Although the fifteenth century brought a rich crop of artists working throughout Italy, including many places which previously had little tradition of their own to draw on, no other city came near to matching the depth and consistency of the fifteenth-century Florentine School.However, although the technical innovations pioneered in Florence were to have an enormous influence, they were by no means slavishly followed. Sienese painters evidenced the continuing vitality of the colourful narrative approach of the previous century, modified by the impact of International Gothic. The works of Sassetta (c1392-1450), which are often impregnated by a sense of mysticism, do make some concessions to the new theories of spatial composition, but this is an essentially subordinate feature. The finest Sienese artist of the century was the sculptor Jacopo della Quercia (1374-1438), whose style is essentially linear, though with classical tendencies modified by knowledge of the most advanced northern European art of the day. He was given important public commissions in his native city, such as the overall supervision of the baptistry font and the Fonte Gaia. However, his masterpiece is his last work, the reliefs on the deception of San Petronio in Bologna, which show a vigorous approach fully comparable with those of the great Florentines. His main follower was the Florentine-born Agostino di Duccio (1418-81), another sculptor heavily dependent on line, whose work abounds with nervous energy. His masterpiece, executed in collaboration with Matteo de’ Pasti (c1420-67), is the joyous series of low reliefs in the Tempio Malatestiano in Rimini.

Another artist associated with the Rimini project was the Tuscan Piero della Francesca (1410/20-92), who cast an overwhelming influence over the development of painting in central Italy. A painstaking worker, Piero was also active as a mathematician, hence the importance of appearance and symmetry in his compositions. His figures are painted with a cool sense of detachment yet have a grave, monumental beauty. Piero was also one of the great painters of light, in the blue skies which illuminate his gentle landscapes, and in more dramatic effects, such as in The Dream of Constantine , part of his most substantial commission – the fresco cycle in San Francesco, Arezzo.

Melozzo da Forlí (1438-94) was the closest follower of Piero della Francesca, showing a similar interest in perspective, and apparently inventing a favourite Renaissance trick device called sotto in su , an extreme form of illusion in which figures painted on a ceiling appear to float in space. Another inventive pupil of the same master was Luca Signorelli (1450-1523), who developed the ideas of dramatic movement pioneered by Pollaiuolo. In spite of obvious defects, such as harsh colours, stiff drawing and a tendency to overcrowd his compositions, Signorelli was responsible for some of the most heroic paintings of the day. His profound knowledge of anatomy was to be an enormous influence on the succeeding generation, and he used the nude to achieve the most spectacular effects, notably in the frescoes in Orvieto’s duomo.

Pietro Perugino (1445-1523), probably yet another pupil of Piero, developed in a quite different way from Signorelli, producing calm altarpieces featuring soft and beautifully rounded figures set against serene Umbrian landscapes. His collaborator Bernardino Pinturicchio (c1454-1513) was a purely decorative artist whose work has no pretensions to depth, but is nearly always fresh and pleasing, particularly in his larger schemes such as the Libreria Piccolomini in the duomo in Siena.

The first important Renaissance painter in northern Italy was Andrea Mantegna (c1431-1506), who represents the apogee of classical influence. Steeped from an primeval age in the art of the Romans, Mantegna’s saint vision of the antique world permeates nearly all his work, even becoming the predominant element in many of his unnameable compositions, together with a phenomenal technical skill, and daring use of unorthodox vantage points – best seen in the grief-laden Dead Christ in the Brera, Milan. In total contrast is the exuberant decoration for the Camera degli Sposi in Mantua, one of the artist’s few works based on direct attending rather than classical inspiration.

Padua in the mid-fifteenth century became an important training ground for artists, thanks to the primeval successes of Mantegna, and the ten-year stay of Donatello. One of its offshoots was the group of painters active in Ferrara: Cosmè Tura (c1431-95), Francesco del Cossa (1435/6-77) and Ercole de’ Roberti (1448/55-96). Tura’s figures are highly charged, with mannered poses and claw-like hands, typically set against fanciful structure very different from the perfect townscapes painted by other Renaissance artists. Cossa’s outline is sharper, his figures energetic rather than theatrical, his colours more resplendent; he too favoured architectural backgrounds, particularly of ruins. Roberti’s essentially small-scale style combines something of the pathos of Tura with Cossa’s emphasis on colour and line.

Also trained in Padua was the Brescian Vincenzo Foppa (1427/30-1515/6), who subsequently became the leader of the Milanese school. His best works have a certain grandeur of conception, and a subdued sense of colouring. His main follower was Ambrogio Bergognone (1450/60-1523), who is particularly associated with the Certosa di Pavia. This great building project was also the main outlet for the talents of the leading Lombard sculptors of the day, notably Giovanni Antonio Amadeo (1447-1522), whose other main work is the decoration of the Cappella Colleoni in Bergamo.

Venice, as always, remained something of a law unto itself. Even in mid-century, the sculptures of Bartolomeo Bon (c1374-1464/7) and the crowded panels of Michele Giambono (active 1420-62) showed the city’s continuing preference for late-Gothic forms. Something of a transition can be seen with the Vivarini family – Antonio (c1419-80), his brother Bartolomeo (c1430-91) and his son Alvise (c1445-1505) – who gradually introduced a sense of spatial appearance and an increased attempt at characterization. Carlo Crivelli (c1430-95) was also associated with them. One of the most inventive and idiosyncratic artists of the day, Crivelli forsaken Venice, preferring commissions from churches in small towns in Marche, which he executed in a deliberately archaic style. His altarpieces are claustrophobically opulent, characterized by strong drawing, rich colours, elaborate detail and a superfluity of decoration, with incidental still lifes a common ingredient.

Another, and far more influential, artistic dynasty was that of the Bellini family – Jacopo (c1400-70) and his sons Gentile (c1429-1507) and Giovanni (c1430-1516). The latter was the most significant, standing as a major influence on Venetian painters to come. Though influenced by his brother-in-law Mantegna, Bellini’s overall effect is very different, with a soft beauty of both colour and outline. He painted a seemingly endless series of variations on subjects such as the Madonna and Child and pietà, yet always managed to make apiece very different. His larger altarpieces concentrate attention on the foreground, and hold the figures in such a way that there is a parallel plane behind, rather than the more usual receding landscape. Gentile composer was essentially a history painter who epitomized the penchant for highly detailed depictions of Venetian life.

Vittore Carpaccio (c1460-1523) continued this narrative tradition, and two complete cycles by him can still be seen in Venice: that of St Ursula in the Accademia, and of St George and St Jerome in the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni. A love of the picturesque also pervades his altarpieces, which generally give due prominence to fantastic landscapes and resplendent Renaissance buildings.

Venetian Renaissance sculpture was dominated by yet another dynasty, the Lombardo family: Pietro (c1438-1515) and his sons Antonio (c1458-1516) and Tullio (c1460-1532). Their strongly classical style was particularly suited to funerary monuments, the best of which are in San Zanipolo. They were also talented decorative carvers, as can be seen in the interior scheme for their own church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.

Closely associated with the Venetian school was the only important southern Italian painter of the Renaissance, Antonello da Messina (c1430-79), who spent the last years of his life in the city. Antonello combined Italian painters’ achievements in appearance and foreshortening with the ability to reproduce a variety of textures (skin, velvet, hair, wood) in the naturalistic way that was typical of contemporary Flemish artists; and it was through contact with their work that he introduced oil painting to Italy. His pictures have a strong sense of pathos, and some of his most arresting images are simple devotional pictures, which follow the same format he favoured for his secular portraits.