice had a long tradition of trading especially with the East, and the distinctive Byzantine and Islamic architecture and art mixed with those of mainland Italy and Northern Europe to create the city's uniqueness. It lacked antiquity and so its Renaissance was an import of ideas and images from other places. As a trading hub it was at the forefront of new developments especially technology. Printing flourished in Venice, and Durer twice visited the city from his German homeland.

2. Two devotional paintings

Focusing on two works of Giovanni Bellini Madonna Greca (c.1470) (CB2 P6.7 p222) and the San Giobbe altarpiece c.1480 (CB2 P6.13 p228) Paul Wood explores how Venice's unique position and its links through its wide trading network, with both the East and Northern Europe come together in creating its 'Renaissance style'. A lengthy section covers:

- Venice's Byzantine influences, St. Mark's cathedral particularly it's mosaics and its venerated icon Blessed Virgin Nikopoia (CB2 P6.6 p221).

- The established gothic influence with its use of gold and flat surface.

- The arrival of oilpainting that suited the Venetian love of light and surface effects.

Vasari dismisses Byzantine painting as '...that rude Greek manner' (CB2 p221) but in Venice its tradition of evoking religious contemplation, its use of gold and lack of spatial awareness became incorporated into the artistic development.

3. A portrait

The portrait in question is Portrait of Mehmet II (1480) oil on canvas (CB2 P6.14 p230) by Gentile Bellini who was sent to paint the Ottoman Emperor as part of the peace agreement between Venice and the Ottoman Empire. Bellini spent a year and a half in Constantinople and his image together with those of Constanza da Ferrara, medal of Mehmet II 1481 (CB2 P6.17 p233) did much to establish the image of the Turkish otherness that became used in Western art by the likes of Durer. Some of these images were positive, but many negative as the fear and suspicion of the Eastern Islamic Empire spread through the Christian West.

4. Some history paintings

This is a review of a number of paintings completed in Venice some of which show scenes of Venice and others imaginary scenes set in the East. The theme that links them however, are views of the 'otherness' of the East and Islamic culture. They tend to reinforce the idea that representations are drawn from a very limited pool of images, that mix both Ottoman and Mamluk dress and ideas such as seen in for example Gentile Bellini's Saint Mark Preaching in Alexandria c.1504-7 (CB2 P6.27 p243) but which also have a familiarity to the architecture of Venice and hence tend to show the conversion of Islam to Christianity alongside the notion of the predominance of Venice over the East.

Conclusion

Paul Wood's wonderful conclusion which includes speculation on the future, particularly of the pre-dominance of the Western canon of art, does however, draw together the manner in which this chapter has shown some aspects of the social and cultural diversity of 15th Century Venice and how that affected the art of the period and particularly its relationships with the East in its several manifestations.