Iconography of hands in renaissance painting
Abstract
Renaissance style of painting reflects all types of plastic design principles, approaches and understanding as a standard character of historical, political, religious, cultural, and economic features of that era. Disposing of unadulterated strict and church focused kind of perspective, Renaissance artists practically start to look on nature, science, literature, philosophy, and obviously human anatomy in a different set of minds. Reasonable, balanced, scientific and logical portrayal of human life leads painters to focus closer on pieces of the human body. Aside from the faces of the figures, hands become essential body parts to hold a mirror to the interior universe of the figures. They were included within the iconographic program such mirrored the emotions and contemplations of the figure, and the connection among figures and objects. In this study, an examination through various Renaissance paintings will shed light on how the painters like Giotto, Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Francesca, and more utilized the portrayal of hands as an apparatus and as a language of their creative purposes. Thusly, an iconography of hands in Renaissance painting will be manifested.
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