Conflicts Between the Catholics and the Protestants During The Baroque Period

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The Baroque period began in the 17th century, right after the Reformation period. The definition for Baroque in Italian is another word for “barocco,” or an irregular shaped pearl, as jeweler would define it. There were many important artists throughout this period, but before the Baroque period began, it all started with Martin Luther and his movement.
Conflicts between the Catholics and the Protestants began when Martin Luther attached the 95 Theses in 1517. He protested when the Catholic Church corrupted and so the Protestant Reformation was created. Although, the Catholic Church started with Baroque when it launched “its own internal reformation to both clean up corruption and clearly define its doctrines and theology” (McKay). The church thought that the reformation was to help the people understand more about their faith and educate them, although, “The Council of Trent declared that art should be used to explain the profound dogmas of the faith to everyone, not just the educated” (McKay). What the Council of Trent said and thought that the work of art should inspire others by making them feel what was going on, not just make the viewer think about the work, and this became to be known as the Baroque period. They thought that by expressing everything through art, this corruption that was going on would get cleaned up or fix it itself. The Baroque art and sculptures had expressed many dramatic and emotions that was related to the bible. The sculptures and paintings in this period were balanced, referenced the ancient Greece and Rome, dramatic and emotional. The contrast and the colors were either dark to light or light to dark (chiaroscuro). There were many artists during the seventeenth century; many of them included famo...

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...Artemisia kept painting, following Caravaggio’s techniques painting “Judith and her Maidservant and with the Head of Holoferness,” “Minerva”, “Cleopatra,” “Self Portrait as the Allegory of Painting,” and many more. Although, Artemisia went through a lot she became a famous painter gaining many friends in high places, she also interpreted her relations to her paintings from her own struggle she went through “claiming her rightful place in an art world dominated by overpowering men” (Stokstad &Cothren 726).
During the 17th century many artists joined the Baroque art period, painting vivid and emotional paintings referring to the bible. Whether the artists such Artemisia had a horrible story behind her paintings or like Caravaggio who was a wonderful painter who started as a man with no money and ended up being a famous Baroque painter that many artists looked after.

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