TOEFL Listening: TPO-TOEFL听力TPO - P631RSDUC9R75F88S$

Lecture: Techniques used during the Renaissance: Narrator: Listen to part of a lecture in an Art History class. Professor: As I was saying the Renaissance period, which started in the 1400s in Europe. The Renaissance was still a pretty religious period and that is reflected in the artwork of that time. But artists were trying to experiment with a more secular point of view as well. A tendency to also use the natural world as the subject matter for their art. And there were different ways that these natural things were explored. For instance, many artists would painting portraits, while other, although this was more common in northern Europe, would make landscapes the subject of their works. But today I would like to consider and influential Italian Renaissance artist: Leon Battista Alberti. Who took a slightly different approach. Leon Battista Alberti was a painter, sculptor, architect, musician, poet; very wide ranging interests. Like DaVinci or Michelangelo, the sort of guys for whom the term "Renaissance Man" was in fact created. Alberti believed that the most important approach for a painter was to capture a story or narrative. Now, as I vindicated this narrative could be either religious or secular, depending of what the work of art was for. If the work was to be placed in a church, then obviously it'd have a religious theme; whereas as if it was for someone's home then it could deal with a different subject matter. The exact narrative didn't really matter, so long as if it was one that captivated the audience, that held the viewers attention. So what is actually needed to tell a story? Well, Alberti needed characters, right? Human figures; and he wanted to represent them as realistic as possible, to capture the viewers attention. One way he achieved this was to make use of what is known as the 'contrapposto pose'. A "contrapposto pose" basically entails showing us slight twists in the body – the shoulders and hips are usually bent in different directions. In other words, if the left shoulder is bent, so that is slightly higher than the right shoulder, then the hips will be bent so that the left side would be slightly lower than the right side. Similarly in sculptures most of the weight seems to be on one foot, which also result in the slanted position. Making it seems like the figure is about to walk or move. This adds to the realistic aspect of the figure. But there are, actually, a lot of things that can go wrong in the attempt to create such a pose. You can make a figure's arms bigger than its legs, or a head too small for the body. Messing up the proportions can leave a figure looking cartoon like and unnatural. But Alberti had a solution: he encouraged artists to visualize the figure's bones and structure. This would give the artist an idea of the proportions of the figure. From there Alberti suggested the artist imagine patching the tendons and muscles. Then covering those with flesh and skin. Now, although this method may seem complicated, artists since antiquity have used anatomical observations to try and get the proportion of the human figure as accurate as possible. Though, obviously, not to the degree that Alberti was recommending. Now, in addition to characters the setting is extremely important. Especially when attempting to tell a story realistically. Renaissance artists essentially needed to create a three-dimensional scene on a two-dimensional surface. They accomplished this by the use of prospective. A relatively new idea for artists at the time. In particular the type of prospective that Alberti advocated was called "Linear One-point Perspective". In fact, Alberti was one of the artist that developed the geometry behind 'linear one-point' prospective. Linear prospective basically consist of drawing straight lines that extends from the four front of the painting into the background. Lines that seems to be parallel to each other, but which actually converge on a singe point in the horizon, called the 'vanishing point'. By drawing figures and objects smaller and smaller, as the lines get closer together, the artist is able to create depth in a painting. This gives the illusion of a third dimension and makes the work of art more realistic.