Late Gothic art: c. 1200-1400

Italian art from the late 13th and 14th centuries was once known as primitive because it was seen largely as a transition from Medieval abstraction to the naturalism of the Renaissance (with a dose of Byzantine influence thrown in for good measure). We now study the brilliant artist’s of Florence and Siena in their own right.

The story embodied on the altarpiece offered an object lesson in the human suffering experienced by Christ.

The Medieval and Renaissance Altarpiece

Taddeo Gaddi, Saint Julian, 1340s, tempera on wood, gold ground, 54 x 36.2 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) — Monks and nuns removed candle soot from this painting using urine and lye, but its gold background never tarnished.

The conservator’s eye: Taddeo Gaddi, Saint Julian

Pisa Pulpit — Some distortions are deliberate. This pulpit has its critics, but it coheres in real life—just not in photos.

Giovanni Pisano, Pisa Pulpit

Distorting the Madonna in medieval art — Small torso? Huge shins? If you think you could paint Mary better, remember that artistic goals change over time.

Distorting the Madonna in Medieval art

Siena Cathedral — Whether church decoration or public works, the art of this wealthy city blended devotional piety and civic pride.

Siena in the Late Gothic, an introduction

Giotto, Crucifixion, Arena Chapel, Padua — Like a comic without words, these frescoes tell the story of Christ and his parents—and give their patron a cameo.

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel

Domenico di Michelino, Dante holding the Divine Comedy, 1465 (Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence) — Dante’s vision of Hell inspired generations of artists—and his words still feed imaginations today.

Dante’s Divine Comedy in Late Medieval and ...

Giotto, The Ognissanti Madonna (detail) — Boom times in Florence saw a rise in art commissions, and the Italo-Byzantine style yielded to Giotto’s naturalism.

Florence in the Late Gothic period, an ...

Fresco in the former Abbey of Saint-André-de-Lavaudieu, France, 14th century- detail — Rats spread plague throughout the streets of Europe. Society turned upside down—but the Renaissance lay ahead.

The Black Death

Cimabue — Artists in Late Gothic Italy increasingly sought to rationalize space, measure the world, and master the figure.

Introduction to Late Gothic art

From carpenters and workshop assistants to apothecaries and goldsmiths, it took a village to make a panel painting.

Gold-ground panel painting

Cimabue, Santa Trinita Madonna and Child Enthroned — This huge panel hints at the coming Renaissance, but the figures remain weightless and their features, elongated.

Cimabue, Santa Trinita Madonna and Child Enthroned

Cimabue, Santa Trinita Madonna and Child Enthroned and Giotto, The Ognissanti Madonna and Child Enthroned — Only decades apart—but what a difference. Next to Giotto’s substantial Virgin, Cimabue’s appears flat yet elegant.

Cimabue and Giotto compared

Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin, c. 1342, tempera on panel, 6' 1" x 5' 11", for the altar of St. Savinus, Siena Cathedral (now in Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Siena) — Take a peek into a 14th-century household! This painting transplants a biblical story into a busy Sienese bedroom.

Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin

Pietro Cavallini, The Last Judgment, c.1293, fresco, Santa Cecilia, Rome- detail — Monumental figures like these apostles hadn’t been seen since ancient Rome. What sensitivity to rhythm and color!

Pietro Cavallini, The Last Judgment

Giotto, Last Judgment, Arena Chapel, Padua, c. 1305 — Christ sits as Judge, separating the blessed from the damned. In Hell, money lenders—like Scrovegni—appear hanged.

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel (part 4 of ...

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel, Padua, c. 1305 — In this powerful scene, Mary cradles the dead Christ. A simple landscape and mourning crowd direct us to her grief.

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel (part 3 of ...

Giotto, Narrative Cycle, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel - Kiss of Judas detail — With their emotion, gestures, mass, and volume, Giotto’s people seem real—and time moves with them.

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel (part 2 of ...

Giotto, Arena Chapel — Painting covers every inch of this chapel, from the spiraling narrative cycle to the star-studded blue sky.

Giotto, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel (part 1 of ...

Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Allegory of Good Government, Effects of Good Government in the City and the Country, and Allegory and Effects of Bad Government in the City and the Country, c. 1337-40, fresco, Sala della Pace (Hall of Peace) also known as the Sala dei Nove (the Hall of the Nine), 7.7 x 14.4m (room), Palazzo Pubblico, Siena- detail — Things get ugly when tyrants take over! But with peace, fortitude, and prudence, Siena prospers—an urban paradise.

Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Allegory and Effects of Good ...