I accidentally posted this in our word press from last semester so that is why it is so late.
In today’s class, we continued our discussion of 15th-century Italy. We focused on the artist Masaccio and his works, which were very significant to the period. What was particularly impressive was how much of an impact and success he had in the short life of only 27 years. The Tribute Money painting is one of his most famous paintings and it has alot to be studied. Like much of artwork at the time the painting is heavily connected to the Bible. He depicted a scene from the Gospel of Mathew, which was not a common scene to be depicted. Since this was an uncommon scene that meant that he had to very closely read and interpret the bible. I found this interesting as alot of biblical art is not particularly unique, since it has been done many times. In this case Masaccio seems to be taking an artistic risk to depict his own interpretation.
I also really enjoyed his style throughout this painting. His understanding of color theory and how to best use color to strengthen elements of the painting was very impressive. We also discussed his use of perspective and the vanishing point. I have found the vanishing point to be a relatively complicated topic, so how well he has mastered it is very impressive.