The Italian Renaissance

First issued in 1972, this study treats Italy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as a social world that produced a cultural elite. Burke examines how painters, sculptors, humanists, and architects were recruited, paid, and trained, and how patrons, cities, and courts shaped what they made. He discusses ways of seeing and thinking as well as famous works by Leonardo, Raphael, and Michelangelo. Statistics of origin, workshop, and medium support the argument. The book is a sociological history of Renaissance culture, not a biography of any one artist and not a narrative of the Italian wars.

Bound in cloth printed with detail from Raphael’s Saint Catherine of Alexandria. 32 pages of colour plates and 11 integrated black & white illustrations. Blocked slipcase.