Fra Angelico and the Rise of the Florentine Renaissance

'The glory and success of Fra Angelico and the Rise of the Florentine Renaissance is the way in which the images were curated to highlight Fra Angelico’s position in the Renaissance spectrum, proving that not only the High Renaissance artists deserve recognition.' - New York Journal of Books

A richly illustrated book exploring the birth of Renaissance art and the role played by Fra Angelico

Fra Angelico and the Rise of the Florentine Renaissance investigates the beginnings of Florentine Renaissance art, with the friar painter Fra Angelico at the centre of the story. Fra Angelico is one of the great masters of Renaissance art and responsible for its early achievements in Florence alongside the painters Masaccio, Masolino, Uccello and Filippo Lippi, the sculptors Ghiberti, Donatello, and Nanni di Banco, and the architect Brunelleschi. Fra Angelico is sometimes seen as separate from his contemporaries, because of his status as a friar.

A reconsideration of the chronology of his key early works demonstrates that not only was he a full participant in the artistic culture of his times, but a key innovator: the Prado's great Annunciation Altarpiece, Fra Angelico's breakthrough work from the mid-1420s, is the first Renaissance-style altarpiece in Florence. The Altarpiece has been the subject of extensive conservation and technological research at the Prado, the results of which are presented for the first time here. This catalogue focuses around that masterpiece, as well as two other recently acquired Fra Angelico paintings: the Alba Madonna and the Funeral of Saint Anthony Abbot.

Details

• Author: Carl Brandon Strehlke, Emeritus Curator at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Ana González, Curator at the Prado
• Paperback: 256 pages 
• Date published: July 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN: 978-0500970997
• Product Dimensions: 30.0 x 24.5 cm