The Cinquecento: the High Renaissance and papal Rome

The High Renaissance, or Cinquecento, spans roughly the years 1490/1500 to 1520, centered on Florence and, increasingly, Rome. It is characterized by a search for harmony, compositional balance, and classical idealization, in contrast to the greater attention to individual detail of the Quattrocento. Leonardo da Vinci painted "The Last Supper" (1495-1498) in the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan and "La Gioconda," the Mona Lisa (c. 1503-1519), using a perfected technique of soft, smoky tonal transitions known as sfumato.