Other editions of book KNIGHTS OF ART

IN MONOCHROMERELIEF IN MARBLE BY GIOTTO, `The shepherd sitting under his tent, with the sheep in front,' Campanile, Florence.DRAWING BY MASACCIO, `His models were ordinary Florentine youths,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY GHIRLANDAIO, `The men of the market-place,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY LEONARDO DA VINCI, `He loved to draw strange monsters,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY RAPHAEL, `Round-limbed rosy children, half human, half divine,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY MICHELANGELO, `A terrible head of a furious old man,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY GIORGIONE, `A man in Venetian dress helping two women to mount one of the niches of a marble palace,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.DRAWING BY TINTORETTO, `The head of a Venetian boy, such as Tintoretto met daily among the fisher-folk of Venice,' Uffizi Gallery, Florence.GIOTTOIt was more than six hundred years ago that a little peasant baby was born in the small village of Vespignano, not far from the beautiful city of Florence, in Italy. The baby's father, an honest, hard-working countryman, was called Bondone, and the name he gave to his little son was Giotto.Life was rough and hard in that country home, but the peasant baby grew into a strong, hardy boy, learning early what cold and hunger meant. The hills which surrounded the village were grey and bare, save where the silver of the olive-trees shone in the sunlight, or the tender green of the shooting corn made the valley beautiful in early spring. In summer there was little shade from the blazing sun as it rode high in the blue sky, and the grass which grew among the grey rocks was often burnt and brown. But, nevertheless, it was here that the sheep of the village would be turned out to find what food they could, tended and watched by one of the village boys.So it happened that when Giotto was ten years old his father sent him to take care of the sheep upon the hillside. Country boys had then no schools to go to or lessons to learn, and Giotto spent long happy days, in sunshine and rain, as he followed the sheep from place to place, wherever they could find grass enough to feed on. But Giotto did something else besides watching his sheep. Indeed, he sometimes forgot all about them, and many a search he had to gather them all together again. For there was one thing he loved doing better than all beside, and that was to try to draw pictures of all the things he saw around him.It was no easy matter for the little shepherd lad. He had no pencils or paper, and he had never, perhaps, seen a picture in all his life. But all this mattered little to him. Out there, under the blue sky, his eyes made pictures for him out of the fleecy white clouds as they slowly changed from one form to another. He learned to know exactly the shape of every flower and how it grew; he noticed how the olive-trees laid their silver leaves against the blue background of the sky that peeped in between, and how his sheep looked as they stooped to eat, or lay down in the shadow of a rock.Nothing escaped his keen, watchful eyes, and then with eager hands he would sharpen a piece of stone, choose out the smoothest rock, and try to draw on its flat surface all those wonderful shapes which had filled his eyes with their beauty. Olive-trees, flowers, birds and beasts were there, but especially his sheep, for they were his friends and companions who were always near him, and he could draw them in a different way each time they moved.Now it fell out that one day a great master painter from Florence came riding through the valley and over the hills where Giotto was feeding his sheep. The name of the great master was Cimabue, and he was the most wonderful artist in the world, so men said. He had painted a picture which had made all Florence rejoice. The Florentines had never seen anything like it before, and yet it was but a strange- looking portrait of the Madonna and Child, scarcely like a real woman or a rea

Originally written for younger readers as an introduction to the world of the Italian Renaissance, this classic work takes the reader on an exciting personal tour of some of the greatest artists of that time period. Much more than just a dry history of who painted what, Steedman's book portrays each artist in personal terms, providing details of their lives, loves, highlights and low points. The period of Italian Renaissance painting started around the late thirteenth century and flourished until the sixteenth, covering the periods scholars now call the Proto-Renaissance (1300-1400), the Early Renaissance (1400-1475), the High Renaissance (1475-1525), and Mannerism (1525-1600). Drawing much of her material from the classic Lives of the Painters, by Giorgio Vasari, Steedman gives readers young and old a concise and enthralling overview of Italian Renaissance painters and discusses their impact upon society and their enduring cultural legacy. As Steedman writes in her introduction: "Then came the time which is called 'The Renaissance,' a word which means being born again, or a new awakening, when men began to draw real pictures of real things and fill the world with images of beauty. Now it is the stories of the men of that time, who put new life into Art, that I am going to tell you-men who learned, step by step, to paint the most beautiful pictures that the world possesses." The artists discussed include Giotto, Fra Angelico, Masaccio, Fra Filippo Lippi, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Filippino Lippi, Pietro Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, Andrea del Sarto, Giovanni Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. This edition has been completely reformatted to modern standards and contains all the original illustrations.

