Harvard professor Zerner focuses on one of the most dynamic and flamboyant periods in art history, the Renaissance in France. Renaissance Art in France explains how the school of Fontainebleau, in its exaggerated elegance and complex fantasies, combined French forms of medieval origin with the Italianate decorative style. It quickly came to represent a high point in the development of Mannerism and laid the groundwork for the invention of French Classicism. The volume showcases artists who excelled in the fine arts such as court portraitist François Clouet and sculptor Jean Goujon, as well as those working in decorative arts that also flourished during this period: tapestry, stained-glass windows, printmaking, and metalwork. With beautiful illustrations and an accessible text, it is all summed up here in one compact volume.

Henri Zerner, originally from France, is a professor of art history at Harvard University and former curator of the Fogg Art Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His books include Italian Art 1500-1600: Sources and Documents and The School of Fontainbleau.

In the 16th century, the concept of the Renaissance was as yet undefined in Italy, not to mention France. Zerner (history of art, Harvard; The School of Fontainebleau) details the complex crosscurrents between Italy and France during this dynamic period, in which Francis I imported the Italians Francesco Primaticcio and Rosso Fiorentino to decorate Fontainebleau, thus opening a dialog between two disparate cultures: modern French Gothic and Italian antique revival. The emergence of things uniquely French during this flamboyant period can be attributed to important artists and artisans such as Pierre Lescote and Jean Goujan, builders of the Louvre. Unlike in Italy, 17th-century Reformist iconoclasm and later the French Revolution destroyed many French archives and works of art, making this period difficult to interpret. Zerner now helps reconstruct the record by pulling together the disparate threads and by asserting that most French painting was artisanal, beautiful, but not of the same quality as high art in Italy or Flanders. This difficult, fully documented work contains 300 illustrations and was originally published in 1996 in French. It will best be deciphered by scholars and could serve as a textbook. Recommended for research, museum, and university libraries and larger public libraries where there is interest.-Ellen Bates, New York Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.