Heading 1

Heading 2

Heading 3

Medieval painting (roughly the 5th to 15th centuries in Europe) was primarily made to teach, inspire devotion, and make sacred stories visible to people who could not read. Much of it appears in illuminated manuscripts, church wall paintings, and panel altarpieces, where figures are often stylized rather than naturalistic: faces can look calm and symbolic, bodies may be elongated, and scale is frequently “hierarchical,” so the most holy person is painted larger than others. Gold backgrounds and bright pigments help create a sense of divine light and timeless space, while repeated visual conventions, like halos and specific colors for saints, made images easy to interpret. Over time, especially in the later Middle Ages, artists began adding more observation of nature, emotion, and depth, setting the stage for the increased realism of the Renaissance.

Medieval painting (roughly the 5th to 15th centuries in Europe) was primarily made to teach, inspire devotion, and make sacred stories visible to people who could not read.

Medieval painting (roughly the 5th to 15th centuries in Europe) was primarily made to teach, inspire devotion, and make sacred stories visible to people who could not read.