Italian art

Since ancient times, the Italian peninsula has been home to diverse civilizations: the Greeks in the south, the Etruscans in the centre, and the Celts in the north. The numerous Rock Drawings in Valcamonica date back as far as 8,000 BC. Rich artistic remains survive from the Etruscan civilization, including thousands of tombs, as well as from the Greek colonies at Paestum, Agrigento, and other sites. With the rise of Ancient Rome, Italy became the cultural and political centre of a vast empire. Roman ruins across the country are extraordinarily rich, from the grand imperial monuments of Rome to the remarkably preserved everyday architecture of Pompeii and neighbouring sites.
Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Italy remained an important artistic centre throughout the Middle Ages. The country saw significant contributions to Carolingian art, Ottonian art, and Norman art, as well as the flourishing of Byzantine art in cities such as Ravenna.
Italy was the main centre of artistic innovation during the Italian Renaissance, beginning with the Proto-Renaissance of Giotto and culminating in the High Renaissance with artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Antonello da Messina. These artists influenced the development of Mannerism, the next phase of Renaissance art. Italy retained its artistic prominence into the 17th century during the Baroque period and into the 18th century with the emergence of Neoclassicism. Both movements originated in Rome and spread throughout Western art.
From the mid-19th century onward, Italy maintained a presence in the international art scene through movements such as the Macchiaioli, Futurism, Metaphysical art, Novecento Italiano, Spatialism, Arte Povera, and Transavantgarde.
Italian art has profoundly influenced many major artistic movements across the centuries and has produced numerous renowned painters, sculptors, and architects. Today, Italy continues to play a vital role in the global art scene, with major galleries, museums, and exhibitions. Key artistic centres include Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan, Turin, Genoa, Naples, Palermo, Syracuse and other cities. Italy is home to 61 World Heritage Sites, the highest number of any country in the world.

Etruscan art

Etruscan bronze figures and terracotta funerary reliefs exemplify a vigorous Central Italian artistic tradition that declined by the time Rome began expanding its dominance over the peninsula.
The Etruscan paintings that have survived into modern times are predominantly wall frescoes found in tombs, especially in the necropolises of Tarquinia. These works represent the most significant examples of pre-Roman figurative art in Italy known to scholars.
Etruscan frescoes were painted onto wet plaster—a technique known as fresco—which allowed the pigments to bond with the plaster as it dried, thereby enhancing their durability. In fact, nearly all surviving Etruscan and Roman paintings are in this medium. The colours were made by grinding stones and minerals into pigments and mixing them with a binding medium. Fine brushes, often made from ox hair, were used to apply the paint.
From the mid-4th century BC onward, Etruscan artists began employing chiaroscuro techniques to suggest depth and volume. While some frescoes depict scenes of daily life, mythological themes are more common. Notably, Etruscan frescoes generally lack accurate anatomical proportion, and figures often display exaggerated or stylized features.
One of the most famous examples of Etruscan painting is the Tomb of the Lioness in Tarquinia.

