Italian Renaissance Drawings

A beautifully illustrated small book introducing the drawings of the Italian Renaissance and showing the enduring significance of the extraordinary development of drawing during the fifteenth century.

The Renaissance was a ground-breaking period in the history of drawing. Drawing became an art form in its own right rather than just being used in the preparation of other works of art. Prior to 1400 few drawings survive, and it is only in the fifteenth century that we can gain an understanding of how and why artists drew. The reasons for this are threefold: the growth in paper production meant it became more economical to draw; the demand by patrons for originality necessitated artists make more studies to explore new compositional ideas and poses; and finally a widening interest in collecting meant that drawings were preserved. Drawing was an integral part of how Renaissance artists were trained. Thanks to this education artists were able to express their ideas with extraordinary fluency on paper.