Renaissance in the Low Countries

Last updated

The Renaissance in the Low Countries was a cultural period in the Northern Renaissance that took place in around the 16th century in the Low Countries (corresponding to modern-day Belgium, the Netherlands and French Flanders).

Contents

Culture in the Low Countries at the end of the 15th century was influenced by the Italian Renaissance, through trade via Bruges, which made Flanders wealthy. Its nobles commissioned artists who became known across Europe. In science, the anatomist Andreas Vesalius led the way; in cartography, Gerardus Mercator's map assisted explorers and navigators. In art, Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting went from the strange work of Hieronymus Bosch to the everyday life of Pieter Brueghel the Elder. In architecture, music and literature too, the culture of the Low Countries moved into the Renaissance style.

Geopolitical situation and background

Map showing the political situation in the Low Countries between 1556 and 1648. The Low Countries.png
Map showing the political situation in the Low Countries between 1556 and 1648.

In 1500, the Seventeen Provinces were in a personal union under the Burgundian Dukes, and with the Flemish cities as centers of gravity, culturally and economically formed one of the richest parts of Europe. During the course of the century the region also experienced significant changes. Humanism and Reformation led to a rebellion against the Spanish rule of Philip II of Spain and the start of the religious war. By the end of the 16th century the Northern and Southern Netherlands were effectively split. While this fracture was reflected in the visual arts by the Dutch Golden Age in the north and the Flemish Baroque in the south, other areas of thought remained associated with 16th-century currents of Renaissance thought. Gradually, the balance of power shifted away from the Southern Netherlands, which remained under Spanish authority, to the emerging Dutch Republic. [1]

Two factors determined the fate of the region in the 16th century. The first was the union with the kingdom of Spain through the 1496 marriage of Philip the Handsome of Burgundy and Juana of Castile. Their son, Charles V, born in Ghent, would inherit the largest empire in the world, and the Netherlands, although a prominent part of the empire, became dependent on a large foreign power.

A second factor included religious developments. The Middle Ages gave way to new modes of religious thinking. Devotio Moderna practices, for example, were particularly strong in the region, while the 16th-century criticisms of the Catholic Church that spread throughout Europe also reached the Low Countries. Humanists such as Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam were critical but remained loyal to the church. However, the spread of the Protestant Reformation, started by Martin Luther in 1517, eventually led to outright war. The Reformation, particularly the ideas of John Calvin, gained significant support in the Low Countries, and following the 1566 iconoclastic outbreaks Spain attempted to quell the tide and maintain the authority of the post-Tridentine Church through force by installing Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alba. [2] The repression that followed led to the Dutch Revolt, the beginning of the Eighty Years War, and the establishment of the Dutch Republic in the northern provinces. Subsequently, the Southern Netherlands became a bastion for the Counter Reformation, while Calvinism was the main religion of those in power in the Dutch Republic.

Influence of the Italian Renaissance

Desiderius Erasmus in 1523 Holbein-erasmus.jpg
Desiderius Erasmus in 1523

Trade in the port of Bruges and the textile industry, mostly in Ghent, turned Flanders into the wealthiest part of Northern Europe at the end of the 15th century. The Burgundian court dwelled mostly in Bruges, Ghent and Brussels. The nobles and rich traders were able to commission artists, creating a class of highly skilled painters and musicians who were admired and requested around the continent. [3]

This led to frequent exchanges between the Low Countries and Northern Italy. Examples are Italian architects Tommaso Vincidor and Alessandro Pasqualini, who worked in the Low Countries for most of their careers, Flemish painter Jan Gossaert, whose visit to Italy in 1508 in the company of Philip of Burgundy left a deep impression, [1] musician Adrian Willaert who made Venice into the most important musical centre of its time [3] (see Venetian School) and Giambologna, a Flemish sculptor who spent his most productive years in Florence.

