ART AND CULTURE

RUNNING HEAD : Renaissance

Renaissance

Name

Institution The Renaissance

The Renaissance was a movement that marked the end of the Middle Ages ushering the coming of the modern period . The word itself essentially meant a rebirth in the sense that the period was actually a revival and a resurgence , particularly of the classical culture and influences of the ancient Greeks and Romans . In Italy , where the movement started , the people were constantly surrounded by the ancient ruins which served as a constant reminder of what they were and what they had

. This further gained momentum following the Black Death that decimated half the population of Europe . Because the established institutions at the time notably the church , could not address the crises , people sought answers elsewhere , thus giving birth to the humanist movement which tended to put greater emphasis on the individual . Whenever the word `Renaissance ' is invoked , what would immediately come into mind would be art , and to a certain extent , architecture - the styles , the works as well as the individuals behind it . They used the works of the ancient Greeks and Romans as their model , putting emphasis on the characteristics of proportion and symmetry . In the case of the arts , a lot of emphasis was put into depicting subjects as realistically as possible without exaggerating nor skimping on the details to achieve the desired realism , which the artists felt were the right and proper thing to do and they did this by going against the norms at the time which...