Mannerism

Mannerism was a style of Italian painting, sculpture and architecture that flourished from roughly 1520, following the death of Raphael, through the end of the sixteenth century, characterized by a deliberate departure from the High Renaissance's balanced naturalism toward artificial elegance, elongated figures, exaggerated poses and compressed or ambiguous pictorial space. Named from the Italian maniera, meaning style or stylishness, the movement is exemplified by Parmigianino's Madonna with the Long Neck and Pontormo's emotionally charged Deposition, and in sculpture by the elongated, spiraling figures of Giambologna. Mannerism spread from Florence and Rome to courts across Europe, including Fontainebleau under Francis I, and its self-conscious virtuosity and tension were long undervalued next to the High Renaissance before twentieth-century scholars reassessed it on its own terms as a bridge to the Baroque.