y brought with them a new access to the Greek language and Greek culture. Economically and politically, the period was the product of the Italian city-states, chief among them being Florence. All were proud, independent entities with trading and banking systems that were the most sophisticated in Europe and that owed much to the lavish patronage offered by an increasingly secularized papacy.
This was the background in which new movements in art developed, allowing for greater expression and for the development of new forms, new materials, and new subjects for artistic expression. Michael Baxandall discusses the place of painting in this era, relating the works to the society that produced them, the economy that supported them, and the patrons who collected them. As he indicates, there was a close relationship between the social arrangements by which paintings were produced and distributed and the way these paintings looked. There were different relationships involved in the production of paintings, depending under what auspices the painter worked. One type of social relationship affecting the form of painting was contractual. Paintings were commissioned and so had to fit the requirements of the buyer, and elements of the form to be followed were embodied in contracts, showing what was wanted by the buyer of the time and showing why certain elements became part of the art of the time in order to satisfy those buyers. Baxandall notes the three elements that were included in the contract: 1) what the painter is to paint; 2) how and when the client is to pay; and 3) often a requirement that the painter use a good quality of colors, with preferences for gold and ultramarine expressed early in the century. By the end of the century, though, a shift occurred so that less and less emphasis was placed on gold and ultramarine. Gold was now usually cited for the frame, while arguments over different shades of blue are no longer given...