Italian Frescoes: The Early Renaissance

The first comprehensive survey in modern times of the surviving fresco cycles of the early Renaissance, this path-blazing work is an extraordinary achievement in scholarship and publishing.

Certain Italian fresco cycles, notably the Brancacci Chapel in Florence by Masaccio, Masolino, and Filippino Lippi, are well known. Others, such as Piero della Francescas work in Arezzo and Benozzo Gozzolis Chapel of the Magi in Florence, have been reproduced countless times. Yet no publisher - until now - has attempted to gather together and document in extensive photographs the essential fresco cycles of the early Italian Renaissance. The list of works in Italian Frescoes: The Early Renaissance, 1400-1470 covers the regions of Italy, from the Alpine mountain areas to Puglia, with an emphasis on Tuscany and Florence, the artistic center that gave life to the Renaissance.

Italian Frescoes: The Early Renaissance opens with a concise introductory text discussing various aspects of fifteenth-century fresco painting: artists, patronage, cultural and historical conditions, technical methods, and questions of local tradition. The central section of the book examines twenty-one fresco cycles, each representing a crowning achievement in this field. A descriptive and interpretive essay introduces each cycle and is followed by a series of full-page and double-page color plates-many of them new photography of recently restored frescoes-covering the entire work. This parade of colorful masterpieces, paired with Steffi Roettgens authoritative text, makes a brilliant volume that will be treasured by scholars and art lovers alike. A second volume, Professor Roettgens Italian Frescoes: The Flowering of the Renaissance, continues the story with works by Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, and many others.

Steffi Roettgen studied at the universities of Munich, Erlangen, and Bonn and has taught at the Technical University of Berlin and the University of Munich, where she currently lectures on fifteenth- to eighteenth-century Italian art. Antonio Quattrone is regarded as one of the leading photographers of works of art; his many books include Mantegnas Camera degli Sposi (Abbeville/Electa).

"Detailed plans and descriptions set the projects before us as never before, bringing home masterpieces that in some cases can only be seen with difficulty in out-of-the-way places. The second volume is eagerly awaited." -- Chicago Tribune

"Italian Frescoes: The Early Renaissance captures the magnificence of religious painting between 1400 and 1470 through Roettgens lucid text and an abundance of magnificent color photographs by Antonio Quattrone. The close-up views of famous and lesser-known sites, particularly in Tuscany, are almost as good as traveling to Italy." -- Philadelphia Inquirer

"One of the finest set of artbooks that one might wish for... Gorgeous. *****" -- Art Times