The artist Giotto di Bondone was born about 1266 in the village of Vespignano, near Florence. Outstanding as a painter, sculptor, and architect, Giotto was recognized as the first genius of art in the Italian Renaissance. He lived and worked at a time when people's minds and talents were first being freed from the shackles of medieval restraint, dealing largely with the traditional religious subjects.
Giotto is regarded as the founder of the central tradition of Western painting because his work broke free from the stylizations of Byzantine art, introducing new ideals of naturalism and creating a convincing sense of pictorial space. In the generation after his death he had an overwhelming influence on Florentine painting, and his work was later an inspiration to Masaccio, and even to Michelangelo.
He had a grasp of human emotion and of what was significant in human life. In concentrating on these essentials he created compelling pictures of people under stress, of people caught up in crises and soul-searching decisions. …
