ENDNOTES  page 192

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Cimabue: *

see illustration Maestà di Santa Trinita (1280-85), Uffizi Gallery, Florence.

 

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Giotto: *

see illustration

The Scrovegni Chapel interior decorations, fresco; Padua (1305)

On Salvation, with emphasis on the Virgin Mary (the chapel is dedicated to the Annunciation & the Virgin of Charity & was used for annual Mystery Plays); west wall dominated by Last Judgment (traditional in Medieval Italy); the other walls display the Annunciation, scenes of the Life of Christ

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naturalism (as art):*

In literature

Zola coined the term naturalism; as a literary movement it emphasized observation, scientific method in the fictional portrayal of reality; it also was characterised by detachment (impersonal tone & disinterested point of view), determinism (opposite of free will, a character's fate is predetermined, by nature & beyond human control), & a sense that the universe itself is indifferent to human life.  The novel was an experiment allowing the author to discover & analyse scientific laws influencing behaviour (such as emotion, heredity, environment).

 

Zola (1840-1902) was a French novelist, playwright, journalist, proponent of literary school of naturalism & contributor to theatrical naturalism.  He embraced the methodology of the French philosopher Auguste Comte, who proposed a scientific method that went beyond passive empiricism favouring controlled experiments to prove or disprove a given hypotheses.  Zola claimed that naturalism in literature should be like controlled experiments where the characters function as the phenomena. Major figure in the political liberalization of France; he worked for the exoneration of the falsely accused & convicted army officer Dreyfus (he wrote the open letter "J'accuse...!" or I accuse…, 13 January 1898 published in L'Aurore newspaper).  Nominated for the first & second Nobel Prize in Literature (1901 & 1902).  Notable works include: Les Rougon-Macquart (Natural & social history of a family under the Second Empire) 1871-93; collective title given to a cycle of 20 novels following the lives of the members of the 2 titular branches of a fictional family in the 2nd French Empire (1852–1870), a prominent works of the French naturalism literary movement.

 

in art

aka Realism, is the attempt to represent subject matter truthfully, without artificiality or artistic conventions, without the implausible, exotic & supernatural.  In painting the movement began in France in the 1850s, following the 1848 Revolution; it was a clear rejection of Romanticism (which dominated French literature & art, going back to the late 18th century) & History painting (a genre with even a longer pedigree). It is characterised by an accurate depiction of lifeforms, perspective & details of light and colour.  It may emphasize the mundane or the ugly or sordid. Realist painters used common labourers & ordinary people in ordinary surroundings engaged in real activities as subjects.  Two of its chief exponents were Gustave Courbet (1819-77), Jean-François Millet (1814-75)

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