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  The Taking of Christ, 1602, Oil on Canvas Though he was apprenticed to Simone Peterzano, a Venetian of the later Mannerist period, Michelangelo 'Caravaggio' Marisi's career first took hold in the early 1590's under the patronage of Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte. It was in this manner Caravaggio was taken under the wing of the Roman Catholic Church, and amidst a transformational period in religious practice when the Church was still working to revitalize the piety of the individual and to influence the arts away from the unusual scale and color that was the Mannerist period.  This transitional period in Italian art--from the Mannerist to the Baroque--coincided with what is known as the Counter-Reformation of the Catholic Church, which took roots in a set of council meetings some 30-40 years prior in Trent, northern Italy, known as the Council of Trent. The objective of the Council was a return to the indisputable power of the Church, clarification of its doctrines...

  Jacopo da Pontormo's Madonna with Child and Saints, oil on painting, 1518     The piece I selected comes from the High Renaissance, or Late Renaissance, which began roughly around 1520 until about 1580. This peak period has been dubbed the Mannerist period. I immediately became interest in this particular style of Renaissance art due to the literal definition of mannerism: a habitual or characteristic manner, mode or way of doing something; a way of speaking or behaving; an idiosyncrasy . The fascination I find in people from all walks in life is they are uniquely themselves--they have their own idiosyncrasies, their own peculiarities that naturally bring to light their individuality and being. So when we learned about the outgrowth of Mannerist artists from the Italian Renaissance, I was taken by this particular group that studied and contributed to a pivotal movement in the visual arts, and also made it their own. While the humanist philosophy jump started this moveme...