Before 1500, the Italian Renaissance had little or no influence above the Alps. After this Renaissance influences moved northward, but unlike the Italian Renaissance, Gothic elements remained important. The revival of the classical period is also not a central theme like in Italy, the "rebirth" shows itself more as a return to nature and earthly beauty. [3]

Renaissance in the Low Countries

Art

Hell, the right panel from the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch Hieronymus Bosch - The Garden of Earthly Delights - Hell.jpg
Hell, the right panel from the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch
Landscape with the Fall of Icarus after Pieter Bruegel the Elder Bruegel, Pieter de Oude - De val van icarus - hi res.jpg
Landscape with the Fall of Icarus after Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Fifteenth-century painting in the Low Countries still shows strong religious influences, contrary to the Germanic painting. Even after 1500, when Renaissance influences begin to show, the influence of the masters from the previous century leads to a largely religious and narrative style of painting.

The first painter showing the marks of the new era is Hieronymus Bosch. His work is strange and full of seemingly irrational imagery, making it difficult to interpret. [1] Most of all it seems surprisingly modern, introducing a world of dreams that highly contrasts with the traditional style of the Flemish masters of his day.

After 1550, the Flemish and Dutch painters begin to show more interest in nature and in beauty an sich, leading to a style that incorporates Renaissance elements, but remains very far from the elegant lightness of Italian Renaissance art, [3] and directly leads to the themes of the great Flemish and Dutch Baroque painters: landscapes, still lifes and genre painting – scenes from everyday life. [1]

This evolution is seen in the works of Joachim Patinir and Pieter Aertsen, but the true genius among these painters was Pieter Brueghel the Elder, well known for his depictions of nature and everyday life, showing a preference for the natural condition of man, choosing to depict the peasant instead of the prince.

The Landscape with the Fall of Icarus , now thought to be an early copy, combines several elements of northern Renaissance painting. It hints at the renewed interest for antiquity (the Icarus legend), but the hero Icarus is hidden away in the background. The main actors in the painting are nature itself and, most prominently, the peasant, who does not even look up from his plough when Icarus falls. Brueghel shows man as an anti-hero, comical and sometimes grotesque. [3]

Architecture and sculpture

As in painting, Renaissance architecture took some time to reach the Low Countries, and did not entirely supplant Gothic elements. [4] The most important sculptor in the Southern Netherlands was Giambologna, who spent most of his career in Italy. An architect directly influenced by the Italian masters was Cornelis Floris de Vriendt, who designed the city hall of Antwerp, finished in 1564.

Sluter, The Well of Moses, 1395-1405 Well of Moses at CMArt (Cropped).JPG
Sluter, The Well of Moses, 1395-1405

In sculpture, however, 15th-century Netherlandish artists, while adhering to Christian subjects, developed techniques and a naturalistic style which compares favorably to the work of early-Renaissance Italian contemporaries such as Donatello. Claus Sluter (fl. ~1400) produced works such as the Well of Moses with a dynamism almost unknown at the turn of the 15th century; and Dutch-born Nikolaus Gerhaert van Leyden (b. ~1420) made sculptures such as "Man Meditating", which even today appear more "modern" than does Italian Quattrocento carving.

Gerhaert, Man Meditating, 1467 Nicolaus von Leyden, Self-portrait2.JPG
Gerhaert, Man Meditating, 1467

In the early-17th century Dutch Republic, Hendrick de Keyser plays an important role in developing the Amsterdam Renaissance style, not slavishly following the classical style but incorporating many decorative elements, giving a result that could also be categorized as Mannerism. Hans Vredeman de Vries was another important name, primarily as a garden architect.

Music

Orlande de Lassus leading a chamber ensemble, painted by Hans Mielich Orlando de Lassus2.jpg
Orlande de Lassus leading a chamber ensemble, painted by Hans Mielich

Although there is no reference to antiquity, there is a clear Flemish "Renaissance consciousness", as indicated by the words of Flemish theorist Johannes Tinctoris, who said of these Franco-Flemish composers: "Although it is beyond belief, nothing worth listening to had been composed before their time". [1]

Josquin des Prez was the most celebrated composer during the High Renaissance, and during his career enjoyed the patronage of three popes. Equally at ease in secular and religious music. [1]

Other important composers from the Low Countries were Guillaume Dufay, Johannes Ockeghem, Jacob Clemens non Papa and Adrian Willaert. Orlande de Lassus, a Fleming who had lived in Italy as a youth and spent most of his career in Munich, was the leading composer of the late Renaissance.

