Why have painters been keen on painting the Madonna since the Renaissance?

The core spirit of the European Renaissance, which took place in14-16th century, is humanism of "putting people first" and "emphasizing people's own value". This idea will naturally be reflected in the field of art, and its outstanding performance is that the traditional painting mode of the Madonna in the Middle Ages has undergone tremendous changes.

The image of the Virgin Mary in the Renaissance, whether from the prototype of the Virgin Mary, or from the composition and performance content, tends to be more and more life-oriented, highlighting a strong humanistic color.

Works of art are intuitive. Through the analysis of these Madonna works, we can more clearly see the ideological changes that took place in that era.

Most early statues of the Virgin Mary followed a pattern.

In the image, the posture, facial expression, dress and so on of the characters are basically fixed. At that time, the painting of the Madonna was not based on "real objects", but the elements of the image in the picture were actually a kind of "imaginary symbol". These elements have religious symbolic significance, but they lack appeal.

In painting, the early Madonna was mainly "flat painting". This is partly because painting skills are still immature. At that time, there was no painting method of oil painting, so it was impossible to "pile up paintings" and modify them repeatedly. Therefore, there is no strong light and shadow effect on the expressive force of characters, but a little shading treatment is added on the basis of plane painting, which makes the facial structure and clothing lines of the picture image appear concave and convex and lack of three-dimensional sense. Basically, it is a plane outlined by lines, and its color is very simple, which mainly symbolizes sacred gold, so its expressive force is not strong. On the other hand, it was also limited by the concept at that time, because only in this way can it produce a "solemn" effect.

Generally speaking, the early Madonna tried to downplay secular feelings, and the expression of her image was serious and inaccessible. This feature is particularly prominent when expressing the relationship between the virgin and the son. The two images in the picture are only "together in composition", and there is no "emotional echo" between them.

The Madonna painted in this way has serious "stylized traces". Because of the fixed pattern, various Madonna works also lack individuality and look very different. So the painters who painted the Madonna at that time were mostly equal to craftsmen.