Search Results for: Renaissance

The great flourishing of arts and culture that took place during the European Renaissance inevitably made its way into the realms of fashion and textiles, shaping and informing the way people across Europe would dress for centuries to come. But with few surviving artefacts of clothing from this era, art has much to tell us…

“Painters of the Northern Renaissance clothe their figures in a fabric that has the friable angularity of carvings made from wood.” Andrew Graham-Dixon During the 15th and 16th centuries, the enlightening ideas of the Italian Renaissance spread throughout Northern Europe, lifting it out of the Dark Ages into the wonder of a new era. Much…

“Dress was employed by the Renaissance elite to manifest rank and magnificence.” William J Connell, contemporary historian. In High Renaissance Italian art, virtuoso paintings convey an extravagant world of thick piled velvet, metallic embroidery and glossy, stiffened silks. This fabric allowed artists to tell wondrous, exotic stories, whipping and swirling in the wind, circling and…

“Fabric was more than décor; it became part of the story.” Alan Riding, writer Sinuous, flowing drapes of fabric flow across early Renaissance paintings, wrapping the contours of bodies and breathing into them dynamic life. Taking their cue from the sculptures of Ancient Greece, artists of the Renaissance period produced diaphanous veils of colour and…

“Veils and cloths are versatile instruments that stimulate fantasy and conjure make believe…” Paul Hills, art historian Fabric defines Renaissance art, cascading, caressing, or breezing over saintly figures, lavish interiors, and ethereal landscapes with decadent, sumptuous folds. Art reflects how fabric was woven into Renaissance culture, filling palaces, churches, interiors, and streets with glorious colour,…