Literature

Antwerp City Hall (finished in 1564) 0 Antwerp town hall (1).JPG
Antwerp City Hall (finished in 1564)

In the middle of the 16th century, a group of rhetoricians (see Medieval Dutch literature) in Brabant and Flanders attempted to put new life into the stereotyped forms of the preceding age by introducing in original composition the new-found branches of Latin and Greek poetry. The leader of these men was Johan Baptista Houwaert, who was led by an unbounded love of classical and mythological fancy. [5]

The most important genre was music publishing, especially psalms. The Souterliedekens publication is one of the most important sources for the reconstruction of Renaissance folksongs. Later publishing was heavily influenced by the rebellion against the Spanish: heroic battle songs and political ballads ridiculing the Spanish occupants.

Best remembered of the writers is Philips van Marnix, lord of Sint-Aldegonde, who was one of the leading spirits in the war of Dutch independence. He wrote a satire on the Roman Catholic Church, started to work on a Bible translation and allegedly wrote the lyrics to the Dutch national anthem.

Other important names are Dirck Volckertszoon Coornhert, Hendrick Laurensz. Spieghel and Roemer Visscher. Inevitably, their works and career were very much determined by the struggle between Reformation and the Catholic Church.

Science

Gerardus Mercator's map of Europe, 1554 MercatormapFullEurope16thcentury.jpg
Gerardus Mercator's map of Europe, 1554

The new age presents itself in science as well. Flemish anatomist Andreas Vesalius's life typically shows both the new possibilities and the troubles that came with them. He delivered ground-breaking work on human anatomy, after centuries of disregard for it. This earned him great respect from some, but also caused several enquiries into his methods (dissection of the human body) and the religious implications of his work.

While Vesalius performed ground-breaking work in rediscovering the human body, Gerardus Mercator, as one of the leading cartographers of his time, did the same for rediscovering the outside world. Mercator too came into trouble with the Church because of his beliefs, and spent several months in jail after a conviction for heresy.

Both scientists' lives show how the Renaissance scientist is not afraid of challenging what has been taken for granted for centuries, and how this leads to problems with the all-powerful Catholic Church.

Though the invention of the printing press by Laurens Janszoon Coster in the 1430s appears to be a romantic notion, the Low Countries had an early start in printing. By 1470 a printing press was in use in Utrecht, where the first dated extant book was printed in 1473, while the first book in the Dutch language was the 1477 Delft Bible. By 1481 the Low Countries had printing shops in 21 cities and towns. [6] Famous publishing houses like those of Christoffel Plantijn in Antwerp from 1555 on, Petrus Phalesius the Elder in Leuven from 1553, and the House of Elzevir in Leiden from around 1580 turned the Low Countries into a regional center of publishing.

See also

Political situation

Arts

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Renaissance</span> European cultural period of the 14th to 17th centuries

The Renaissance is a period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and surpass the ideas and achievements of classical antiquity. Associated with great social change in most fields and disciplines, including art, architecture, politics, literature, exploration and science, the Renaissance was first centered in the Republic of Florence, then spread to the rest of Italy and later throughout Europe. The term rinascita ("rebirth") first appeared in Lives of the Artists by Giorgio Vasari, while the corresponding French word renaissance was adopted into English as the term for this period during the 1830s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pieter Bruegel the Elder</span> Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painter

Pieter Bruegelthe Elder was among the most significant artists of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes ; he was a pioneer in presenting both types of subject as large paintings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jan Brueghel the Elder</span> Flemish painter (1568–1625)

Jan Brueghelthe Elder was a Flemish painter and draughtsman. He was the son of the eminent Flemish Renaissance painter Pieter Bruegel the Elder. A close friend and frequent collaborator with Peter Paul Rubens, the two artists were the leading Flemish painters in the first three decades of the 17th century.

