Italy Secondaria di secondo grado – classe 1ª Drawing and art history

Chapters: 2

1. Art history: origins to the 14th century

Prehistoric, Greek and Roman art · Romanesque and Gothic

Ancient Art: From Cave Walls to Roman Arches – Ancient art runs from cave paintings (over 40,000 years ago) to the fall of Rome (476 CE). Prehistoric people painted animals and hands with ochre and charcoal and raised megaliths using post-and-lintel. Egypt made stiff, rule-based figures for eternity. Greece searched for ideal beauty and balance in marble temples and statues. Rome copied Greek forms but added the arch, concrete and the dome, and used art and buildings to show the power of the state.
Medieval Art: From Mosaics to Gothic Cathedrals – Medieval art in Europe and the Mediterranean covers about 300 to 1400 CE. Early Christian art took over the Roman basilica and catacomb paintings. Byzantine art added domes, gold mosaics and icons. Romanesque churches (c. 1000–1150) have round arches, thick walls and small windows, with teaching sculpture over doors. Gothic cathedrals (from c. 1140) use pointed arches, ribbed vaults and flying buttresses to build tall, thin walls filled with stained glass. Monks made illuminated manuscripts. Late Gothic painters like Giotto made art more lifelike, opening the way to the Renaissance. Art in this age mainly served faith and taught stories to people who could not read.

Plane figures and orthographic projection · Axonometry and shadows

Orthographic Views of Solids – An orthographic view shows a solid as seen straight on from one direction, with no perspective. The three main views are the front view (front elevation), the top view (plan) and the side view (side or end elevation). Each view loses one dimension, so we usually need all three to fix the shape. Views are arranged in a standard layout: first-angle projection (plan below the front view; used in India, Europe and ISO standards) or third-angle projection (plan above; used in the USA). Visible edges are thick continuous lines, hidden edges are dashed, and centre lines are chain lines. A net is the flat pattern that folds into a solid, and a cross-section is the shape you see when you cut through it.
Isometric Projection and Axonometric Drawing – An axonometric drawing shows a solid in one picture with three axes: width, depth and height. In isometric projection the three axes are 120° apart and every axis is shortened equally (scale ≈ 0.82). An isometric drawing uses full lengths instead. Dimetric shortens two axes the same, trimetric all three differently. Oblique (cavalier, cabinet) keeps the front face true size and draws depth at 45°, full length (cavalier) or half (cabinet). Circles on faces become ellipses.