Roman art

The Etruscans were responsible for constructing some of Rome's earliest monumental buildings, and Roman temples and houses were initially modeled closely on Etruscan prototypes. Etruscan influence is evident in Roman temples, particularly in the use of a raised podium and the strong emphasis on the front façade over the remaining three sides. Similarly, large Etruscan houses were organized around a central hall, a layout later adopted in Roman domestic architecture as the atrium house.
Etruscan architectural influence gradually declined during the Roman Republic, as Rome increasingly absorbed elements from the broader Mediterranean world, especially Greek architecture. Since Etruscan architecture was itself influenced by the Greeks, the Roman adoption of Hellenistic styles was not an abrupt cultural shift. From the 3rd century BC onward, especially after the Roman conquest of Syracuse in 211 BC, a significant influx of Greek artworks and craftsmen entered Rome, exerting a decisive influence on Roman architectural development. By the time Vitruvius composed his architectural treatise De Architectura in the 1st century BC, Greek architectural theory and models had become dominant.
As the Roman Empire expanded, Roman architectural styles spread widely and were used for both public structures and, in wealthier cases, private residences. While local tastes influenced decorative details, the overall style remained distinctly Roman. In many regions, Roman and indigenous architectural elements coexisted within individual buildings, reflecting a syncretic vernacular tradition.
By the 1st century AD, Rome had become the largest and most advanced city in the world. The Romans developed innovative technologies to improve urban infrastructure, including sanitation, transportation, and construction. They engineered extensive aqueduct systems to supply the city with freshwater and constructed sewers to manage waste. While the wealthiest Romans resided in large, gardened villas, the majority of the population lived in multi-story apartment blocks made from stone, concrete, and brick.
Roman engineers discovered that mixing volcanic ash from Pozzuoli with lime and water produced an exceptionally durable form of cement. This allowed them to develop robust concrete structures, including large apartment buildings known as insulae.
Wealthy homes were often decorated with elaborate wall paintings depicting garden landscapes, mythological or historical narratives, and scenes of daily life. Floors were adorned with intricate mosaics composed of small, colored tiles arranged into decorative patterns or figural imagery. These artworks not only enhanced the brightness and apparent spaciousness of rooms but also served to display the owner's social status and cultural sophistication.
In the Christian period of the late Empire, wall painting, floor and ceiling mosaics, and funerary sculpture continued to flourish, while free-standing sculpture and panel painting declined—likely due to changing religious sensibilities. After Constantine the Great moved the imperial capital to Byzantium, Roman art absorbed Eastern influences, giving rise to the Byzantine style. Following the sack of Rome in the 5th century, many artisans relocated to the Eastern capital. Under Emperor Justinian I, Roman artistic traditions reached a final, monumental expression with the construction of the Hagia Sophia and the creation of the famed mosaics of Ravenna, which employed thousands of craftsmen.

Medieval art

Throughout the Middle Ages, Italian art primarily took the form of architectural decoration, especially frescoes and mosaics. Byzantine art in Italy was characterized by a highly formalized and refined aesthetic, marked by standardized iconography, stylized figures, and the lavish use of gold and vivid color.
Until the 13th century, Italian art remained largely regional in character, shaped by a combination of local traditions and influences from both Western Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean. Around 1250, however, artistic developments across different Italian regions began to exhibit shared characteristics, leading to a growing sense of unity and the emergence of distinctively original styles.

Italo-Byzantine art

Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire—later known as the Byzantine Empire—continued to thrive for nearly a thousand years, with its capital at Constantinople. Byzantine artisans were frequently employed on major artistic projects throughout Italy, and the influence of Byzantine aesthetics led to the development of the Italo-Byzantine style, which persisted in various forms into the 14th century.
The Italo-Byzantine style typically refers to religious paintings that imitate standard Byzantine iconography but were executed by Italian artists without formal training in Byzantine techniques. These works often feature subjects such as the Madonna and Child, rendered on gold ground panels. They introduced the format of small, portable framed paintings to Western Europe and played a central role in the devotional practices of the period.
This style dominated Italian painting until the late 13th century, when artists like Cimabue and Giotto began to forge a more naturalistic and emotionally expressive approach, particularly in Florence. Nevertheless, Italo-Byzantine painting continued to be produced in some regions and religious contexts well into the 15th century and beyond.

Duecento

Duecento is the Italian term referring to the 13th century, a formative period in Italian cultural and artistic history. During this time, Gothic architecture, which had originated in northern Europe, began to spread into Italy, particularly in the northern regions. However, Italian Gothic developed distinctive local variations, often more restrained and less vertically ambitious than its northern counterparts.
Two major religious orders—the Dominicans, founded by Saint Dominic, and the Franciscans, founded by Francis of Assisi—gained widespread popularity and financial support in this period. These mendicant orders undertook extensive church-building projects, often adopting simplified versions of Gothic architecture suited to their preaching missions and vows of poverty.
The use of large-scale fresco cycles became widespread during the Duecento, as frescoes were both cost-effective and useful for conveying religious narratives to largely illiterate congregations. A landmark example is the Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi, a complex structure comprising two superimposed churches built on a hillside and begun shortly after Francis's canonization in 1228. The basilica was adorned with frescoes by many of the leading painters of the period, including Cimabue, Giotto, Simone Martini, Pietro Lorenzetti, and possibly Pietro Cavallini.
These artistic developments laid the groundwork for the innovations of the Trecento and the later Italian Renaissance.