Elizaveta Grigorieva
Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia
The Renaissance is one of the most important periods in the history of European art. Having originated in Italy, the Renaissance gradually spread through all the countries of the Old World, however, in each of them it obtained peculiar characteristics. Renaissance reached Spain in the beginning of the 15th century, however only at the beginning of the 16th century an important change occurred, as a result of which all the processes in art obtained new characteristics of great value.
The members of a highly respected Mendos family were the first to build palaces and castles, basing themselves on new features of the Italian Renaissance. For Spain they were like Medici for Italy but they were closely connected not with the leading centers of Renaissance Italy but with the northern areas, where the impact of France prevailed.
At the beginning the Renaissance architecture in Spain was a mixture of different styles and directions that dominated the country during its existence. Casa de las Conchas, the palace of Dukes Infantado in Gwadalhara, and Monsares el Real near Madrid — all these and some other constructions are typical examples of the early Renaissance in Spain. On the one hand, the traditions of Italian art can be found in them. However, these features are not just copied but borrowed and adopted to local traditions. That is why, on the other hand, in each of these constructions the impact of Plateresco style and of the reminiscence of bygone Mudehar style can be noticed as well.
Although this period of Spanish art is not covered enough in Russian historiography, it represents an important step of development of Renaissance in Spain. It became a transition period from Plateresco and Isabellino art, which dominated governmental orders, to the art of Italian Renaissance, which came to the country at the beginning of the 16th century.