The Lion of St Mark
1516
Posts tagged art
Interior of the Upper Church of San Francesco, Assisi, after 1279
So. This is the Upper Church of San Francesco, an incredibly important building in the history of Italian art, and it’s all because of a guy named Francis. The short version is that everything in his life happened super fast. Francis renounced his worldly life for a Christian one in 1205, was given approval for a new Order (a very rare occurance) in 1209, received the stigmata in 1224, died in 1226, and was canonized in 1228, only two years after his death. In addition to all that stuff, his commemorative church (San Francesco) was consecrated in 1253 by Pope Innocent IV, and everything just took off from there, with most of the frescos completed around 1300. Tons of artists were brought in from all over Europe to work on the frescos, which is one of the reasons why they were completed so quickly.
So, why is this important? Because it was all funded by the papacy. St. Francis was incredibly charismatic, and the papcy wanted to capitalize on that and bring more people into the church in a time where their position was largely unstable in Rome. The result is San Francesco. The Upper Church has a fresco cycle of St. Francis’ life, and Old and New testament scenes in addition. Many people believed that Francis was the second coming of Christ, and the fresco cycles in the Upper Church reflect that belief, drawing connections between Francis and Christ throughout the fresco scenes.
Constantine the Great, c. 315-330, with a digital rendering of what the full statue might have looked like.
Four classic video games have been given a Japanese Samurai redesign by William Chua. Prints were out of stock, but now they are once again available. Head over to William’s Facebook page to see how you can grab one up.
Video Game Art Prints by William Chua /Xiaobaosg (Flickr) (Twitter)
OMG!!!!FOREVER LOVE THIS.