The designation Franco-Flemish School, also called Netherlandish School, Burgundian School, Low Countries School, Flemish School, Dutch School, or Northern School, refers to the style of polyphonic vocal music composition originating from France and from the Burgundian Netherlands in the 15th and 16th centuries as well as to the composers who wrote it. The spread of their technique, especially after the revolutionary development of printing, produced the first true international style since the unification of Gregorian chant in the 9th century. Franco-Flemish composers mainly wrote sacred music, primarily masses, motets, and hymns.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Master</span> Any skilled painter who worked in Europe before 1800

In art history, "Old Master" refers to any painter of skill who worked in Europe before about 1800, or a painting by such an artist. An "old master print" is an original print made by an artist in the same period. The term "old master drawing" is used in the same way.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Early Netherlandish painting</span> Work of artists active in the Low Countries during the 15th- and 16th-century Northern Renaissance

Early Netherlandish painting is the body of work by artists active in the Burgundian and Habsburg Netherlands during the 15th- and 16th-century Northern Renaissance period, once known as the Flemish Primitives. It flourished especially in the cities of Bruges, Ghent, Mechelen, Leuven, Tournai and Brussels, all in present-day Belgium. The period begins approximately with Robert Campin and Jan van Eyck in the 1420s and lasts at least until the death of Gerard David in 1523, although many scholars extend it to the start of the Dutch Revolt in 1566 or 1568–Max J. Friedländer's acclaimed surveys run through Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Early Netherlandish painting coincides with the Early and High Italian Renaissance, but the early period is seen as an independent artistic evolution, separate from the Renaissance humanism that characterised developments in Italy. Beginning in the 1490s, as increasing numbers of Netherlandish and other Northern painters traveled to Italy, Renaissance ideals and painting styles were incorporated into northern painting. As a result, Early Netherlandish painters are often categorised as belonging to both the Northern Renaissance and the Late or International Gothic.

Michiel Coxie the Elder, Michiel Coxcie the Elder or Michiel van Coxcie, Latinised name Coxius, was a Flemish painter of altarpieces and portraits, a draughtsman and a designer of stained-glass windows, tapestries and prints. He worked for patrons in the principal cities of Flanders. He became the court painter to successively Emperor Charles V and King Philip II of Spain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern Renaissance</span> Renaissance that occurred in the European countries north of the Alps.

The Northern Renaissance was the Renaissance that occurred in Europe north of the Alps. From the last years of the 15th century, its Renaissance spread around Europe. Called the Northern Renaissance because it occurred north of the Italian Renaissance, this period became the German, French, English, Low Countries and Polish Renaissances, and in turn created other national and localized movements, each with different attributes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">German Renaissance</span> Renaissance in Germany

The German Renaissance, part of the Northern Renaissance, was a cultural and artistic movement that spread among German thinkers in the 15th and 16th centuries, which developed from the Italian Renaissance. Many areas of the arts and sciences were influenced, notably by the spread of Renaissance humanism to the various German states and principalities. There were many advances made in the fields of architecture, the arts, and the sciences. Germany produced two developments that were to dominate the 16th century all over Europe: printing and the Protestant Reformation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pieter Coecke van Aelst</span> Flemish painter and sculptor

Pieter Coecke van Aelst or Pieter Coecke van Aelst the Elder was a Flemish painter, sculptor, architect, author and designer of woodcuts, goldsmith's work, stained glass and tapestries. His principal subjects were Christian religious themes. He hailed from the Duchy of Brabant, worked in Antwerp and Brussels, and was appointed court painter to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Flemish painting</span> Painting style from the County of Flanders

Flemish painting flourished from the early 15th century until the 17th century, gradually becoming distinct from the painting of the rest of the Low Countries, especially the modern Netherlands. In the early period, up to about 1520, the painting of the whole area is typically considered as a whole, as Early Netherlandish painting. This was dominated by the Flemish south, but painters from the north were also important. Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, of which Antwerp became the centre, covers the period up to about 1580 or later, by the end of which the north and south Netherlands had become politically separated. Flemish Baroque painting was especially important in the first half of the 17th century, dominated by Rubens.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting</span>

Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting represents the 16th-century response to Italian Renaissance art in the Low Countries, as well as many continuities with the preceding Early Netherlandish painting. The period spans from the Antwerp Mannerists and Hieronymus Bosch at the start of the 16th century to the late Northern Mannerists such as Hendrik Goltzius and Joachim Wtewael at the end. Artists drew on both the recent innovations of Italian painting and the local traditions of the Early Netherlandish artists.

