Vasari on Technique

Fülszöveg

Giorgio Vasari (1511-1571) is wcll known for his celcbrated work on the lives of the Renaissance artists. But not many people know that Vasari was a painter and architect as well as a biographer, and that he wrote one of the most valuable treatises on the technical methods of the painters, architects, and sculptors of his time. This is the first and only English translation of this important technical material (originally published in 1550 as an introduction to Vasari's Lives of the Artists). Vasari, as a practical craftsman, brings to his work an unusual understanding of the processes and materials he writes about, and conveys this knowledge to the reader in a style of the pleasantest and most readable kind. In the section on architecture, he describes the methods used in constructing rustic fountains and grottoes; how Michelangelo developed new uses for architectural materials; the architectural uses of enriched plaster; the Renaissance view of Ionic, Doric, Gothic, other types of... Tovább

Fülszöveg

Giorgio Vasari (1511-1571) is wcll known for his celcbrated work on the lives of the Renaissance artists. But not many people know that Vasari was a painter and architect as well as a biographer, and that he wrote one of the most valuable treatises on the technical methods of the painters, architects, and sculptors of his time. This is the first and only English translation of this important technical material (originally published in 1550 as an introduction to Vasari's Lives of the Artists). Vasari, as a practical craftsman, brings to his work an unusual understanding of the processes and materials he writes about, and conveys this knowledge to the reader in a style of the pleasantest and most readable kind. In the section on architecture, he describes the methods used in constructing rustic fountains and grottoes; how Michelangelo developed new uses for architectural materials; the architectural uses of enriched plaster; the Renaissance view of Ionic, Doric, Gothic, other types of architecture; how mosaic pavements were constructed; the Renaissance conception of an ideál architecture; and many similar topics. In the section on sculpture, the reader will learn about the making of the model, completion of the statue, reliefs, bronzé casting, diesinking for medals, modelled plaster work, sculpture in wood, and other processes. The final section, on painting, discusses aesthetics, perspective, foreshortening, how colors were blended, fresco painting, painting in tempera, the discovery and early history of oil painting, gilding, preparing glass mosaic cubes, murals, methods of engraving in copper and silver, and the origin, history, and technique of the stained glass window. Scholars and historians of art have long used this book as the most detailed and valuable sourcebook of its time. But its full, readable discussions, combined with the sense of actuality and historical presence it contains, make it alsó perhaps the best possible description for the generál reader and the artist of the methods and techniques of the Renaissance artists in the heyday of their achievement. Unabridged republication of lst (1907) edition. Edited with introduction and notes by Professor G. Baldwin Brown. Index. 18 plates, 11 figures. xxiv -f 328pp. 5% x 8. 20717-X Paperbound Vissza