The Italian Renaissance and Giuseppe Arcimboldo

Usually, when I say that I live near Florence (Italy), people replies to me that they know the city of Florence as the crib of Italian Renaissance (14th-16th century). It's true, Florence and some other cities in the Tuscany (a central region of Italy) were the first cities to spread the ideals of the Renaissance culture, especially in literature and I'm very proud of this ^_^

When we think about the Italian Renaissance in the Art, we think about Leonardo da Vinci, Raffaello, Michelangelo, Piero Della Francesca, Donatello and other great artists. It was a very fruitful time for the art and, between many other things, we have to say thanks to that age for the study about the techniques of perspective too.

I have a question in my mind: does people know that during the Italian Renaissance there were very different artists and some different styles? Well, I want to introduce you a famous italian artist that, in the time of Italian Renaissance,  used a totally different style from Michelangelo or Raffaello: Giuseppe Arcimboldo.

The Spring (1563) - Arcimboldo (source)

This italian painter is know for his imaginative portraits where he uses to paint some different objects (flowers, vegetables, books, etc) to create faces. 

I agree with R. Barthes (a French critic) who wrote that whe can think about the philosophy behind the Arcimboldo's works as based in linguistic: "without creating new signs he confused them by mixing and combining elements that then played a role in the innovation of language.". Isn't it cool? ^_^

The librarian (1566) - Arcimboldo (source)

Arcimboldo was born in Milan  in the 1526 and he was a court portraitist in Vienna and Prague. His surrealist portraits were admired by contemporaries and also today, they are really a surprise for the eyes: if you look them at a distance, you see normal portraits, but if you look them closely you can see every single object that composes the face.

Vegetable in the bowl - Arcimboldo (source)

If you turn the painting upside down, you can see this:

The gardener - Arcimboldo (source)

I hope you liked this content about our Renaissance time ^_^

See ya soon

Silvia