The Antwerp School was a school of artists active in Antwerp, first during the 16th century when the city was the economic center of the Low Countries, and then during the 17th century when it became the artistic stronghold of the Flemish Baroque under Peter Paul Rubens.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maerten de Vos</span> Flemish painter

Maerten de Vos, Maerten de Vos the Elder or Marten de Vos was a Flemish painter. He is known mainly for his history and allegorical paintings and portraits. He was, together with the brothers Ambrosius Francken I and Frans Francken I, one of the leading history painters in the Spanish Netherlands after Frans Floris career slumped in the second half of the sixteenth century as a result of the Iconoclastic fury of the Beeldenstorm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Flemish Baroque painting</span> Painting movement

Flemish Baroque painting was a style of painting in the Southern Netherlands during Spanish control in the 16th and 17th centuries. The period roughly begins when the Dutch Republic was split from the Habsburg Spain regions to the south with the Spanish recapturing of Antwerp in 1585 and goes until about 1700, when Spanish Habsburg authority ended with the death of King Charles II. Antwerp, home to the prominent artists Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony van Dyck, and Jacob Jordaens, was the artistic nexus, while other notable cities include Brussels and Ghent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Art of the Low Countries</span> Visual arts created in the Low Countries, as well as Belgium and the Netherlands

The art of the Low Countries consists of painting, sculpture, architecture, printmaking, pottery, and other forms of visual art produced in the Low Countries, and since the 19th century in Belgium in the southern Netherlands and the Netherlands in the north.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern Mannerism</span> Art movement

Northern Mannerism is the form of Mannerism found in the visual arts north of the Alps in the 16th and early 17th centuries. Styles largely derived from Italian Mannerism were found in the Netherlands and elsewhere from around the mid-century, especially Mannerist ornament in architecture; this article concentrates on those times and places where Northern Mannerism generated its most original and distinctive work.

Despite its size, Belgium has a long and distinguished artistic tradition that goes back to the Middle Ages, considerably pre-dating the foundation of the current state in 1830. Art from the areas making up modern Belgium is called in English Netherlandish up to the separation with the Netherlands from 1570 on, and Flemish until the 18th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">World landscape</span> Type of composition in Western painting

The world landscape, a translation of the German Weltlandschaft, is a type of composition in Western painting showing an imaginary panoramic landscape seen from an elevated viewpoint that includes mountains and lowlands, water, and buildings. The subject of each painting is usually a Biblical or historical narrative, but the figures comprising this narrative element are dwarfed by their surroundings.

The Golden Age of Flanders, or Flemish Golden Age, is a term that has been used to describe the flourishing of cultural and economic activities of the Low Countries around the 16th century. The term Flanders in the 16th century referred to the entire Habsburg Netherlands within the Burgundian Circle of the Holy Roman Empire. It was inclusive of modern-day Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. Its political capital was Brussels, while the financial-economic centre was Antwerp. Other major artistic and cultural centres of the period included Bruges, Ghent, Mechelen and Leuven. It is also grouped with the Dutch Golden Age, a more common term used primarily in reference to the Dutch Republic, and typically dated from 1588 to 1672, within a "Flemish and Dutch golden age" covering the period from the late 15th to the 17th century.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Janson, H.W.; Janson, Anthony F. (1997). History of Art (5th, rev. ed.). New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. ISBN   0-8109-3442-6.
  2. Kamen, Henry (2005). Spain, 1469–1714, A Society of Conflict (3rd ed.). Harlow, United Kingdom: Pearson Education. ISBN   0-582-78464-6.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Heughebaert, H.; Defoort, A.; Van Der Donck, R. (1998). Artistieke opvoeding. Wommelgem, Belgium: Den Gulden Engel bvba. ISBN   90-5035-222-7.
  4. Rietbergen, P. J. A. N. (2000). A Short History of the Netherlands: From Prehistory to the Present Day (4th ed.). Amersfoort: Bekking. p. 59. ISBN   90-6109-440-2. OCLC   52849131.
  5. Wikisource-logo.svg One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : Gosse, Edmund William (1911). "Dutch Literature § Houwaert". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica . Vol. 8 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 721.
  6. E. L. Eisenstein: The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe, Cambridge, 1993 pp.13–17, quoted in: Angus Maddison: Growth and Interaction in the World Economy: The Roots of Modernity, Washington 2005, p.17f.