Guild of Saint Luke - Italy

Italy

In Renaissance Florence the Guild of St. Luke, per se, did not exist. Painters belonged to the guild of the Doctors and Apothecaries ("Arte dei Medici e Speziali") as they bought their pigments from the apothecaries, while sculptors were members of the Masters of Stone and Wood ("Maestri di Pietri e Legname). They were also frequently members in the confraternity of St. Luke (Compagnia di San Luca)—which had been founded as early as 1349—although it was a separate entity from the guild system. There were similar confraternal organizations in other parts of Italy, such as Rome. By the 16th century a guild had even been established in Candia in Crete, then a Venetian possession, by the very successful Greek artists of the Cretan School. In the sixteenth century, the Compagnia di San Luca began to meet at SS. Annunziata, and sculptors, who had previously been members of a confraternity dedicated to St. Paul (Compagnia di San Paolo), also joined. This form of the compagnia developed into the Florentine Accademia del Disegno in 1563, which was then formally incorporated into the city's guild system in 1572. The Florence example, in fact, eventually acted more like a traditional guild structure than the Accademia di San Luca in Rome. Founded by Federico Zuccari in 1593, Rome's Accademia reflects more clearly the "modern" notions of an artistic academy rather than perpetuating what has often been seen as the medieval nature of the guild system. Gradually other cities were to follow the example of Rome and the Carracci in Bologna, with leading painters founding an "Academy", not always initially in direct competition with the local Guilds, but tending to eclipse and supplant it in time. This shift in artistic representation is generally associated with the modern conception of the visual arts as a liberal rather than mechanical art, and occurred in cities across Europe. In Antwerp David Teniers the Younger was both a dean of the Guild and founded the Academy, while in Venice Pittoni and Tiepolo led a breakaway Accademia from the old Fraglia dei Pittori as the local guild was known. The new academies began to offer training in drawing and the early stages of painting to students, and artistic theory, including the hierarchy of genres, increased in importance.

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