This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.

Color edition. Originally written for younger readers as an introduction to the world of the Italian Renaissance, this classic work takes the reader on an exciting personal tour of some of the greatest artists of that time period. Drawing much of her material from the classic Lives of the Painters, by Giorgio Vasari, Steedman gives readers young and old a concise and enthralling overview of Italian Renaissance painters and discusses their impact upon society and their enduring cultural legacy. As Steedman writes in her introduction: "Then came the time which is called 'The Renaissance,' a word which means being born again, or a new awakening, when men began to draw real pictures of real things and fill the world with images of beauty. Now it is the stories of the men of that time, who put new life into Art, that I am going to tell you-men who learned, step by step, to paint the most beautiful pictures that the world possesses." The artists discussed include Giotto, Fra Angelico, Masaccio, Fra Filippo Lippi, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Filippino Lippi, Pietro Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, Andrea del Sarto, Giovanni Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. This edition has been completely reformatted to modern standards and contains all the original illustrations. Cover image: Portrait of Giovanna Tornabuoni (1488) by Domenico Ghirlandaio.

Color edition. Originally written for younger readers as an introduction to the world of the Italian Renaissance, this classic work takes the reader on an exciting personal tour of some of the greatest artists of that time period. Drawing much of her material from the classic Lives of the Painters, by Giorgio Vasari, Steedman gives readers young and old a concise and enthralling overview of Italian Renaissance painters and discusses their impact upon society and their enduring cultural legacy. As Steedman writes in her introduction: "Then came the time which is called 'The Renaissance,' a word which means being born again, or a new awakening, when men began to draw real pictures of real things and fill the world with images of beauty. Now it is the stories of the men of that time, who put new life into Art, that I am going to tell you-men who learned, step by step, to paint the most beautiful pictures that the world possesses." The artists discussed include Giotto, Fra Angelico, Masaccio, Fra Filippo Lippi, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Filippino Lippi, Pietro Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, Andrea del Sarto, Giovanni Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. This edition has been completely reformatted to modern standards and contains all the original illustrations. Cover image: Portrait of Giovanna Tornabuoni (1488) by Domenico Ghirlandaio.

Originally written for younger readers as an introduction to the world of the Italian Renaissance, this classic work takes the reader on an exciting personal tour of some of the greatest artists of that time period. Much more than just a dry history of who painted what, Steedman's book portrays each artist in personal terms, providing details of their lives, loves, highlights and low points. The period of Italian Renaissance painting started around the late thirteenth century and flourished until the sixteenth, covering the periods scholars now call the Proto-Renaissance (1300-1400), the Early Renaissance (1400-1475), the High Renaissance (1475-1525), and Mannerism (1525-1600). Drawing much of her material from the classic Lives of the Painters, by Giorgio Vasari, Steedman gives readers young and old a concise and enthralling overview of Italian Renaissance painters and discusses their impact upon society and their enduring cultural legacy. As Steedman writes in her introduction: "Then came the time which is called 'The Renaissance,' a word which means being born again, or a new awakening, when men began to draw real pictures of real things and fill the world with images of beauty. Now it is the stories of the men of that time, who put new life into Art, that I am going to tell you-men who learned, step by step, to paint the most beautiful pictures that the world possesses." The artists discussed include Giotto, Fra Angelico, Masaccio, Fra Filippo Lippi, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Filippino Lippi, Pietro Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, Andrea del Sarto, Giovanni Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. This edition has been completely reformatted to modern standards and contains all the original illustrations.

Knights of the Art-Stories of the Italian Painters is a classic Italian art history text by Amy Steedman. In telling these stories I have been helped by an old book called The Lives of the Painters, by Giorgio Vasari, who was himself a painter. He took great delight in gathering together all the stories about these artists and writing them down with loving care, so that he shows us real living men, and not merely great names by which the famous pictures are known.

This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.