Explorations in Art

  Judith Slaying Holofernes | Artemisia Gentileschi Judith Slaying Holofernes, 1614-1621   Artemisia Gentileschi       Gentileschi was a talented Baroque painter who began putting out amazing artwork at a young age. She had a focus on realism and painted a lot of women from stories, folklore, and notable allegories; while highlighting their naturalism. Sadly, a lot of her story and career were not as talked about as how she was raped and the story of that covered up many of her achievements. Now, she is talked about and appreciated by people all over the world and has many paintings in prestigious art museums.   Judith Slaying Holofernes      This painting is something of a self portrait, where Gentileschi is getting revenge for when a man named Agostino Tassi raped her. She wanted to kill him and get revenge and when there was no way of getting justices, the closest thing was to paint it. In this, Judith, the woman with the sword is Gentileschi, and the man, Holofernes, is Agostino. T

Effects of Good Government in the City   “Sala Della Pace” or "The Effects of Good Government in the City and in the Country”, was created by Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s in Siena, Italy during 1338-1339. These murals on the walls of a display room that portray an allegory of the government’s influence on the people, city, and countryside. While this may seem a bit early for the Italian renaissance, this was one of the early works that focused on some signature characteristics of the Italian renaissance, as well as humanism aspects.  Allegory of the Good Government      The return of humanistic ideals into the mainstream of art during this time had a lot of the same elements of past art pieces but applied more towards humans (body, size, overall atmosphere). I feel something artists did at this time was bridging the gap between more religious works, making it more relatable. The churches liked this and to keep the religious work going, ended up paying artists a good amount of money to c